Page 30 of Heartbreak Bay

I take in a deep breath. “You took care of that obituary, though. It won’t—”

“Show up online, or in the papers? No. But we should be aware that’s a tactic that’s out there. Stay alert.”

I feel sick at the thought. There’s so muchviciousnessto all this. And I understand the impulses behind it. It’s so easy at a distance to pass judgment, to feel satisfaction when someone else receives pain you think they deserve.

What this man—if it is just the one man—is doing is the bigger, more toxic version of that common, petty feeling.

“Anything else?” I ask him with a sigh. It’s been a hell of a day. I take a big gulp of wine.

“Thank God, no. That’s all I’ve got. We’re going to get through this, you know.” He takes my hand, and we sit quietly, connected. “You trust me, right?”

“I love you, Sam.”

“But do youtrustme?”

I turn to look at him, and find him staring straight at me. I feel the impulse to lie to him. To protect myself. And I fight that with all my heart. “Honestly? I’m trying as hard as I know how. Sam ...I hate this.I hate that all my instincts tell me to grab my kids and protect them from everything, everyone, evenyou. I know it isn’t right. I know that you’re the love of my life, the man I ought to trust above anyone else. But I have tolearnthat. It doesn’t come naturally.”

I’m afraid, when I say it, that he’s going to take offense ... and I realize that fear, too, is part of what I have to unlearn. Melvin got in me as deep as cancer, but if I have to claw him out by the bloody handfuls, I will.

It feels like a piece of that rot falls away when Sam says, steady as always, “It didn’t come naturally for me either. You’ll get there, Gwen. I trust you to find the way. And I’m not going anywhere.”

The gift of that makes tears burn in my eyes. I lift his hand and press my lips to it in silent gratitude.

“Now,” Sam says. “Somebody’s fucking with our lives. What are we going to do about that?”

I take a deep breath. “Go get him,” I say.

“Damn right.”

We clink glasses and drain the last of our wine.

10

KEZIA

I’m so damn tired that night when I get home, I fall asleep on the couch without doing any of the normal things I’d take care of before bed.

Like putting my phone on the charger.

I wake up at 5:00 a.m. and instinctively reach to check messages only to find the damn thing’s dead.Shit.I plug it in and go off to shower and make coffee; when I come back it’s got enough power for me to see that I had just one missed call.

Gwen. I call back while I take my first, life-saving sip of coffee, and I forget about the cup altogether as she tells me about her night. About the damn wanted posters, the gun range expulsion. That has to hurt, and it’s worrying. My coffee gets significantly cooler while she tells me about the new internet stalker she’s acquired, but I take a big gulp anyway before I say, “You think it’s the same guy?”

“Seems pretty likely,” she says. “Sam’s going to check on the Lost Angels site and find out who’s agitating against us right now. This guy ... seems pretty devoted, and pretty capable. I’m worried, to be honest.”

“About how the kids will handle it? Or about how you will?”

“Shit, Kez. You get right to the heart of things, don’t you?” She lets out a breath. “Both, I guess. You know what my impulse is, don’t you?”

“Grab what you love and run?”

“I can’t do that anymore. I can’t do it tothemanymore.”

“‘Stand your ground’ didn’t work so well out at Stillhouse Lake.”

“That was special circumstances,” she counters. “Unless the NPD finally decided to get serious about the Belldenes, it was the right decision to go.”

“We haven’t, and we probably won’t unless they do something real stupid,” I say. “So you’re likely right. You think the kids can handle that pressure?”

---