Chapter 34
“And if I come home,” Tessa said—she heard the tone in her voice, it didn’t even sound like her, she felt like someone else, but then wasn’t she someone else?
She was, had been for the past several weeks, and, actually, longer, and would continue to be, someone totally else.
“If I come home, then I can meet Barbie, can’t I? ”
“Barbie?” Henry took a sip from his stubby glass.
“Yes, the beautiful Barbie, who lives across the street, and has irresistible dogs, and apparently”—she took a chance with this one—“talks to married men late at night when their wives are out of town.”
“Yeah.” Henry drew the word out.
Tessa swiveled in her desk chair, saw the light from the television news make patterns across her face. She should say goodnight, eat her salad, go to sleep. Things would be better in the morning.
“Something’s going on, Tessa. What are you not telling me?”
“What am I not telling you? I? Not telling you ? That’s pretty funny.”
Stop, Annabelle said. Stop, stop, stop.
“There’s nothing that’s funny,” Henry said.
“You made a decision, you and I made a decision. You got your dream. You got what you wanted. You wrote a terrific book, sweetheart, and this is the price of that. I know you’re tired, I know you’re exhausted, I know you’re overworked.
But don’t take it out on me. I’m holding down the fort while you’re gone. ”
“Holding it down? Holding it down ? By letting Zack spend the night with a complete stranger? By leaving Linny in the bookstore alone? By telling the bookstore people, when you finally got there, where we lived? That’s holding it down?
” Tessa wished the internet would go out or some divine intervention would stop her from escalating this.
It wasn’t simply the schedule, it was everything about that mysterious locket, and the earrings, and Sam on the airplane, and the nasty woman about the hometown, and the contentious probing questions about her deal with the devil.
And it wasn’t coincidence. Something was going on. Here, and at home, too.
So she had to go home. She simply had to go home.
“You’re right,” she finally answered. “I’ll come home. I will.”
“Terrific,” Henry said. “Tell me your flight, and I’ll pick you up at the airport. We’ll have margaritas. We’ll celebrate.”
“I’d have to call DJ. Tell the publisher. And Sadie Bailey.”
“Yep,” Henry said.
“And tomorrow I’m supposed to be in San Diego. At a big influential bookstore. If I canceled now, it would be terrible. Incredibly rude. Two hundred people have signed up for it.”
“Yeah, that would not be good for your career. But,” Henry went on, “maybe being on the road is not good for your life. Our life.”
“What if I was sick or something? Then I could cancel.”
“Yep.”
Tessa paused, imagined emailing her editor. Her publicist. Her agent. She’d have to call them, she couldn’t do a thing like this by email.
“Maybe I should at least go to San Diego,” she said. “One more event.”
“Your call.” Henry lifted a palm, giving her permission.
Permission? His assumption of the power role, as if he were in charge, made her angry all over again . “But why did you tell the bookstore where we lived? It’s so—”
“How did you know what I did in the bookstore?”
“Linny told me.” Was she ratting out her own daughter? No. Henry had relinquished their privacy in front of everyone. It was already public.
“She did, huh? When?”
“We FaceTimed. When you were out talking to dog walker Barbie.”
“Her name is Barbara. She is not a dog walker. She has dogs. She just moved in, renting, I think. And she’s, well, nosy.”
“Nosy?”
“Who knows, I guess she’s a fan. But this is not about nosy Barbara and her dogs, honey. I don’t like the way you sound. I think you should come home.”
Out of the corner of her eye she saw a commercial on TV showing faces of starving dogs, sad-eyed and pitiful, asking for money. With that song about angels. Even though it was muted, it would be in her head all night.
“Seriously. You should.” Henry had put on his own puppy face, Tessa realized, and it was equally persuasive. Or heavy-handed. “You can meet Barbara. I bet she’ll go away, once the wifey is home. To protect her sexy, irresistible husband from the predatory seductive dog walker.”
“Shut up, Henry. Goofball.”
They sat, each silent, for a moment, staring across thousands of miles and into each other’s heads, looking into each other’s eyes, but not really, only the pixelated reproduction of each other, with no real connection, only light and sound waves being carried by satellites, up thousands of miles and down thousands of miles, with human emotions diminishing in the process.
“I have to keep doing this, don’t I,” Tessa said.
“Your call. We’ll work out something.”
“If I come home, that’s the end of my career. And the house.”
“We’ll manage.”
“My reputation will be ruined. And I do love writing.”
“And it certainly loves you,” Henry said. “But if you’re—exhausted? Come home. Write your books and be a recluse and that’ll work for you. I’ll love you no matter what.”
“That won’t pay the mortgage,” she said.
“We’ll figure something out.” Henry toasted her with whatever was in his glass.
She kept hearing noises, but maybe it was Linny.
Or the television. Figure something out , Henry had said.
For how many years had she heard that? She’d adored him, from moment one, his relentless optimism and positivity—but sometimes Tessa needed him to face reality.
The time he’d had the “best job ever” that allowed her to quit her own hellish one had been all too short.
On the other hand, now he could be at home. When she couldn’t.
“I guess I… I guess I do have low blood sugar,” she admitted, eyeing the box of chocolates. Eyeing the locket in her suitcase. Those earrings.
“Come home, come home, come home,” Henry chanted.
“Are you trying reverse psychology on me?”
Good luck with that question, Annabelle said.
“I guess I can’t win, can I.” Henry blew out a breath, flickered his attention away from the screen for a beat, then faced her, as if defeated. “I’m trying to make you happy.”
She looked at him, tried to see him through the screen, more than see him, but it was impossible. There was utterly no way to know his motives. Or if he had motives. “I can’t come home. I can’t. I’m sorry I freaked out. I’m tired.”
“Look. Do what you think is best. We have a terrific new home and sometimes-adorable kids waiting for you, and you have a kick-ass career on the road. Family and love and fame and money. All this could be yours, right?”
“Ha ha,” she said.
Later, after they’d said always always , and now tucked under the hotel-issue comforter, she held her cell phone in front of her face, the only light glowing in the darkened unfamiliar hotel room.
After considering whether she should encase the disconcerting earrings in toilet paper and stuff them in the wastebasket, Tessa had wrapped them in a tissue and stuck them into a corner of her tote bag. Out of sight, but not out of mind.
She should sleep. It was crazy, she had to get up so early, but she opened her socials.
Mile High Books had posted photos of the event, and Tessa scanned for the woman who’d asked about the deal with the devil.
But she wasn’t there. Tessa two-finger zoomed to bring the photo closer. Maybe. Maybe she was there.
A string of comments dropped down below, tantalizing. She was tempted to read them, respond to them all, put hearts by the nicest ones. “Go to sleep,” she instructed herself out loud. “Go to sleep.”
But she couldn’t resist. Her entire existence, her family’s complete livelihood, depended on what people thought of her.
This was her life. She opened her laptop. And began to scroll.