The Shadow Writer

by Maxwell, Eliza

  Graye pushes her salad away. She doesn’t disagree as she wipes at the condensation gathered on her glass.

  “It’s nothing,” Graye says. “It’s not my place to pry.”

  It was inevitable, really. They can only tap-dance around the elephant in the room for so long.

  “Graye, can I ask you something? As a friend?” Laura says, tackling it head-on.

  “Of course.”

  “When you dropped off my bag and keys yesterday . . . did David say something to upset you?”

  Graye takes a deep breath and meets Laura’s eyes, but she doesn’t speak.

  “Did he . . . did he make a pass at you?”

  Graye’s lips turn down in a frown, and that’s all the answer Laura needs.

  “Not exactly,” Graye says. “I mean, sort of, I guess. Maybe. But not really. He was drunk and . . . well, it doesn’t matter. I dealt with it.”

  The food she just ate sits like lead in Laura’s stomach. Damn him.

  “Graye, I’m so, so sorry. I understand if you’re not comfortable continuing on—”

  “Oh God, no,” Graye interrupts. “It’s fine. I took care of it. I don’t think it will happen again.” Graye’s face is flushed and her eyes have gone wide. “This is where I want to be. Please don’t let me go over this.”

  Laura is surprised by and a little ashamed of the rush of relief she feels. It’s selfish, but she likes Graye.

  “I’m not firing you, if that’s what you’re thinking,” she says. “If you’re sure you want to stay.”

  Graye nods emphatically. “I want to stay.”

  “I’m really glad to hear that.” Laura reaches across the table and squeezes the younger woman’s hand. “But I will talk to him.”

  “No, please don’t. That’ll just make things awkward. Can we just forget it happened?”

  Laura won’t forget. She can’t, but if it will set Graye’s mind at ease for her to agree, it’s the least she can do.

  “If that’s what you want.”

  She’ll deal with David all the same, without dragging Graye into their mess. She’s been avoiding it for too long.

  “Thank you,” Graye says, but judging by her face, there’s more on her mind. Laura waits.

  “Can I ask you something? As a friend?” Graye finally says.

  Laura sighs. Inevitable. “Why I stay with him?”

  Graye nods.

  Laura twists the wedding ring on her finger and looks away from Graye’s searching gaze. How can she explain to this young woman with her whole life ahead of her the fire David used to ignite in her? The thrill she’d get from the brush of his hand across hers, or the way their eyes would meet across a room, communicating their thoughts in just a glance.

  She can’t describe the scent of a thousand flowers. But she can remember.

  She can remember the glow in David’s face when she came home to the first apartment they shared and found it filled with endless bouquets of daisies, peonies, roses, chrysanthemums, and so many more. Flowers she didn’t even know the names of.

  “What in the world?” she whispered, dropping her bag at her feet. “David?”

  He grabbed her, swinging her legs around in a circle, laughing with the purest joy she’d ever witnessed.

  “We did it,” he said, kissing her fiercely. “We did it, Laura. We sold the book. And I have you to thank.”

  “By buying every flower in the state?” she cried, laughing along with him.

  “Yes,” he said. He held her gently and put both his hands on her cheeks. “I was searching for just one that could compare to my incredible wife, but none of them came close, so I had to buy them all.”

  Things are different now, and have been for a while, but Laura doesn’t know exactly when or where that crumbling shift began.

  Was it after David’s second novel was released, to much fanfare, followed by a universal sigh of disappointment?

  Was it after she broke their agreement? No kids, they’d both said. We don’t need kids to be fulfilled, they’d said, young and arrogantly unaware that things wouldn’t, couldn’t, continue down the same charmed path forever.

  Or was it before that? Was it the decaying scent of a thousand cut flowers inevitably dying in their vases, no matter how hard she tried to extend their life?

  David dealt with success far better than failure. He allowed failure to change him.

  And the thing is, she’d have loved him to his dying day as a washed-up novelist. What she can’t find it in her heart to forgive is the way he’s giving everything he is, everything they are together, over to bitterness.

  It makes her feel cheap. It makes her love cheap, so easily traded—not for something new and better, but something poisonous and hurtful.

  How can she ask Graye to understand, when she herself doesn’t?

  Laura and David are flying toward the finish line in a race she’s set in motion without David’s knowledge, and she’s holding on only to give him one final chance. A chance to choose her, and a future, and step away from the mire their life together has become.

  To start over. To be a family.

  She feels she owes him the chance to make a better man of himself.

  Not that she expects him to take it. She doesn’t even know if he can, but when he makes his choice, she will know at least that she’s seen it through. And maybe, in the end, she can forgive herself for changing the rules on him.

  But she can’t say any of this to Graye.

  “It’s complicated right now,” she says instead, an inane phrase that sounds exactly like what it is. A big fat excuse. Yet it’s true.

  Life with David has never been anything but complicated. Yet she can’t leave Graye with that. She deserves more.

  “There are changes coming,” Laura says. “I’m not sure exactly when, or what form they’ll take, but they’re coming all the same.”

  Again, too vague, but Laura’s stomach flutters in recognition of the unbending honesty of those words.

  She should say more, knows she should, but Graye’s face has softened, and Laura doesn’t dare continue for fear she’ll sound like a bigger idiot than she already does. She keeps her mouth shut and watches the other woman take it all in.

  “Okay,” Graye says softly, accepting the inadequate explanation without further questions.

  “In the meantime,” Laura says, glancing at the clock on her phone while she composes herself, “you and I have some murder to plan.”

  17

  GRAYE

  The hotel manager is a small woman, and younger than Graye expected, but she’s enthusiastic and eager to bring the event off without a hitch.

  “We’re fully booked for the weekend, Mrs. West, and your party makes up the bulk of the reservations. The staff and I are, as always, at your disposal.”

  “Thank you, Yolanda.”

  “We’ve never hosted a murder mystery dinner, and I’m intrigued,” the hotel manager says.

  “You guys just do what you do best. Graye and I will take care of steering the guests when it comes to Saturday night.”

  “I’ve set aside a room on the first floor for the staging area as you requested.”

  “That’s wonderful,” Laura says.

  Graye must admit, the small historic beachfront hotel is the perfect backdrop for what Laura’s cooked up.

  Yolanda and Laura move to the far side of the ballroom. The hotel manager’s hands wave as she speaks, directing Laura’s attention. Graye stands back, building the evening in her imagination, searching for potential problems they haven’t considered.

  She glances around, filling in the practical details.

  “Where are the restrooms from here?” she calls to Yolanda.

  “Just out those doors and to your left,” the manager calls back.

  Graye glances over her shoulder and cranes her neck to peer out the doors. A figure, standing too still in the hallway by the elevators, turns his back to her suddenly.

  But Graye ha
s seen his face. Her world begins to spin. She’ll never forget that face. It’s been in her nightmares for years.

  She stares at his back, willing herself to be wrong.

  The red board shorts. The man she passes in the mornings on the beach, never looking too closely, never making eye contact, because that’s what she does. She always keeps her head down, not drawing notice to herself.

  He’s been watching her. The day Laura’s tire was slashed, that morning from the beach. It was him.

  No, her mind screams. Not this. Not now, just when things are finally coming together.

  The elevator dings and the door slides open. The man steps casually inside.

  Nothing to hide. Nothing to see here.

  And Graye wants to believe it. Wants to be wrong.

  But she isn’t wrong.

  When the man turns to press the elevator button, his face is angled away from her, but she sees the quick flutter of his eyes, sideways, seeking her out. Just a millisecond slip, to check if he’s been found out, gives him away.

  When he catches her watching him, his eyes narrow and he stands straighter, facing her head-on.

  There’s no mistake.

  A dizzying sense of vertigo takes hold of her as she stands with her future on one side, and her past staring her down on the other.

  Without thought for the consequences, Graye bolts toward the elevator.

  The doors begin to slide closed between them, but Graye reaches them just in time to thrust her hand out. They open again, whether she truly wants them to or not.

  Heart pounding, she steps inside without a word, facing the man she hasn’t been this close to in more than fifteen years.

  He doesn’t speak, doesn’t smile. Not that she expects him to. His eyes are shrouded in mystery, but Graye refuses to give in to terror.

  She’s no longer the little girl she once was.

  The elevator doors slide closed, oblivious to her pounding pulse or the way her skin prickles at being closeted in such a small space with nothing between her and him.

  “Hello, Grace,” he says quietly.

  The softness of the words doesn’t fool her.

  His voice is deeper than she remembers, his skin lined, his hair shorter, but otherwise, he’s the same.

  “What are you doing here, Nick?” She forces the words from her lips, hating how they sound. Weak. Shaky.

  Will he lie? Pretend his presence on this little island is some sort of cosmic joke they can laugh about together like old friends?

  If he does, Graye doesn’t think she can stop the scream that’s building in her throat.

  “I’ve been watching you,” he says instead.

  A chill courses through her at the words. The scream lingers too near the surface.

  “What do you want?” she demands.

  He tilts his head, studies her like a bug beneath a magnifying glass.

  “You’ve grown up, Grace,” he says, sidestepping her question.

  She chokes back her response as the elevator pitches to a stop and the doors slide open. A young couple, laughing and happy, steps into the elevator with them. Graye moves to stand at the back, making room, and stares down at her feet.

  She can feel his eyes on her, even while the elevator continues along its way. She bites at the inside of her cheek, tastes blood, while they ride inside the mechanized box that’s begun to feel like a cell.

  The door dings again, and the couple steps off. Graye glances up and meets his eyes, but he makes no move toward her, though she doesn’t feel any safer for it.

  “Don’t run from me, Grace. There’s nothing to be afraid of,” he says.

  Her mind conjures an image of a sharp, glinting blade slicing into a sidewall of rubber.

  Nick, silent on the beach, observing the aftermath.

  He’s lying.

  She reaches over and again thrusts her hand between the elevator doors, stopping them before they can close her in once more.

  “Stay away from me,” she hisses. “There’s nothing here for you.”

  She steps out, free from the confines of his presence, and forces her feet to keep a calm pace as she walks away.

  “You can’t hide forever, Grace,” she hears him call.

  She quickens her pace, but that’s the thing about ghosts. They’re impossible to outrun. They travel in the heart of the people they’ve hurt the most.

  She should know. She’s been running from ghosts her whole life.

  Now she’s been found, and she’s nine years old again. Little Gracie, who is always afraid.

  Little Gracie, who put a murderer behind bars.

  But there are no bars to protect her now.

  18

  MARGARET

  Sister Ursula does a poor job masking her curiosity when she hurries to find Sister Margaret in the garden.

  “You have a phone call, Sister,” the small, round woman says, out of breath from her rush to share the news. “A young woman. She sounds quite upset.”

  Margaret frowns, ignoring Ursula’s overly bright, probing gaze.

  Life is quiet at St. Sebastian’s. One could even be forgiven for calling it dull.

  This suits some of the girls, and frankly, some of the nuns, better than others.

  “Carrie, have the girls take the vegetables you’ve gathered into the storeroom when you’re done. And two baskets to the kitchens, if you don’t mind,” Sister Margaret says.

  “Yes, Sister.” Carrie is one of their older girls, and a responsible sort.

  Margaret brushes the soil from her hands and walks toward the home office, where their only phone is located.

  Ursula hurries along beside her.

  “I believe it may be Graye Templeton,” she chatters. “I do hope the child hasn’t found herself in a pickle.”

  Margaret sighs. Ursula has a penchant for colorful phrases better suited to children’s television programming than real life. In a pickle is a favorite.

  “What do you suppose the trouble might be?” the other woman continues.

  “I don’t have the faintest idea, Sister, as I’ve yet to speak to her.”

  “Yes, of course. That makes sense. Mustn’t get the chickens before the horse.”

  “The cart,” Margaret corrects.

  “What’s that?”

  “Mustn’t get the cart before the horse, dear. Not the chickens.”

  “Oh. Yes, yes, of course. Although I’d think getting the chickens before the horse wouldn’t be a good thing either. Chickens underfoot like that.” Ursula shakes her head, clucking. “Someone could get hurt.”

  Margaret stops in the large entryway and turns to face the other woman, who stumbles to a halt. “Sister Anna mentioned she could use some help in the kitchens.”

  Sister Ursula’s shoulders droop.

  Margaret keeps her features polite until Ursula finally turns to shuffle slowly off in the other direction. She stays put until Ursula has disappeared, then walks briskly to the office, where the receiver of the phone lies waiting on the desk.

  “Graye?” Margaret says into the phone. Ragged, heavy breaths come from the other end of the line. “What’s wrong?”

  There’s a choking hitch that might have been a sob before the young woman speaks.

  “How could you, Sister?” the voice asks, low and pleading.

  “How could I what, Graye?”

  “Nick,” she cries. “Nick is here. Did you tell him where to find me? You must have.”

  The unease that’s been lying heavy on the nun’s mind since she heard Graye’s voice cracks open, becoming full-fledged panic.

  She struggles to hold it in check. Histrionics won’t help.

  “Graye, take a breath and slow down.”

  Margaret’s heart pounds. Graye has tried so hard to put the past behind her, but the nun’s greatest worry for the girl has always been that she’ll never be able to run far or fast enough.

  It would appear she was right.

  “If Nick is in New
York, he certainly didn’t find you through me.”

  “He’s not in Ithaca, Sister. I’m in Texas. If he can find me even here, I’ll never . . . I’ll never . . .” Graye’s voice breaks.

  “Texas?” Margaret says, confused. “What are you doing in Texas?”

  “You didn’t know. No, of course you didn’t.”

  “You haven’t returned my calls or answered my letters in months, child.”

  “But . . . but how did he find me then?” Graye asks.

  “I don’t know, but if you’re sure it’s him, you should go to the police. Tell them everything, then pack your things and get out of there as soon as you can.”

  “No!”

  The vehemence in the girl’s response leaves Margaret shocked.

  “What choice do you have, Grace? You can come here. We can protect you, just like we did before. We’ll get you a new name, a new identity, if we need to. You can start over—”

  “No, Sister!” Graye shouts. “No. Not now, I can’t leave now.”

  “Grace, be reasonable—”

  “Stop calling me that!”

  The slip was accidental, but Margaret is struggling to stay composed.

  “I’m sorry, Graye,” she says slowly, in a soothing tone. “Take a breath and explain to me exactly what’s going on. Why can’t you leave?”

  “I’ve got a job. A real job with a future.”

  It’s the first Margaret has heard of this, but it isn’t unusual for Graye to go long periods without contacting her. She’s no longer a child, and the nun has no claim on the girl’s time, as much as she might worry.

  “What job could be worth putting yourself at risk this way?” she asks.

  “You don’t understand.”

  Margaret takes a deep breath. “Then explain it to me.”

  “I’m an assistant for an important woman in the book community. She’s reading my novel. I can’t just pack up and leave now. This could be my shot, Sister.”

  Margaret opens her mouth to disagree, then stops. Her words, she knows, will make no difference.

  Writing has always been more to Graye than simply a dream. It’s the thing, possibly the only thing, that pulled the child from the depths.

  When Grace arrived at St. Sebastian’s, the care workers told them she was capable of speech. She could talk. She just chose not to.