That was Ron’s way of excusing himself to use the bathroom. Julia shook her head and smiled.
A statuesque redhead hustled into the kitchen while Julia was on her second cup of coffee.
“Oh,” she said, surprised to see someone in her workspace.
Julia stood up, rinsed out her mug, and placed it in the sink. “It’s all yours.”
She wandered into the den to look for the writer boy, but it wasn’t there. She thought maybe Dane had moved it to keep her niece and nephew from playing with it.
She searched a few of the rooms looking for Dane and when she didn’t find him she decided to head upstairs to take a shower.
The coffee put a spring in her step and she entered the master suite with more energy than she had left it. She stepped into the walk-in closet, carefully choosing a modest skirt and a silk blouse to wear for brunch. She chose red pumps that she thought looked festive, nude hose, a lacy camisole and matching panties, and laid the entire ensemble neatly across the bed. She closed and locked the bedroom door and then undressed in the bathroom
The shower felt wonderful, the hot water steaming the clear glass, her rosemary shampoo invigorating her scalp. She was feeling rather foolish for her actions the night before, but she made a vow to make it up to Dane. This week, she would be the perfect wife, the perfect daughter-in-law, the perfect host. As she pumped the conditioner in her hands, she heard a voice call her name.
Julia.
It didn’t sound like Dane, but the water was stifling her hearing. She turned it off and called, “Hello? I’m in the shower. Be right out.”
She smeared the conditioner in her long hair and turned the water back on at full blast. As she stepped beneath the nozzle for a final rinse, she heard another call.
Julia.
Only louder. But not deep. One of the kids maybe? But she could have sworn she had locked the bedroom door.
She stuck her head out from beneath the faucet and listened. “Hello? Dane?”
Nothing. She sighed, deciding that whoever it was could wait. She finished rinsing off, shut the water down, and stepped out of the shower. She wrapped her head in a towel, dried her body off and shrugged into a robe. She slathered moisturizer on and blew her hair out into a relaxed style then applied mascara and blush. When she finished her routine, Julia opened the bathroom door.
She took one look at the bed and screamed.
Chapter 6
Julia slapped her hands over her mouth, and took several deep breaths to calm herself, a trick she had learned in therapy. She closed her eyes and counted to three.
One. Two. Three.
The writer boy was still sitting on the bed, its glassy blue eyes vacant, as if it had been there the entire time she had gathered her clothes and laid them out.
Had it been there? But how could she have missed it? The piece was large, the size and width of an old typewriter, but twice as tall.
No. No, the automaton was definitely not on the bed before she had stepped into the shower. She was certain of it.
She turned slowly around the room. Nothing else seemed out of place. She checked the bedroom door.
Still locked.
The windows too. Not that anyone would be shimmying up the drain pipe, but still.
She ran a hand through her freshly styled hair and thought, is it happening again? Please, God, not now. Not when I have so much to lose.
The handle on the bedroom door rattled and Julia yelped.
“Honey? You in there?”
Dane.
She rushed to unlock it and flung herself in his arms.
His hair was plastered to his head. He was wearing a jogging suit and running shoes and he smelled of sweat and pine trees. There were earbuds in his ears and Dane removed them, dropping the smile from his face when he looked at her.
“What? What’s wrong, baby?”
Julia swallowed hard. She wasn’t sure what exactly to tell him. In fact, she had never told him about the other time. That had all happened years before they had met. She was too ashamed to tell him and too far recovered to relive it.
“Wh-where were you?” she asked.
“I just went for a run. It started snowing, so I cut it short.” He bent to look into her eyes. “Did something happen? You’re shaking.” He stepped into the room and shut the door behind them.
She was fairly sure no one had heard her scream. The old house was all brick, built with sturdy hands and thick walls. Everyone was likely downstairs and only Dane and she lived in this wing. The guest suites were across the way, past a spiral staircase and a balcony. Most likely the kids were in the playroom, the adults in the living area near the tree, and the caterer in the kitchen.
Julia smiled. “It’s nothing.” She pointed to the bed. “I was startled when I saw the automaton on the bed. Someone must have brought it up and I didn’t realize before I stepped into the shower.” She tried to hold her smile even, tried not to let her lip quiver. She wanted to assure her husband that his wife was perfectly normal. Perfectly sane.
Dane looked at the bed, then at his wife. “Oh. Maybe Nathan brought it up to keep it away from the kids.”
But the door was locked. And why would her brother-in-law come into their bedroom?
Julia shrugged off her thoughts and nodded. “That’s it, I’m sure.” She managed to squeak out a laugh. “I’m just a bit jumpy with the whole family here, that’s all.”
Dane hugged her tight and whispered in her ear, “You want to know a secret? So am I.”
He kissed her on the cheek and went to take a shower.
After she heard the water turn on, Julia approached the little writer boy, wondering how someone could have gotten into her locked bedroom. Unless—had she brought it up here and just forgotten? There was so much activity in the house right now, she supposed it was possible. She gently touched the doll’s hair deciding that he would indeed make a pretty good office mascot. In fact, first thing tomorrow, she was going to get back to working on her fiction. She didn’t have any pending assignments and the distraction might be just the thing she needed to relax her nerves.
“I think we got off on the wrong foot, my friend,” Julia said to the doll. She knelt down and peered into the toy’s eyes. “You look like a Toby. I think that’s what I’ll call you.”
The doll sat perfectly still, unblinking.
Julia turned away from the automaton and leaned against the bed. She slipped into her undergarments and stockings, snapping the nylon band across her slim waist. Then she pulled on her skirt and zipped it up the side. The jewelry armoire was on the far side of the room near the window. She opened the oak door, taking inventory of the necklaces, earrings, and bracelets, deciding on a simple gold chain with a floating heart. She fastened the clasp around her neck, shoving away her fears. Her biggest fear, actually. The one she had worried about ever since she was seventeen years old.
That the voices would come back.
Julia stood there in her bedroom a moment, watching the snow fall in big fluffy flakes across the lawn and tried to think happy thoughts. The house was alive with family and children, gifts and food. She had much to be thankful for. Her life had turned out better than she had ever imagined. Better than she believed she deserved.
And then, something stirred in her belly. The tiniest twinge. Right before the hair on the back of her neck pricked up. She got the distinct sensation that she was being watched. She turned, expecting to see Dane out of the bathroom.
But no one was there.
No one, that is, except Toby.
Chapter 7
Dane watched his wife closely throughout the day. He could see that she was disturbed, but she wouldn’t tell him why, and he decided not to press her. He suspected that the old demons were rearing their ugly heads. She’d been strong for a long while, but a woman like Julia didn’t have the strength to keep fighting. Sometimes, the demons won. And that’s when he stepped in. It was his duty as a husband, after all, to take care
of his wife.
And take care of her he would.
Of course, it was the holidays and there was his mother which would bend even the steeliest of nerves. An entire week with the family. What had he been thinking? Although he wasn’t the one who would be dealing with them on a daily basis. Tomorrow, he had to get back to work. There was still much to do before the election. Lots of planning and strategizing.
Julia smiled at him across the dinner table as she chatted with Ron, and Dane smiled back. Was it possible his mother was right? Was his wife simply not cut out to be a politician’s bride? She hated the spotlight, he knew that. Understood it even, but it came with the territory. She knew what he wanted to do with his life before they were married and she had signed up for it anyway. Still, she might be more of a hindrance than a help if Dane’s political path followed the trajectory he had mapped out. And then where would he be?
Would he have to choose between his wife and his career?
Dane’s mother asked him a question and he answered absentmindedly. He reached for a roll, tearing it apart to slather butter in between the halves, thinking of what he had heard earlier as he walked passed Julia’s office.
Whispering. Voices. When he knocked on the door, Julia answered, but she was alone. It was just her, her laptop, and the automaton.
Dane was positive she had been speaking to someone. So who was it? She didn’t have her cell phone with her—that was on the dresser in the bedroom—and there was no desk phone in the office. Had she been Skyping? But with whom? And why would she keep it a secret?
Although, Dane knew his wife held many secrets. Secrets from her old life that she thought none of them knew.
But that wasn’t so.
Secrets could destroy a political career before it’s even off the ground and he made damned sure he knew everything about his fiancée before they walked down the aisle. It was part of the process and he had been painstakingly thorough. He knew about the hospital, about her illness, her instability, but it had been years before they met and he felt confident that she had made a full recovery at the time. But that was before the miscarriages. And he had to face the fact that these things had a way of worming back into a person’s life. You could cut off its tail, but it was only a matter of time before it grew back a longer, stronger one.
Dane finished his steak and grabbed his wineglass to wash it down. As he did so, he caught his brother staring at him.
Chapter 8
Julia hadn’t slept well. Despite the drafty house, and the freezing temperatures outside, she sweated through a fitful night of terrifying dreams. She tossed and turned, kicking back the covers and waking every few hours from nightmares so vivid, she felt as if she could reach out and touch them. She dreamed of tentacled monsters that snatched babies from their cribs, demons from hell that chased her down fiery corridors made of cold stone, and a faceless man who seemed to want to tell her something, yet he lacked the tongue to do so.
Dane was still snoring softly when she finally decided that sleep would be elusive and dragged herself out of bed. It was still dark outside as she crept into the bathroom to wash her face and brush her teeth. She climbed into the sweat suit she had worn yesterday morning and headed into her office.
There was a light on when she walked into the room, although she thought she had turned it off yesterday. She switched on her laptop and grabbed the notebook where she logged all of her fiction ideas, then went downstairs to make some coffee, patting Toby’s head on the way out of the room.
The house was dark and quiet. Not surprising for five a.m. Everyone would still be asleep and she could get lost in her fiction for at least a few hours this morning. Dane would be heading off to work and Nathan was likely going to the restaurant today, but she wasn’t sure what Cynthia and Ron had planned. She thought she heard Cynthia mention something about spending quality time with her grandchildren. Meaning, of course, that Julia would not be invited to participate in whatever activity her mother-in-law had planned. Which was fine with her.She had spent time yesterday playing with her niece and nephew and the new toys she had purchased for them. Before nightfall, there had been enough snow on the ground to build a snowman, so she got the kids bundled up and took them outside to build one.
Julia poured herself a hot cup of coffee and sat at the kitchen table, swirling the cream inside the cup and watching it dissolve into the black liquid. She grabbed a pen from the junk drawer and jotted down images from her dream. She wasn’t sure if she would use any of it in the family saga novel she was writing, but an English teacher told her long ago to always keep a journal. No matter how banal the image, he had said, one never knew when something might strike a chord inside the mind of a writer. She had kept a journal ever since and never had it come in so handy than when she had had her breakdown.
Still groggy, and a little queasy after her second cup of coffee, Julia wondered if perhaps something she ate last night didn’t agree with her. Too much wine perhaps? Or maybe the rich cheesecake with the chocolate sauce? Whatever it was, she decided she needed a slice of toast to settle her stomach.
There was movement to her right when the toast popped out of the toaster. She turned her head to find Jeremy standing there wearing his footie pajamas and clutching the new dinosaur that Julia had stuffed in his stocking.
“Hey there, little man,” Julia said. “What are you doing up so early?”
Jeremy’s eyes were droopy and his tiny face was twisted into distress.
He shrugged. “Had bad dreams.”
Julia pulled out a chair and Jeremy climbed on top of it.
“I did too. You want to tell me about it?”
She popped another piece of bread in the toaster and went to the refrigerator to pour Jeremy a glass of milk.
“Don’t like it when they fight,” Jeremy said.
Julia set the milk down in front of him and Jeremy took a long sip.
“Who, honey? Was someone fighting in your dream?”
Jeremy shook his head. “Nope. Just have bad dreams when they do.”
Julia sat next to her nephew and said, “Mommy and Daddy both love you even if they fight sometimes.”
She bit into the dry toast.
“Not Mommy. Nana.” The little boy finished his milk in three large gulps, leaving a mustache behind.
“Nana and Daddy were fighting?”
“Yeah. Last night. Hate it.”
That didn’t seem out of the realm of possibility, but what could they have been arguing about that couldn’t wait until after Christmas?
“What were they fighting about, sweetie?”
Jeremy said, “Heretence.”
Heretence? “You mean inheritance?”
“Yes.”
But why would they be arguing about an inheritance? Had Cynthia held some money back from Nathan’s share of what his father had left him?
“What else did they say?”
The other slice of toast popped and Julia rose from the table, slathered it with grape jelly, and handed it to Jeremy.
“Nana said Daddy wasn’t responsible. He wasted his heretence. Said Uncle Dane might need her help for the company trail.”
“You mean the campaign trail?”
“Yeah.” Jeremy bit into his toast. A trace of jelly lingered at the corner of his mouth.
So Nathan was in the red again. Why he didn’t just let the restaurant go, she didn’t know. It seemed like an awful amount of stress to contend with when you had two young children to look after.
“Hey, is this a private party or can anyone join?” Nathan said.
Julia started at the sound of his voice. She hadn’t noticed any lights flick on from the hallway. How long had he been standing there? How much had he heard? And why was he creeping around in the dark?
Nathan sank into a chair across from Julia and tousled his son’s hair. “Mm. Grape jelly, yum. Can I have a bite?”
Jeremy giggled and offered the toast to his father. Nathan took a bite and
chewed it slowly as if it was the best thing he had ever tasted. He looked over at Julia and flashed her that crooked smile.
She smiled back.
Nathan leaned over and said to his son. “You should probably get your sister up. I think Nana has big plans today and it takes her forever to get ready.”
“Okay.”
Julia watched as the boy slid off the chair. He hugged her tight and shuffled away, still sleepy.
“Can I get some of that coffee, sis?”
“Sure.”
As she dug in the cabinet for a mug, she wondered if she should ask Nathan if he needed a loan. Surely Dane could afford to help out his brother. Although, with the campaign in full swing, he might be reluctant to part with any funds that might give him an edge over the other candidates. Julia herself had some money socked away in her private account. She supposed she could offer Nathan the money. That’s what families were for anyhow. To support each other in times of crisis.
But he would have mentioned it to her directly if he had wanted her to know. Perhaps it was best not to say anything at all. The Caulfield men were a proud lot. Nathan might feel wounded if Julia suggested he needed help.
She set the coffee in front of her brother-in-law and decided to bring up the subject to Dane later in private. He would know the right way to approach this. Dane always knew just what to do.
Chapter 9
After one more cup of coffee, Julia was back in her office pounding away on the keyboard. She was thrilled to have this private alone time with just herself and her thoughts. Cynthia had taken the kids out to lunch, followed by a Dickens’ play, Dane was at work, Ron went to visit a friend, and Nathan was at the restaurant. Julia’s brain was firing off thoughts so rapidly, it was a struggle for her fingers to keep up the pace. She wrote in a frenzy for hours upon hours, only stopping to go to the bathroom and to get a drink of water. She found she wasn’t even hungry. At least not for food anyway. She was hungry to get her ideas down on paper, fearful that the momentum would fade and that she wouldn’t be able to regain this spark again.
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