The Girl in the Mist (Misted Pines 1)

I knew, obviously, it’d be all kinds of bratty to demand he pause his hunt for a kid killer to come over and fuck me senseless (if that was in his sexual repertoire).

But that didn’t mean I wasn’t tempted to do it.

I stared at the blank Word document, willing myself to bring up the outline I’d written months ago so I could get the juices flowing, hearing David working in the kitchen—he was scraping off the backsplash (the cabinets would remain, but we’d ordered new countertops, new tile was going up, a new sink would be there in a week, the new faucet was in the garage, and new appliances would be placed as and when in the project).

We both felt this was a good way to go considering the next big projects, the bathrooms, were going to be complete overhauls and that would take time.

Needless to say, David was breathing easy (at least in one part of his life). His wife was due in five months. We both figured he’d finish his last project for me (all-over-the-house floor refurbishing, or perhaps the boathouse) a couple of months after that.

And David was delightful. I was not only glad I was getting this house as I wanted it, I was glad I was giving him some peace of mind.

On this thought, my phone rang.

I looked to it, hoping for one name, dreading the idea that it might be two others (I had eventually touched base with Warren and Angelo just to let them know I was okay, but was now avoiding them because this event had disastrously triggered some base protective instinct in both and they were driving me batty), and getting the name I expected.

Camille.

She’d called every day since Welsh was caught.

I knew her ploy.

Before he was caught, she’d mostly left me alone, a subtle communication that all was well, I was safe and alive and should live my life with normal sporadic, but relatively frequent, communication with my grown daughter.

Now that the situation was resolved, the threat behind bars, but the women entering a new period of hell—that being the journey they’d be taking to find themselves, whoever that self ended up being after he’d shifted their life’s trajectory so drastically—Camille knew I’d obsess about that and was all over me like a rash.

I should have worn sunglasses a lot more with her too, that’s all I’m saying.

“Hello, lovely,” I greeted.

“Hey, what’s happening?” she replied.

“It’s raining. And…surprise! There’s fog on the lake. Last, my kitchen tile is being chipped away.”

“Okay, this is good, right here, an immediate segue because I’ve been wanting to talk to you about that.”

“About my kitchen tile?”

“About the fact that Fenn and Joan and I all think it’s weird you didn’t do what Alicia and Russ did. Get out of town, rent someplace safe and far away, so after this was done, you could come home. Instead, you dug through all that stuff you kept in storage from the Montana house, stuff you should have sold, so we kinda already knew, and bought and furnished an all-new house.” Pause, then loaded and heavy she went on, “Mom, we all feel you should understand that you have a real estate addiction.”

I burst out laughing.

“I’m not being funny,” she said through my laughter, my serious, caring, I’ll-find-a-problem-to-fix-even-if-there-isn’t-one girl. “How many properties do you own?”

“Honey, I’m rich,” I reminded her. “And I don’t remember you complaining the five times you hung out in Paris for the whole summer. Or that winter you used the Cornwall cottage to write your dissertation.”

“Well, the Paris place doesn’t count. That’s like a family retreat. And, I mean, the Cornwall place is the same, obviously.”

Of course both didn’t count.

I was still laughing, just not as loudly, when I reminded her, “Outside the house in the Hollywood Hills, that’s all the property I own.”

“Except some random place about five miles south of the Canadian border.”

“It’s beautiful here.”

“I know, you sent pictures. It’s still totally rando.”

“Camille, I’ve met somebody.”

Utter silence.

“It’s very young, but he’s very…him.”

That got her talking.

“What’s him mean?”

“He’s intelligent and he’s a loving and involved father, and he’s not conventionally handsome, but he’s exceptionally attractive.”

She broke in.

“Please tell me he’s tall. I know. I know. It’s stupid. I can’t even mention it to Joan. It ticks her off. But it’s an aesthetics thing. And we can just say I’m super glad she’s model-tall-taller than me.” Another pause, then, “And obviously, I’m super glad she’s model-model gorgeous. But don’t tell Joan I said that either. She threatened to burn herself with acid once to break me from my societal brainwashing of beauty norms. She wouldn’t do it but…yikes.”

I was again laughing when I told her, “He’s tall.”

“What’s his name?”

“I’m not telling you.”

“Why not?”

“You’ll Google him.”

“I won’t Google him.”

“I know you’re lying.”

“Okay, I won’t deep-dive Google him,” she allowed. “I’ll make you a deal, I get to check his Facebook page, Twitter and Insta feeds and, say, click on the top five search backs that pertain to him, if he has them.”