Chapter 18
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
To Do:
- Triple check inventory spreadsheet
- Send thank you donuts to fire dept
“Claire. Wake up.” Luke’s voice cut like a knife.
Her eyes flew open. She was tilted at a curious angle, surrounded by darkness. Wind tugged at her hair. Inexplicably, a steering wheel was clenched in her hands.
“Oh, shit.”
Not again. She had just gotten the sleepwalking under control. Now, from the looks of things, she had driven Luke’s new golf cart into a ditch.
He removed her hands and slid her across the seat. A slant of moonlight hit him as he climbed behind the wheel. His eyes were bloodshot, brows creased. She bit her lip. This wasn’t going to be a fun conversation.
“How did you find me?” she asked.
“I followed the trail of canned ravioli and kitchen knives you left behind.” The barely suppressed anger wafted off him like toxic fumes.
“Oh.” She fell silent. Something hard was in her bra. She fished it out as Luke reversed out of the ditch and drove them back toward the house.
A Taser and a burrito emerged. She unwrapped the burrito and took a bite. Still good. She offered it to Luke. Maybe a bra burrito would soothe his frazzled nerves. He took the burrito and whipped it into the forest.
“Hey!” She turned around.
“You need to try the medication.” His knuckles were white on the steering wheel.
She straightened and faced him. They had had this argument more than once. “I’m not taking Klonopin,” she hissed. “I’m going the all-natural route. Soothing sleep routine, meditation, and exercise.”
“Oh yeah? And how’s that going for you?” Luke reached behind him and dropped a black JanSport onto the seat. Cans and knives were visible through a gap in the zipper. “I’m tired of you ignoring your problems. You’re going to hurt yourself. Or someone else.”
“I didn’t ask for this.” She waved a hand at the trees crawling by. “Do you think I want to sleepwalk? To feel so out of control all the time? To have a national network of serial killers burning down my office and blowing up my car? Do you think I want to feel scared all the time?”
“Klonopin would help with your anxiety and your sleepwalking. You’re being selfish.”
Claire’s mouth dropped open. It would have hurt less if he had dropkicked her out of the golf cart. “Don’t you dare accuse me of being selfish. I spend my entire life slaving over details, trying to create beauty for other people. I’m not going to jeopardize my entire career by becoming a drug-addled zombie.”
He sighed and wiped a hand over his face. “I don’t get it.”
“Get what?”
“You would do anything— anything —for someone else. But you won’t take care of yourself. You can’t plan proposals if you’re dead, Claire.”
“I’ll be sure to mention that to the next person who tries to kill me.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. Her lip ached where she had bitten it. They rode back to the house in silence. Luke parked the golf cart in the garage and pulled out the key. They both sat, unmoving. Was he about to pick another fight? Her heart couldn’t take it.
“I’m sorry for calling you selfish.”
Claire unclenched her hands. The comment still stung, but she was tired to the bone. She didn’t have it in her to argue. “I’m sorry for stealing the golf cart. For the record, I know this is bad. Maybe the exercise approach isn’t sustainable. I’ll think about the meds, okay? I just want to do some research before I commit.”
His hand rested on her knee. “You’re just saying that to placate me, aren’t you?”
“No,” she said defensively. She would make this decision the way she always (well, usually) made decisions—thoughtfully, and with a binder full of research and a comprehensive pros and cons list. And that could take weeks. Certainly not until after Brad’s proposal.
“Come on. Bed.” He grabbed her hand and lifted her, draping her over one shoulder. “I’m getting the handcuffs.”
“Do what you must.”
Hours later, after a medium-okay night of sleep, Claire stood in the kitchen.
“No, Mom, there’s no need to come up here.” She all but groaned into the phone as she poured another cup of coffee. Opening the refrigerator, she frowned at a container of deli meat and tossed it into the trashcan.
“But, Clairebear, someone burned down your office space.” Alice’s voice was more pinched than usual.
“Yes, but you coming up here would only put you in the path of whatever dangerous idiots are trying to ruin my life. And besides, we leave for LA in the morning so we won’t even be here. Stay where you are, please.” She picked up the remainder of the gallon of milk and dumped it down the drain.
Alice sighed. “I don’t like this, Claire. I’m going to call Brian.”
“Don’t you dare.” The last time Alice had called Brian the PI, Mindy had nearly assaulted him in an alleyway. “I don’t need private security. I’m going to the other end of the country. It’ll be much harder for them to find me there.”
She slammed the refrigerator door and headed to her office, letting her mother yammer on speakerphone. After a quick Google search, several sheets of paper spat out of her printer. She gathered them into a neat pile and three-hole punched them before setting them on top of a binder marked “LA Preparedness.”
She glanced down at the list of possible natural disasters on her desk and scratched off “earthquakes.” Time for wildfires.
Alice was still talking a mile a minute on the other end of the line as Claire searched.
“Los Angeles is dangerous, Claire. Even if they don’t follow you there, you could get swept up by a tsunami or buried by an earthquake or?—”
Claire eyed the corners of the room. Surely her mother hadn’t installed security cameras without her noticing. “Mom, everything’s going to be fine. It’s only a few weeks. I have to go. I need to finish packing.”
Alice sighed like Claire had just told her she was permanently relocating to the jungles of Borneo. “Fine. But I’m going to read your cards tonight.”
“Please don’t. I love you. Bye.” She stabbed the “end” button until the call disconnected.
Her gaze fell on the Happily Ever Afters sign that Nicole had rescued from the wreckage. She had abandoned it in the corner of her home office. How was it possible that her whole office was gone? Countless memories, thoughtfully selected linens and decorations. Pictures and thank you notes from clients. Karen’s priceless childhood saddle. All gone because of some homicidal assholes. She wouldn’t stand for it.
“How’d she take it?” Luke popped into the doorway.
Claire screamed.
“Sorry.” He cracked a smile and shifted the messenger bag and backpack he carried to his other hand.
She pressed a hand to her chest and waited for her heart to stop galloping. Rosie jumped up and put her paws on her thighs. Winston whined from his bed at her feet.
“She’s threatening to hire a PI again.”
“Because that worked out so well last time,” Luke observed.
She shrugged. “I think I at least talked her out of coming here. I told her we’re leaving tomorrow.”
“And we are still leaving tomorrow?” He raised an eyebrow.
“Yes,” Claire said firmly. She had waffled back and forth all day, but there was no sense in staying in West Haven just because her building had burned down. “There’s nothing I can do from here. I already submitted the insurance claim with itemized inventory photos. It’ll take weeks for them to sift through everything, let alone send me a check.”
Luke set his bags on the floor and came to stand behind her. Pressing a kiss to her neck, he put his hands on her shoulders and rubbed his thumbs up and down her neck, bobbling her head back and forth.
Their middle-of-the-night argument had been all but forgotten. Her shoulders lowered. Some of the tension that she had been holding onto since she heard the voicemail dissolved. She closed her eyes and turned her attention inward. There was no proposal, no cross-country move. There was only this moment, with her favorite person in the world in the safety of her office. But soon, the crushing weight of reality and a random niggling question that had bothered her all weekend resurfaced.
“Have you thought about kids?” she asked abruptly.
“What?” The warmth disappeared from her neck, and something crashed to the floor. Rosie ran over to inspect.
Claire swiveled her chair to look at Luke. He must have jumped back and knocked her diamond-shaped paperweight over. At least it hadn’t broken. Small victories.
“Kids. Do you ever want to have children?”
“I bought a house with five bedrooms. What did you think I was going to put in the other four?”
“Dogs? More screening rooms?” Rosie jumped into her lap, and Claire buried her cheek in the corgi’s voluminous fur. The knot in her stomach eased.
“I mean, do you? Want kids?” He took a step away from her and crossed his arms.
“I do. Not for a while. Obviously the business is not in a stable place at the moment, but when things settle down someday—if they ever settle down, anyway—I’d love to be a mother. I just wanted to make sure you were on board in case anything unexpected happened.”
“I see,” he said, perching on the edge of her filing cabinets. “Have you been poking holes in the condoms?”
She scoffed. “Relax, my biological clock isn’t that loud. Sorry, I’m in a weird headspace with everything going on. Do you have everything packed?”
Luke nodded and buried a hand in his already tousled hair. He looked exhausted.
She caught his hand. “Are you okay? I feel like you spend so much time checking in on me and seeing how I’m doing, and we don’t always talk about how your day was.” A burned-down building was not an excuse to be a bad girlfriend.
“I’m fine. There’s just a lot running through my mind too. It’ll get better once we get to LA. I’m going to have to work a lot, but I want to make sure we make time for us while we’re out there. I want to show you California.”
“We’re not moving there permanently,” Claire said, grabbing her stack of papers and shuffling them into the binder.
“No.” He chuckled. “I mean it, though. I know you’re going crazy with work. But it’s important to me that we spend time together out there too.”
She smiled. “I hear you. I’ll even let you plan our first date night.” She bent forward and kissed him. “Want to help me pack Rosie’s suitcase?”
Luke sighed. “Rosie is a dog. She doesn’t need a suitcase.”
“What if she needs her winter jacket?”
“She has a double coat, and it’s Southern California. Trust me, she doesn’t need it. Or her galoshes,” he said firmly.
Claire threw up her hands. “Fine. They’ll need food and toys though, I assume? Or does living in Southern California rid you of that need?”
Luke pulled her from her chair. “Come on, kid. Tomorrow’s a big day.”