a novel by Catherine Bush
EXCERPT
ON WEDNESDAY NIGHT, Claire called Allison once more, but got only voice mail, which probably meant that Allison and Lennie were putting the girls to bed. At nine-seventeen, Allison phoned Claire. "Nothing," Claire said.
"Nothing here either," said Allison. "Look, I know she has a history – but she's been good since Star. For the first while we'd hear like every week or so and I know in the past year it hasn't been quite that often, every couple of weeks or every month, and she visits. I was aware we hadn't heard and I've been meaning to do something or say something but things get so crazy. I suppose I convinced myself she'd be in touch by Star's birthday, which is like three more weeks, but, yeah, I'm worried."
As Claire hung up the phone, the right side of her temple began to pulse. A point in the centre of her scalp. A second one at the base of the bone above and behind her right eye. Another point at the base of her skull, beneath the occipital bone, on the right. (Rachel said that there was a point on the sole of her foot that ached whenever she got a migraine.) Claire had no desire to get on a plane and fly to New York. She was thrown off-balance even having to consider it. She wracked her brain for the names of the one or two of Rachel's friends she'd met on previous visits - Sophia, was it Sophia, whom they'd bumped into on Avenue A? Or Eileen, with whom they'd shared a quick dinner in a café on the corner of First Avenue and St. Mark's Place? If she couldn't remember their surnames it was likely because Rachel hadn't mentioned them.
Stefan came home. He'd stayed late at the lab and gone straight to the gym. Wet-haired, he swept in the front door, trailing his slim shadow, drawing the scent of lilacs in with him.
They kissed, Stefan touching his fingers to the back of Claire's neck. She loved him, loved the life they shared. She did not want to be pulled away from this. She could, of course, sit tight for now, do nothing. There would be an explanation for whatever Rachel was up to. Stefan poured himself a drink, cracking ice cubes into his glass, and sat, Claire's feet wrapped around the rungs of his chair.
"What's the harm in having this guy look in on Rachel's apartment?"
"He might be a murderer. I have no idea who he is."
"And there's no one else you can think of to ask."
"Not offhand." One of Rachel's friends ran a tiny clothing boutique on Seventh Street, which, if she were in New York, Claire could have walked to without hesitation, but she could not remember the name of the woman or the shop. "Even if he goes in, I'm not sure he'll notice the right things. He could wreck things - clues." Through the screen of the open window, raised five centimetres, came the snuffling of the neighbours' bull dog along the foot of their shared fence. Here, too, the perfume of lilacs penetrated. Six and a quarter metres away, on the far side of the alley that ran between their narrow row of yards and those belonging to the houses on the next street, a security light blinked on. "We could go down together next weekend," Stefan said. "I can't this weekend. I said I'd go into the lab. I'm supposed to look over some results with Rob." He didn't want to go, Claire knew. He believed Rachel would turn up. In her own time. She was flighty. She was (she knew he thought this but wouldn't say it aloud) a woman who had abandoned her child. "Why not give her another week to see if she shows herself? Now she knows everyone's trying to get hold of her." This sounded reasonable. "I don't know," Claire said. She frowned. She rubbed the occipital point at the back of her neck. When she caught Stefan looking at her, she dropped her hand. "I may go down to New York this weekend."