Page 41 of The Hanging Dolls
Regina’s stomach folded. The election was in six weeks. What was she going to do?
TWENTY-THREE
“Do you get tired of it?” Aiden asked.
“Tired of what?”
“Chasing closure for other people?”
She swallowed. “Yes.”
“Then why do you do it? Why are you here?”
Zoe sighed. She was tired of him picking at her brain. “Am I that interesting?”
“Sorry?”
“Don’t you have psychopaths and people with split personality disorder who would be more fun to talk to?” She groaned, throwing her head back. Aiden bit his lip, fighting back a smile. “Oh, so now you think I’m funny?”
“Amusing is more accurate. But to answer your question, yes, you’re a one-woman show.”
“I’m here to entertain you?”
His eyes sparkled. “Not going to lie, Storm, but maybe a little bit.”
Her stomach growled. “In that case, I need some calories to keep the Zoe Storm show going. Pizza?”
“With pineapple?”
“That’s blasphemy.”
Zoe lay in bed wide awake, staring at the cracks in the ceiling. She was wearing earbuds and listening to Puccini’s “Nessun Dorma” from the operaTurandot. A rich voice tore through the gentle swell of the orchestra. As the piece progressed, the intensity grew, the singer’s voice rising with a powerful surge of emotion.
The rising crescendo loosened the strings that had her insides tied into a knot. She imagined the cracks in the ceiling mending on their own. But impatience ran through her. An itch, a tickle, a pebble in the shoe. She waited for the music to calm her, to ebb away the currents that pulled her under. But after another minute, the song was nothing but noise in her ears. She removed her earbuds with a huff and her ears ached in the sudden silence.
She sat up and looked around the empty motel room. It was so impersonal. Nothing but a collection of basic necessities used by a gazillion drifters before her. She would also move on, go to another place and crash for a few months, and no one would know she had been here. She was just passing by and she always would be unless she strengthened her roots to her past. But time was withering those away. All she had left of Rachel and their time together were memories that would fade with time.
And then what was she without them? Gina had a family. The only thing left of Zoe would be archived cases in the FBI.
She tried sleeping but the uneasiness was like fizz pumping through her veins. With an irritable groan, she got up, wrapped her fluffy robe around her and padded her way to Aiden’s room. Something told her that he wasn’t sleeping either.
When she knocked on the door, he opened it in a second.
“Storm.” His eyes swept over her robe and bunny-shaped shoes. “Interesting choice.”
She scowled and pushed past him. “I knew you slept in a suit.”
“Why don’t you come in?” he said sarcastically, shutting the door.
Zoe’s eyes slid over his room—an organized stack of files and psychology books sitting on the table, the bed made with such precision that she knew he hadn’t gotten in yet. “Can’t sleep?”
“I don’t sleep.” Aiden shook his head, hands in his pockets.
“What?”
“I have insomnia,” he admitted bashfully.
“Then why did you buy a new mattress?”
