Chapter 58
Of course there was no Wi-Fi on the plane, and of course she had a middle seat, because this was obviously one of those days when nothing would work.
She relinquished the armrests to the passengers who sat on either side, and stared at the seat back in front of her, trying to make sense of what was going on thirty thousand feet beneath her.
If there had been even fifteen minutes before Tessa boarded, she could have called Henry.
She’d been so involved with Evelyn that she’d neglected her phone altogether.
As a result, her life was full of loose ends.
Unknown and menacing loose ends that felt like they were strangling her.
Now, buckled in, and with a moribund internet, hulking seatmates, and suspended by physics and geography, she was absolutely and totally helpless.
Tessa tried to look toward the rear of the plane, rows of tops of heads, everyone on the way to Des Moines. Was anyone going to Des Moines because she was?
Someone was meeting her at the airport, and she was awash with gratitude about that.
DJ could be prickly, but she was doing her job, and would work this out.
By the time Tessa got to the bookstore, she would have been filled in on the fictional explanation DJ had given.
DJ would be happy again. Team Tessa would be back.
It doesn’t make that note go away, though, Annabelle said. “See you in Des Moines.” Wonder who you’ll see?
Did all authors have a Greek chorus in their imaginations?
A personal narrator who would weigh in, unbidden, with sarcasm or criticism?
As a teenager, Tessa had imagined the muse as a benevolent goddess, an apparition who visited lucky people and transformed them into authors.
Now she thought maybe the muse had a dark side.
And you could not accept her gift of craft without also receiving her burden of insidious doubt.
But the voice of Annabelle, she knew, was trying to help.
She must have slept, since a raspy, unintelligible voice over the plane’s public address system startled her into consciousness.
Out the window, the plane was descending through puffs of white, breaking the thick barrier into blue and revealing, beneath, a geometric landscape slashed with the dark curves of a river.
Okay, onward. She was a happy best-selling author, on a successful book tour. She’ll be met by a friendly escort, get more coffee and even some food, and be driven through the Iowa sunshine to a comfortable hotel and a convivial bookstore.
And as she pulled her suitcase toward the terminal exit, what she was seeing now proved it. A smiling, blue-suited woman with graying hair and oversized black-framed glasses displayed a book-sized whiteboard with CALLOWAY carefully printed in thick black marker.
Tessa waved, thankful that she had not had the opportunity to cancel—that word again—her personal escort.
The woman, rail thin, reached out a gloved hand, claiming Tessa’s suitcase, which Tessa gratefully relinquished, leaving her tote bag attached to the extended handle.
“Wonderful to meet you, Ms. Calloway,” the woman said. “I’m Emily.”
Holy crap, Annabelle said.
“Are you all right, Ms. Calloway?” Emily said. “Did you have a rough flight? Do you need some water? Or a bathroom?”
“Yes, no, really, I’m good.” Tessa tried to regroup, this was not her Emily, beyond impossible, but this day was doomed to be a roiling disaster.
Three bad things, her mother had taught her once, three bad things would happen at a time.
Had Tessa already had her three today? Or was the universe poised to hit her with one more?
“Second thought, yes, bathroom,” Tessa said, reassessing. “Can I leave my stuff with you?”
“My pleasure.” Emily pulled the suitcase closer to her. “I’ll take care of it all.”
“Wait.” Tessa reached out, retrieved her roller bag. “I might need something, and my tote has my phone. I’ll meet you right here. Two minutes.”
“I’m here for you,” Emily said. “No rush. There’s plenty of time to get to the hotel.”
She opened the door to the bathroom stall and wrangled her bag inside, relieved that the door lock worked. Her phone pinged, from deep inside the zipped-up canvas. A VIP sound. Maybe DJ, having solved tonight’s worrisome cancellation.
But who would have tried to sabotage that appearance?
Why? Tessa wondered for the ten millionth time as she unzipped her bag and foraged to find the phone.
In that fitful half sleep on the plane, she’d dreamed of people chasing her.
And now, awake and in a strange bathroom at a strange airport, she realized that was not entirely a dream. Someone really was chasing her.
At random bookstores, customers were asking about her hometown.
She went over her confounding list again—the locket, the chocolates, the fire alarm, the earrings.
Did it all connect? The picture in the locket was not Annabelle, or her family, Tessa knew that.
But someone was taunting her about the bad thing.
Someone knew about her past. Who? The only person she’d told was Emily. Emily. But Emily would never tell.
She found the pinging phone in a side pocket. Henry . And turned it off. Henry could wait.
But she stood in the metal cubicle, staring at the door.
There was no way to ignore this. Although DJ and Team Tessa could smooth over tonight’s mysterious disruption, there was a bigger problem.
Now, Tessa calculated, she had three hours until the bookstore event to figure out who was causing it. And stop them.
Because if she didn’t, it would keep happening. And everything she cared about would be taken from her.