She moved back into the kitchen, seeing the room with the eyes of a stranger. Her mother’s briefcase stood near the door. The kitchen cart was wedged beside the stove. It was stacked with cooking utensils, a large bottle of olive oil, salt, pepper, and other frequently used spices. Donna banged a hip into the corner of the cart at least once a week, but Button refused to let her move it.
The Formica counter was chipped and cracking in several places. The kitchen table was pale and scratched from years of use, empty except for Donna’s tin of maple syrup.
As though in a dream, she placed water and oats into a heavy lidded pot and set it on the stove at a low simmer. When she heard Donna’s shower start with a rumble of pipes, she turned on the dishwasher. Then she grabbed a Ziploc bag and a pair of rubber gloves from under the sink, stuffed her feet into a pair of old running shoes, and slipped out the kitchen door into darkness.
FORTY-ONE
Eve’s Twenty-Seventh Birthday
THE RAIN HIT as she left the bakery, and it meant business. It pummelled her blind and deaf, and by the time she ducked under the Starbucks awning to wait for the southbound bus, she was soaked to the skin. Her feet squished inside her boots and her hair dripped into her eyes. Even worse, the cake box sagged from her fingers by a twist of string, waterlogged and threatening collapse. Button would be ticked.
Lightning cracked, and across the street the courthouse’s glass atrium mirrored the blinding flash. Eve wondered if Donna still haunted those darkened courtrooms, unable to sleep until justice had been served.
A man approached, wearing a long overcoat and a fedora. He stepped through the sheets of rain pouring from the awning, and paused at the door to the coffee shop. He reached for her hand, and she saw that his ring finger was gone from knuckle to tip.
“Eve, it’s time.”
She heard the screech of tires in the distance and the pounding of rain on the awning, like a drumbeat calling her home.
His eyes were the colour of dark amber, what Donna had called fool’s gold. She saw herself in their reflection, both the beast and the broken woman, and remembered everything.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be with you,” he said.
“But where am I going?”
She didn’t really expect an answer, and he didn’t give one. He just smiled his kind smile.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I really am sorry for what I did.”
“Then take my hand.”
She thought of Gabriel, the boy who should have been; and Sara, who’d died before her first kiss; and Donna, who’d seen a rapist in her daughter’s eyes. She thought of Leigh, who’d stolen her childhood; and Button, who’d loved her with blind certainty.
And she thought of Eve, the girl who’d smeared makeup on the blank wall in their hallway, creating a universe of unicorns and fairies and rainbows.
She’d spent too many years trying to paint a better life, and she’d grown weary. So, she took his hand.
Acknowledgements
THANK YOU TO the amazing team at Dundurn Press. To acquisitions editor Rachel Spence for loving this story and being its champion; to project editor Jenny McWha for her expert guidance; to Shannon Whibbs for her thorough and thoughtful editing; to art director Laura Boyle and the rest of her team for designing a cover so gorgeous I gasped when I first saw it; and to Stephanie Ellis and the rest of the team for their brilliant marketing.
To Kim Lionetti for being the most amazing agent. Thank you for continuing to push, uplift, and guide me. You are the stuff of legends.
To Hannah for being the first (and second and third) editor of this book. I never feel confident in my words until you’ve run your eagle eyes over them. But more than that, thank you for your friendship. I love you forevermuch.
My eternal gratitude to my family. To my husband, Jon, for being the coffee in my cream. Thank you for supporting this crazy dream of mine. Thank you for eagerly reading each of my first drafts, no matter how much sleep you lose in the process. To my mom, Sheryl, for being the smartest mystery reader I’ll ever know. I haven’t managed to slip one past you yet, but I’ll keep trying. Thank you also for being my art advisor on this project. To my children, Asher and Ivy, for breaking my every notion of what parenting would be. You two are my greatest teachers and my greatest loves. Thank you for choosing me.
About the Author
S.M. FREEDMAN studied at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York and spent years working as a private investigator on the not-so-mean streets of Vancouver before returning to her first love: writing. Her debut novel, The Faithful, is an international #1 Amazon bestseller. It reached the quarterfinals in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, and was selected by Suspense Magazine as a “Best Debut of 2015.” The sequel, Impact Winter, was published in 2016 and also became an international Amazon bestseller. S.M. is a proud member of Sisters in Crime, Crime Writers of Canada, International Thriller Writers, and Mystery Writers of America.
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