Page 6 of A Midlife Vanishing Trick

She blinked at him.

“Stop bothering my customers, Jeff,” Penny said sternly.

The man merely rolled his eyes. He rose to his feet and wandered off, presumably in search of some other lonely woman in the Blue Cicada.

“Sorry about that,” Penny said once he was out of earshot. She flashed Allison a smile. “I hope he didn’t make you too uncomfortable.”

Allison shrugged. “Saved by the barmaid, I suppose.”

The woman’s smile broadened. “I’ve been working here for the past couple of years, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in here before or around town, for that matter. What brings you to the Blue Cicada?”

“My best friend, who I am going to have a word with once I get home,” Allison said. “Speaking of which ...”

She rose to her feet, giving Penny a small smile. “I should get going. It’s getting late.”

Penny regarded her for a moment with knit eyebrows, then left to attend to other customers. She left the Blue Cicada, got into the old pickup truck in the corner of the parking lot, and drove home, making a mental note to give Celine an earful about steering her into bars with annoying men.

Other than a few lit-up buildings, neon signs, and streetlamps, the streets of Torpe were dark. There were few pedestrians on the sidewalks—by now, most people were already in their homes. Not much happened in this town. Not anymore.

Through the windshield, she could just make out the dark outline of Murton Ridge, looming over the entire town. The mountain stretched farther than the eye could see and was home to three different towns. Allison often imagined that Murton Ridge cut off the towns from the rest of the world. For example, Torpe was an old, boring town. No wonder Celine had left for the city.

Was that why Stanley had disappeared, too?

The thought struck her without warning, and as she tried to dislodge it from her mind, her grip tightened on the steering wheel.

Life in Torpe might give someone a plausible reason to want to escape, but it certainly was not bad enough to cause someone to vanish without a trace and abandon your wife and the life you’d built with her. It made zero sense. Stanley had never complained about living in Torpe. Like Allison, he’d always preferred small-town life to life in the city.

She drove past a flickering traffic light, shaking her head. It was almost as if this town had begun to deteriorateafterStanley’s disappearance. When he’d been around, the place had been livelier, with flourishing businesses and a growing population. Now, it was slowly becoming a mass graveyard of potential.

Still, it was her home.

Allison didn’t see herself leaving anytime soon.

She steered the truck around the nearest corner, and was speeding down the long, dark road when her headlights landed on a figure standing in the middle of the road. Allison’s heart flew into her throat, and she turned the wheel sharply, swerving to avoid colliding with the man. She slammed on the brakes and brought the truck to a screeching halt.

“What in the world ...?” she breathed.

For the next few seconds, she remained in the driver’s seat, panting. Then she climbed out of the truck, frowning at the man she’d just narrowly avoided flattening. He was standing in front of her truck and was illuminated by the headlamps.

“Why were you just standing in the middle of the road like that? I could’ve hit ...” her eyes slowly widened “...you.”

Taking in the sight of the man, she gasped involuntarily. He was slightly older than she was and wore nothing but dark trousers and boots, his chest completely exposed. She let hergaze travel over his barrel of a chest, to the veins traveling along his bulging arms. A few scars marked his body, crisscrossing his forearms and abs. The man’s beard was dark and thick, with flecks of grey in it.

“Oh, my God,” she gasped, a hand slowly rising to her chest.

But those details were all secondary to Allison. The body could have belonged to literally anyone. But there was no mistaking the blue eyes gazing back at her from beneath a tangle of dirty-blond hair.

Suddenly, she felt lightheaded. “This can’t be real,” she murmured. “This can’t be—”

That was all she managed to say before her vision began to fade. She fell, and two strong arms shot out to catch her before she hit the ground.

Chapter Two

“I Got Lost”

The odds of nearly getting run over by your long-lost wife of four years were low but never zero.

His breath frozen in his throat, Stanley gazed at the woman lying unconscious in his arms and struggled to form a thought. The woman’s hair, dark except for a streak of grey, fell past her face, swaying beneath her head like a curtain as he held her. Her slender body was still, except for the gentle rise and fall of her chest. The woman’s eyes were closed, but a moment ago, he’d seen them, brown and wide and filled with incredulity. He let his gaze drop to her slightly parted lips, traveling lower to a gold chain gleaming on her neck. Attached to it was a small pendant. A locket.

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