You Were Always Mine

by Nicole Baart

  Advance Praise for You Were Always Mine

  “Equal parts tearjerker and page-turner . . . Entwines the heartbreak of a mother’s struggle with the urgency of a mystery that won’t let her (or you) go. Compelling, heartfelt, and satisfying to the breathless finish.”

  —Jessica Strawser, author of Not That I Could Tell

  “Baart brilliantly weaves mystery into family drama . . . The clues are left in plain sight, leaving the reader on edge trying to solve the puzzle before it’s too late. The conclusion is both sinister and shocking. This is domestic suspense at its best.”

  —Sandra Block, author of What Happened That Night

  Praise for Little Broken Things

  “If you liked Big Little Lies, you’ll want to crack open this new novel by Nicole Baart.”

  —Southern Living

  “Steeped in menace, Baart’s latest is a race-to-the-finish family drama.”

  —People

  “Sweet, scary, and sometimes sordid, Little Broken Things is filled with determined women tenacious in their love for a girl whose childhood has been anything but easy.”

  —Shelf Awareness

  “Mesmerizing . . . An accomplished exploration of the fragile bonds of a family as they attempt to overcome obstacles they never saw coming.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Ventures into the territory of Paula Hawkins, Mary Kubica, and Kimberly Belle . . . Full of twists and turns, this is a great addition to the recent surge in suspenseful domestic fiction.”

  —Booklist

  “Part psychological thriller, part women’s fiction . . . wholly compelling. Told from the perspectives of three complex women (a mother and her two adult daughters) over the course of four emotional days . . . Questions abound and, in true thriller fashion, answers are doled out on a need-to-know basis, keeping the tension high from beginning to end . . . The intricacies of family relationships, love, and friendship are all skillfully explored, layered in all the right places, and captivating in its entirety.”

  —Romantic Times

  “Richly atmospheric and featuring a compelling cast of sharply drawn female characters . . . both a page-turner and a thoughtful examination of what it means to mother and be mothered, in all its most real and varied forms.”

  —Kimberly McCreight, New York Times bestselling author

  “Beautifully layered . . . gives readers everything they could possibly want in a novel—vivid, engaging characters, a town filled with dark secrets, a mind-twisting mystery, and the ferocious power of a mother’s love . . . a stunner that will linger with you long after the final page is turned.”

  —Heather Gudenkauf, New York Times bestselling author

  Praise for The Beautiful Daughters

  “Oh, the dark secrets that can be hidden in the openness of the Iowa landscape. Nicole Baart has given us such fully drawn characters and compelling relationships that only the hardest of hearts wouldn’t be won over by The Beautiful Daughters.”

  —William Kent Krueger, New York Times bestselling author

  Praise for Sleeping in Eden

  “Baart expertly unravels the backstory of her intriguing characters, capturing the nuances of both life-tested relationships and the intense passion of first love. Ripe with complex emotion and vivid prose, this story sticks around long after the last page is turned.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “A taut story of unspoken secrets and the raw, complex passions of innocence lost.”

  —Midwest Connections Pick, May 2013

  Praise for Far from Here

  “A rare journey to a place that left me healed and renewed . . . my heart ached while I read Far from Here, but it ached more when I was done and there were no more pages to turn.”

  —Nicolle Wallace, New York Times bestselling author

  “Gorgeously composed . . . a candid and uncompromising meditation on the marriage of a young pilot and his flight-fearing wife, their personal failings, and finding the grace to move beyond unthinkable tragedy. . . . Pulsing with passion and saturated with lush language . . . will leave an indelible mark.”

  —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

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  This one is for my boys.

  “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view . . . Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”

  Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

  BEFORE

  HE WAS IN over his head.

  Coming here was a terrible mistake, and he regretted it so much he could feel remorse curdling like sour milk in his stomach. It made him nauseous, unsettled, and all at once he knew that he would vomit.

  His palms slipped on the steering wheel as he veered off the highway and pulled onto a gravel road. Rocks hissed and popped beneath his tires, spraying a cloud of dust into the spiderweb of branches that arched overhead. He was going way too fast, and only realized it when he felt the give of the soft shoulder. It dragged the car toward the ditch, catching the tires and tugging so hard he could feel himself losing control.

  Brakes, an unholy screech of rubber and metal and earth, and then, the back of his vehicle whipped toward a leaning oak tree and hit it square. The sound of the crash was dull and elemental, flesh on flesh instead of shattering glass or terrified screams. He barely uttered a sigh, but the impact made him bite his tongue clean through, and when he finally freed himself from the seat belt and wrenched open the door, he leaned over and threw up blood and bile and not much else.

  He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten. He couldn’t remember why he had thought this was a good idea or what he’d hoped to gain from digging deeper. Oh, God. Now he was so far down he feared he’d never be able to climb his way up and out.

  What had he done?

  He passed the back of his hand over his mouth and reached around for the box of tissues that he kept in the armrest. But this wasn’t his Grand Cherokee. It was a trade-in, or rather, a car that he had bought on the side of the road from some guy outside of Mankato. He wasn’t even a dealer, just a farmer with a few vehicles parked at the end of his drive. The farmer gave him a rusting LeSabre and two thousand dollars in crumpled cash. Mostly fifties and twenties, the wad was so thick he had to split it into two stacks—one for each pocket. Even so, it was less than the Jeep was worth, but neither of them were in the mood to haggle.

  It seemed like a fair enough trade at the time, but suddenly the car felt dirty and foreign, as unfamiliar as a stranger’s bed. The odor of stale cigarettes lingered in the upholstery, and he realized he might vomit again.

  He threw himself from the car, leaving the lights on and the engine running, and trying to avoid the mess he had already made in the pale dirt. The air was cold and sharp. Instantly sobering. He gulped a few ragged breaths, his chest heaving against the dress shirt he had picked up at a secondhand store. It was too tight, the frayed tie even more so, and he lifted a shaking hand to loosen the knot, undo a button.

  The crisp autumn breeze, the way it slid cool fingers against his neck, began to steady him. A warm trickle made him raise his hand to his forehead and his palm came away hot and sticky. He realized with a start that he was bleeding. Had he hit his head on the steering wheel? The w
indshield? It didn’t matter. The wound wasn’t serious. He wasn’t about to die from a head injury.

  What now? The question was insistent, ever present, the dependable drum of his heartbeat in his ears. What now? What now? What now? It was the question he had been asking himself for months, and answering it had brought him here.

  And he had no idea where he was.

  A gravel road. A beat-up car. He had intentionally left everything of value in the safe at the run-down motel where he had rented a room on the second floor. There was nothing in his pockets save a single scrap of paper. And that was hollow comfort at best.

  When he finally climbed back into the car and tried to put it in reverse, the transmission sputtered and clunked and refused to shift. He didn’t know much about cars, but it didn’t take a genius to guess that the axle was cracked. Spitting a curse, he thought of his cell phone tucked carefully away back in the room. There was nothing for him to do but turn off the car and walk for help.

  A farmhouse? A nearby town? He could hit the highway and hitchhike, but now that the vehicle was quiet and the gravel road dark, the October night pressed in heavy and assured him that nothing could be done without drawing attention. He was bloodied, reeking of vomit, strange. He felt it coming off him like an odor, the sense that he was not who he was supposed to be. That everything about this night was wrong.

  But as he was about to strike off in the direction of the nearest farm, headlights swung down the gravel road. Because the terrain was so wooded and the night so still, he hadn’t paid attention to the faraway traffic of the blacktop less than a mile away. It streaked past at a distance, a blur of light and motion that seemed more like shooting stars in a distant galaxy than vehicles filled with people. Laughing, listening to the radio, dozing. They were as disconnected from him as the silver crescent moon that hung askance above the trees.

  Still, he straightened his tie. Smiled. When the headlights touched his face, he was sheepish and apologetic, his mouth quirked charmingly and arms outstretched.

  “Hey,” he said as the car slowed down and the passenger-side window made its steady descent. He couldn’t see the driver, so he took a careful, measured step and bent to peer inside. “I was in a bit of an accident and—”

  He couldn’t stop himself from recoiling, from shuddering as if the person in the driver’s seat was an apparition, so freakish and grotesque he had no choice but to flinch in shock. But that was ridiculous. Flesh and blood. Nothing more. He took a breath, forced a smile. “What are you doing here?”

  The moment the words were out of his mouth, he knew the answer.

  In some ways, he had known all along.

  * * *

  5554403686

  Mariah K.

  24, Caucasian, GED

  Short blond hair, blue eyes, average height and weight. Soft-spoken but articulate.

  Little to no family support.

  MAN/DEL CS, 36m, 16w

  CHAPTER 1

  THE KITCHEN WAS cold, the air flat and vacant. Lonely. Jessica shivered as she clung to the doorframe with one hand and bent to slide on her shoes, kitten heels in a leopard print that struck a dissonant chord in the stillness of the hollow room. Coffee. That’s what was missing. Jess puffed a frustrated breath through her nose. Of course she had forgotten to make coffee.

  Jess straightened up and crossed the kitchen at a determined clip, her shoes clicking a confident rhythm that left little room for remorse. But it was there.

  Sometimes she missed him so much it ached.

  For the fifteen years of their marriage, Evan had made the coffee. Every night, while Jess was smoothing night cream on her face and brushing her teeth with the baking soda toothpaste she preferred, he was grinding beans. Such a simple thing to do, and the little measuring scoop made the recipe foolproof, but nobody could brew a pot of coffee like Evan could. He set the timer for seven o’clock so that when Jessica walked downstairs in the slanting, early light, the house was fragrant and welcoming.

  “Get a grip,” Jessica whispered, flicking on the fixture above the sink and lifting the tin of Folgers from the cupboard. She didn’t have time these days for grinding whole, gourmet beans, but the hit of caffeine was nonnegotiable.

  While she measured the grinds and filled the carafe with water, Jess reminded herself again of all the reasons she had kicked him out. It was a daily ritual. Sometimes hourly.

  Evan Chamberlain was a workaholic. Before he moved out, he had become an absent husband and father who was more committed to his caseload than his wife and boys. He was distracted and selfish, obsessed with the lives of his patients. Addicted to his phone. Evan stayed at work late and forgot her birthday and had become a roommate instead of a lover and friend. When he was home, he slept. And snored. Loudly.

  In the end, Jess didn’t have a choice. But in moments like these, when the house raised goose bumps along her arms, she missed him so much she felt scraped out, hollow.

  “Are there any muffins left?”

  Jess pivoted to find her thirteen-year-old son framed in the double-wide archway that opened onto the dining room. Beyond the harvest table she could see the welcoming arrangement of her creamy linen couches, the sweeping open staircase, the oversized front door hung with a rustic olive wreath. But Jessica wasn’t admiring the view or the artful rearranging the interior designers had recently overcharged her for. She only had eyes for Max. He was rumpled and bleary-eyed, his mop of blond hair sticking up in every direction. She almost told him he was overdue for a haircut, but she bit back the comment and smiled instead. It didn’t take much to set Max off these days. “Good morning, handsome.”

  He grunted.

  “Breakfast before shower?” Jess asked, her tone wafer light. No response. Her smile crumbled away. “The muffins are gone, but there might be a blueberry scone in the breadbasket. Would you like me to scramble some eggs for you?”

  “Nah.”

  “You love scrambled eggs. With cheese?”

  “I want scrambled eggs.” A voice from the hallway preceded the entrance of Jessica’s baby—though he was hardly a baby anymore. Gabe padded into the kitchen in bare feet and football pajama pants that Jess realized were at least a size too small—the hems barely grazed his ankles. Gabe yawned noisily, shuffling across the linoleum floor with his eyes squinted almost shut. He reached for Jess and wrapped his arms around her, burying his face in her stomach. “Eggs with lots of cheese,” he murmured against her. “That’s my favorite.”

  Jess tried not to visibly melt at his touch. Max had accused her for years of playing favorites, but it was hard not to bask in Gabe’s generous spirit. He was a lover, an encourager who was liberal with his affection and his laughter. These days, if Jess wanted to hug her firstborn, she had to steal it while he was sleeping. And even then she risked waking him up and making him furious at the weight of her hand on his forehead.

  “Good morning, honey.” Jess squeezed her youngest close. He had recently hit a growth spurt, and his head fit snugly against the curve below her rib cage, just above the soft spot that would have been his home for nine months had he grown in her womb instead of in her heart. Though that wasn’t quite true. Gabe didn’t exactly “grow in her heart” like the poem on the front cover of his baby album proclaimed. He appeared there overnight, an explosion of unexpected emotion that overtook her in the moment that Evan sat her down and said, “So, there’s this boy . . .”

  Gabe was a mushroom cloud, a force of nature, a big bang that defied every theory she had once thought to be true. He was a complete stranger and wholly her son.

  “Eggs it is,” Jess said, raking her fingers through his dark hair. He was, in so many ways, the opposite of his brother. “You too, Max? There’s plenty of time.”

  “I’m good.” He pushed back from the counter where he had been leaning and palmed an apple as he headed out of the room.

  “That’s it? You have to eat more than just an apple.”

  “I’ll eat at school.”r />
  “Doughnuts,” Jess muttered, remembering that she still hadn’t written an email to the superintendent suggesting that maybe it wasn’t the best idea to let the cheerleaders sell doughnuts before school.

  “Why aren’t there doughnuts at my school?” Gabe wondered, rubbing his face against her stomach and crumpling the sheer fabric of her blouse. It would be wrinkled for the rest of the day. Jess extracted herself carefully and kissed the top of his head. He smelled of coconut shampoo and shea butter and sleep, her favorite combination.

  “Because doughnuts aren’t good for you.”

  “Are eggs?”

  “Yes.” Jess grabbed the frying pan from the cupboard while Gabe went to riffle through the refrigerator for the egg carton. “On the bottom shelf,” she told him. “Behind the yogurt. Be careful.”

  He brought the eggs to her attentively, eyes fixed and serious as he balanced the cardboard in small hands that still bore the chubbiness of his toddler years. In some ways, Jess wished that he would never change, that he could remain as innocent and sweet as the little boy who still believed that someday he could marry his mommy. But beneath that fragile yearning was the hope that life would get better with time. That Gabe would grow out of all the things his doctors and therapists rather cavalierly chalked up to minor developmental delays. Some days, Jess would give almost anything to fast-forward to a time when Gabe’s differences would be relegated to the past, a mere footnote in his personal history that she could smile tenderly about in retrospect. Remember when . . . ?

  “Thank you,” Jess said, giving him a genuine smile. “Why don’t you put the orange juice on the table, too?” And then she was turning on the burner and cracking eggs and breaking the sunny yolks with the side of a spatula. She was so lost in her own thoughts she didn’t even hear the phone ring until Gabe was answering it. “Manners!” she reminded him as she spun from the stove. “Remember, we say: ‘Hello, this is the Chamberlains . . .’ ”