Chapter 8
Work was stressful and Gracie was cranky, probably because of the new tooth that Ava could see trying to poke through her gums. Chay was meant to be at her place at six, and Ava still was in her work clothes and now had dried baby food on the front of her sweater.
It took all of her willpower not to join Gracie and start crying. Fern was making nice progress, but Ava had other patients, and her Friday group was starting to be the toughest.
It didn’t help that it was winter. One of her patients, Alice, struggled with anxiety and depression and long walks were really the only thing that helped her, but the weather lately had been so inclement she hadn’t been able to get out, so she’d been walking almost six hours a day on her treadmill, which wasn’t working.
Her nails were bitten to the quick and she hadn’t been able to sit still the entire session until Ava had decided they would go and walk around the park she’d taken Gracie to the other day.
That had worked, but Ava was worried about Alice, even as she knew she had to give her the space to figure out how to help herself. She hadn’t thought of making laps around the park, which of course felt obvious to Ava, but she wasn’t struggling the way Alice was.
There were days like today when she wondered if she was making any difference. She’d volunteered maybe too quickly to take on Gracie to foster. She had no experience with babies, just had somehow figured she could do it.
God, she was wrong.
It wasn’t easy. Those pictures she’d had in her head of rocking a sleeping baby or playing with her as she learned to roll over and start crawling felt like they were mocking her.
The doorbell rang, interrupting her negative thought spiral. She glanced at the clock and then down at herself. There was no time to change. That had to be Chay.
Gracie seemed to cry louder as Ava scooped her out of the high chair and walked to the door.
Opening it to see Chay standing there with a large cooler near his feet.
“Oh no.”
“Exactly. I’m sorry I’m not ready for our date.”
“No problem,” he said, catching Gracie as she threw herself toward him. He turned his head down to the baby, kissing the top of her head. “What’s the matter, little one?”
“I think she’s teething,” Ava answered, picking up his cooler as he walked into her house.
She followed him into the kitchen, slightly reassured to see that Gracie was still crying, even for the baby whisperer.
“What are you supposed to do?”
“I’ve put some topical numbing stuff on her gums, but it’s not working. My mom can’t remember what worked for me and Ryan. Do you think your grandmother has any ideas? If not I’m going to call the pediatrician.”
Chay handed Gracie back to Ava, and the little girl burrowed her head into Ava’s neck, holding tightly onto Ava’s hair with one of her little hands. “Let me ask.”
Ava made a few circuits around the living room as Chay called his grandmother.
She heard him talking but couldn’t really hear what was being said over Gracie’s crying.
But it seemed she was wearing herself out.
As Ava turned to make her fourth trip around the room, Gracie let out a big sigh and quieted down.
She glanced at Chay. His eyes were wide and he cupped his hand over his mouth to whisper to his grandmother. Neither of them wanting to do anything that might startle her awake again.
Ava made another loop around the room as Chay came over to her. “Want to try laying her down?” he whispered.
Ava nodded. “Pray she doesn’t wake up.”
Walking at the same rocking pace she’d used in the living room, she took Gracie to her crib, and Chay helped her get the baby settled. She made a little moan and then shoved her fist in her mouth, sucking on it as she continued to sleep.
They both backed out of the room as quietly as possible. Neither speaking until they were in the kitchen.
“I can heat dinner up on the stovetop, which should be quiet. I have some fresh bread and a cake that my grandmother made,” Chay said.
“Sounds lovely. Would you mind if I went and got a little more date-ready?” she asked him. She didn’t want to admit it, but she needed a cry to relieve the stress of the afternoon and evening.
“You look lovely, but go on. I’ll get her if she wakes,” Chay said.
“Thanks. Did your grandmother have any advice?”
“To let her cry it out,” he said wryly. “Guess Gracie already had that idea.”
She smiled at him and then closed her eyes. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Just being you,” she said, realizing how true those words were. He’d been calm, hadn’t minded she wasn’t ready for their date or focused on him. Probably why she’d agreed to the date. There was something about Chay that she just plain liked.
“Can’t be anyone else,” he admitted. “Go on.”
She left him in the kitchen. She wanted a shower and needed it to mask the sounds of her own crying, so she hopped in, but as she washed herself she realized that having Chay at her side was more helpful than those tears normally were.
Just by showing her that he’d been unsure as well made her feel better.
How the heck did first-time parents cope?
It was harder than she’d imagined having a baby.
Poor Annie Ross, who’d been alone—how had she handled it?
Was that why she’d been out in the wilderness?
Ava would give anything to have a chat with Gracie’s mom.
Anything to have her still alive so that maybe she could help Annie and little Gracie.
So that their family would still be together.
Chay didn’t go on a lot of dates, so he didn’t have a standard to judge this one by, but if he had to rate it he’d say it was one of his best. To keep the noise down in the house, Ava had mentioned she had a fire pit, and they’d gone out to her patio to eat the stew in front of the fire, bundled under blankets.
She was pressed next to his side, which was doing all kinds of things for his libido, making him very aware of the shape and feel of her. But he didn’t need her close to be in this state where she was concerned. There was something about Ava that just got to him.
“When I was growing up, my dad used to do this on the weekends.”
“Make a fire?”
“Yeah, he said it was devices down and time to get our butts outside. I have to say your stew would give his chili a run for the money,” Ava said.
“Nice to know. What devices? Did you have a cell phone?”
“Yeah, but that was just for texting…remember the old days when you had to use a numeric keypad to text?”
He laughed. “You really had to work to send a text.”
“Yeah. Looking back I’m not sure it was worth it to ask Sydney or Frankie if they wanted to twin on Friday.”
“Twin?”
“Yeah, that was big in middle school. We’d match outfits for the day and do our hair the same. Like high pony, braids or straight with the straightener, with the Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen products we’d all begged our moms to get for us from Walmart.”
“Wow, that sounds like something. Are there pictures?”
“Unfortunately, but luckily they are all at my parents’ house, probably in a box somewhere. What about you?”
He shrugged. “Not really. I didn’t get a phone until I left for Salt Lake.”
“To be fair, I never really needed one,” Ava admitted. “Did you have a Nintendo DS?”
“Nope. None of that. I had my grandmother, books and a big chip on my shoulder and a grudge to nurse.”
She tucked her leg underneath her body as she turned toward him. “Want to talk about that?”
Never had she sounded more like a therapist than that moment.
“I’m not your patient.”
“I wasn’t thinking you were. It’s just you brought it up, so it makes me think you might want to talk…or you could be like me and just want to share stuff without diving too deeply into it.”
“What don’t you want to talk about?” he asked, turning the conversation back to her, because no, he didn’t want to discuss the sullen teenager he’d been.
“The fact that most of the time I needed to be the same as my friends to feel like I fit in,” she admitted. “Ridiculous, right? I mean, I’m a Colton, so I already have that and everyone knew who I was. But I’m not like everyone else. What about you?”
“Same. Not like anyone else, but really hearing you now, I realize we were probably just like everyone else. There is something about being a teenager that makes you feel so isolated. Like you’re the only one who’s not fitting in.”
She put her hand on the back of his neck; her fingers were cold, but then she leaned up and kissed him. Just the side of his cheek. “You’re smart.”
“Maybe. Not as smart as I’d like to be,” he admitted. Realizing he was minutes away from taking the kiss he really wanted but she’d tucked her arm back under her blanket. “I’m still not sure there’s a real connection between the women who’ve been taken all over the state.”
Safe topic. Sort of.
“What is the link?” she asked.
“It’s loose. They were all in foster care. But not the same family services or any other connection.”
“Except that they have no family, right? I mean, that’s a connection,” Ava said.
“Yeah. But it tenuous. Why would someone target women like that?” he asked her.
She tilted her head to the side. “I’m not sure. But they’d be able to do whatever they wanted without anyone causing an uproar over their disappearances. I mean, in most cases it was only after they didn’t show up to work for a few days which is how Fern was listed as missing.”
Chay took another bite of his stew. “And then she went into the system. People do leave and move on. The fire and the circumstances that Fern outlined are the only reason I’m pursuing this line of investigation. That and Annie Ross.”
Ava put her bowl on the ground. “I’m curious about her as well. What was she doing all the way out here?”
“Something we might never know. The only thing, and it’s a weak link that connects her to Fern, is that Annie had filed a missing-persons report on a friend of hers. And both Annie and her friend had aged out of the foster care system, like Fern.”