LAINIE
Lainie lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling but not seeing it. She had thought she would cry herself to sleep, exhausted by pain and anger. Instead, ever since she’d slammed the window in Harrison’s face, she hadn’t cried at all. She was angry, and confused—and implacably, horribly awake.
Why had she come here in the first place? Hope. Stupid, foolish hope. She had told herself that she had to oversee the property valuation herself, after seeing enough clients swindled by unscrupulous contractors. But she could have hired someone to do that. Even seconded one of her colleagues from the realtor’s office to deal with the whole bloody project.
She could have let someone else sort the whole thing out, and never even set foot in Hideaway Cove again.
So why didn’t I? Why did I set myself up for all this misery?
Because of hope. The same thing that always tripped her up.
Hope that a stupid family story would turn out to be true, and solve all her problems. Hope that coming back to Hideaway might, in some way, help her untangle the ugly mass of knots inside her.
Lainie groaned and closed her eyes. Instead, you’ve just made everything worse.
Another knot formed inside her as she remembered yelling the same words at Harrison. Poor guy. He’d only wanted a night of fun, and here she was, dragging him into the house of horrors that was her life.
That was her fault. She’d seen the chance for a fun distraction from the work that brought her here, and grabbed it with both hands. She hadn’t thought about the consequences. Her fault.
Just like it’s all your fault, she thought, suddenly feeling very tired. Dad leaving. Never seeing Gran and Grampa again. You should have learned eight years ago that trying to fix things only makes them worse…
She buried her face in the pillow, as though that would help her hide from the memory of her eighteen-year-old self, so hopeful and wanting to help.
Well, that all sure backfired, didn’t it? If you’d just been a bitch back then instead of trying to fix things, you wouldn’t be in this mess.
Seventy-five thousand dollars. That sort of money should have made all her problems go away. Unfortunately, that hopeful, helpful eighteen-year-old Lainie had gotten herself into far more than seventy-five thousand problems.
A sudden clatter made her sit bolt upright. For one insane second, she thought Harrison had come back, and was rattling at her door. Then the noise came again, and this time she placed it. Heavy rain was falling in bursts against the picture window. As the wind picked up, so did the sound of the rain gusting against the walls.
Lainie shivered. When did it get so dark? she thought, wrapping her arms around herself. She checked the cutesy maritime-styled clock on the wall: it wasn’t even late afternoon yet, but it looked like early evening. She walked over and looked out the window. The sky was a forbidding dark gray, and the cove, which had been so calm before, was a boiling mass of whitecap waves.
This must be one of those storms Harrison talked about. Guiltily, Lainie looked down to the path in front of the B&B, where Harrison had been standing earlier. He was long gone, of course.
Shit. So much for my plans to drive home today. Even if she left now, it would be well after midnight by the time she made it back, and that was assuming she didn’t run into trouble with the bad weather.
Another squall of rain battered the window and Lainie winced, letting the curtain fall back over it.
At least the rain had achieved something. The miserable exhaustion that had plagued her since she came back from that godawful interrogation had lifted. She felt energized.
She had to do something. Lying around in a fog of unhappiness wasn’t going to help her.
She shivered as she remembered Mrs. Sweets’ look of disgust. It was the same expression the old woman used to have on her face when she handed eleven-year-old Lainie her ice cream.
I could actually do some work, she thought, imagining the stacks of projects waiting for her at her desk in the city. Or…
Maybe I should call Mom.
Her automatic reaction to the thought was reluctance. She’d tried talking to her Mom about this before, with no success. When it came to Hideaway Cove and her divorce, Lainie’s mother was a closed book.
But this is different. I’m actually here, now. And after I tell her what happened this afternoon, surely she will have to explain something. The whole situation is just… crazy.
If nothing else, if I burst into tears over the phone, maybe that will convince her.
Lainie grabbed her purse, hurrying to make the call before she changed her mind. Her phone wasn’t in its usual pocket. She checked again, and then rummaged through the rest of the bag. Nothing.
Frowning, she checked her laptop bag, and then her suitcase. No phone.
This is getting stupid. Where is it?