Page 7 of Escape Girl

There was no signature. Just a navy button with red font that read:Welcome to the Irvings’.

It looked exactly like the doormat that greeted visitors to the stately home of Dimitri and Selma Irving. I remembered staring at it, a year ago almost to this very moment, while I waited for them to open the door and welcome my father and me to their dinner party.

I hadn’t wanted to go. Who threw a dinner party on a Monday night anyway? And the Irvings were not close friends. Dimitri, a big hedge fund guy, always made a fuss about me when my father was in the room. When he wasn’t, Dimitri looked right through me. I liked Selma more. She was a touch ridiculous as a human being, but at least she was kind along withsilly. She spoke more slowly than any other person I’d ever met. It wasn’t because she couldn’t speak faster. It was an affectation she chose, to space out her words so that every sentence took hours to complete.

I actually really enjoyed watching her speak to other people. The longer her conversation partner refrained from cutting her off or checking their phone, the more I respected them. In most of those half-speed conversations, Selma spoke about three things and three things only: elaborate dinner parties, eternal renovation and decoration based on constant HGTV viewing, and her two beagles: Chip and Joanna.

“Are you sure we can’t cut and run?” I’d said to my father out of the side of my mouth while we stood on their porch. I could hear Selma’s heels clattering, bearing down upon the front door. “We could go to a diner. I’ll ignore your cholesterol and let you have an enormous cheeseburger.”

His lips twitched. “Couldn’t you have brought up that bribe a little sooner?” He put an arm over my shoulder and squeezed me to him. “We’ve already rung the doorbell.”

Next time, I’d bring up greasy red meat as soon as we got into the car. I fixed a polite smile on my face just as Selma threw open the door and exclaimed, “Sven! Emily! Come in, come in! I can’t wait for you to see the place. I’ve redecorated!”

With an inward groan, I followed them inside. My father liked to pretend that he hated these things as much as I did, but it was just an act. My mother had managed their social calendar for the entirety of their marriage. For the first couple of years after she was gone, he’d existed as a workaholic by day, hermit by night. Despite his grumbles, evenings like this made him a happier person. These parties almost always invited couples though, so during this long, between-jobs visit of mine, he’d enjoyed coercing me into being his plus-one.

Now, in my sad little New York studio, my mind stuttered to a halt.No.I was not going to think back to that evening. What was Bobby doing? Why was he trying to make me remember the night we met?

We were over.

I stood up, grabbed my glass of wine, then swung back to the kitchen for the entire bottle—I was allowed to drink a damn bottle of wine on the day I finally decided to file for divorce!—and crawled into bed.

*

The thing aboutinsomnia is that it doesn’t care how much wine you drink.

I woke up at 3:12 a.m. with a pounding head and dry mouth. Cursing my own idiocy, I stomped to the kitchen sink and drank straight from the tap for a full minute before filling a glass and throwing back a few Advil. Then, a few slices of reheated pizza.

Three a.m. had been my mortal enemy for the last five years. It was a rare night when I didn’t open my eyes to see the number 3 on the clock. Sometimes I could roll over and eventually fall back asleep. But on others, like this one, I was awake for ages.

The worst thing about my recent 3:00 a.m. episodes was that, in the months I was with Bobby, I didn’t mind them at all. When we were married, I’d wake him up too. Sometimes to talk, sometimes…not. Every single time I shook him awake, he’d look at me with sleepy delight.

I suddenly found myself at the computer, staring at theWelcome to the Irvings’button. Tomorrow (real tomorrow), I would blame the mixture of the wine and the meeting with the divorce attorney, all capped off by 3:00 a.m. loneliness. I’d be able to justify this and forgive myself.

I clicked the button.

On the screen appeared a very detailed rendering of the outside of the Victorian-style townhouse. It zoomed in on the navy doormat and then the door swung open, revealing the foyer with super-shiny, overly polished dark floors, and too-small rugs.

I’d forgotten that! The floors were so slippery that night that all the women were skidding off balance in their heels. I shook my head, incredulous. Bobby had an incredible eye for detail, and his memory was a bank vault.

On screen, we moved from the foyer down the short hallway and into a formal living area, where we’d had cocktails before being seated for dinner. At the Irving dinner parties, Selma always started her guests with a “signature cocktail,” something my father complained about because he only ever wanted Scotch.

Of course, Bobby had re-created this too. A tray of burnt-orange negronis was sitting on the elegant bar in the corner of the room. The view on the screen rotated, so that an enormous painting of a nude woman’s backside took focus in front of the screen. My throat began to burn from the effort of suppressing everything.

Fine. You win, Bobby. I’ll remember.

Chapter Three

One Year Ago

The painting wasso ludicrous that I chewed the inside of my top lip—hard enough that the next sip of gin was going to sting. But if I didn’t control my mouth, it was going to shape itself into a judgy, bitchy smirk at our poor hostess’s expense.

The painting was of a woman’s back, butt, and legs as she lounged on a blue velvet settee. It didn’t reveal any part of the subject’s face. But it was clearly supposed to be Selma. Selma was a big fan of strapless gowns and asymmetrical shirts. The triangle of small moles on her left shoulder blade was as familiar to me as the shade of dark pink lipstick always highlighting her formidable lips. The woman in the painting sported an identical isosceles mole triangle, as well as a spill of hair in a variety of blonde shades ranging from honey to platinum. I’d once heard Selma boast that it took three colorists four hours every six weeks to keep her signature blend of hair colors perfect.

I cocked my head as my eyes traveled to the problematic part of the woman in the painting. She may have had Selma’s geometric moles and she may have had Selma’s intricate hair. The ass, however…

“Do you think this painting is a prophecy?” A question spoken so low that only I could hear.

I snapped my gaze away from the painting’s exquisite ass and looked up in surprise at the man suddenly next to me. “Huh?” I didn’t recognize him, but that wasn’t surprising as I’d only been back in the Bay Area for a couple of weeks.

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