AUGUST 2016
Caitlin wasn’t sure how long she’d been asleep, but the words woke her with the stopping of her heart. She could tell right away that it was Bear’s voice, not one of her own boys’, coming from down the hall, but it was in her biological programming—in every mother’s organic makeup—that those words would have woken her anytime, anywhere.
“I want my mommy.”
That voice—it wasn’t just whiny, or tired, or confused. It was heartbroken. She could hear Finn’s murmurs, attempting to hush him, and more pathetic little cries from Bear that clawed at her gut until she thought she might vomit. But then she heard Finn padding into the kitchen, and feigned sleep as she listened to the opening of the refrigerator, the soft popping of the milk carton, some fumbling among the sippy cups and lids in the dish drainer, and then a second creak of the refrigerator door before his steps retreated to the sofa bed.
She waited until she could no longer hear any shuffles or sighs, not even the slightest creak from the cabin itself or anyone in it, and untangled herself from the mess of blankets on the couch. She knew now what she hadn’t wanted to admit when she’d drifted off earlier. This wasn’t going to work. Talking sense into Finn was simply going to take too long. Because lying there in the darkness, hearing that tiny little I want my mommy playing over and over in her head, the emphasis on the word mommy as if it were an inalienable right he’d been denied, it became clear that another minute was too long, let alone hours, possibly days …
It was up to Caitlin to get Bear home. It was the only thing she could do to redeem herself. And even if she was beyond redemption, it was just the right thing to do.
She rose as quietly as she could and made her way down the hall and into the master bedroom, pausing every few steps to listen for sounds of anyone else awake. There were none. With both hands, she felt her way through the darkness past the hulking wood footboard of the bed and into the adjoining master bathroom, shut the door carefully behind her, and only then flipped the light switch. She squinted into the brightness of the white globe bulbs mounted above the vanity, letting her eyes adjust. Then she pulled open all three panels of the mirrored medicine cabinet and stood back and surveyed its contents.
For the first time ever, Caitlin was grateful for her mother-in-law being so uptight, and for her father-in-law always reaching for the quickest ways to keep his wife happy. They were all here—the anti-anxiety meds, the prescription sleep aids. It was an impressively stocked pharmacy for a second house that Beverly hardly even visited anymore. Caitlin knew that this was nothing compared to the mother lode she’d surely find at their estate in Ohio—not that she’d ever been in their bedroom there. She was still too much of a guest and not enough of a family member for that.
Caitlin herself hardly ever took medicine unless she absolutely had to. Those years of trying to get pregnant, and then being pregnant, and then nursing, she’d gotten used to suffering through cold and flu season on nothing but an occasional Tylenol. Her father-in-law had once gently joked, after Caitlin may have overreacted to a giant red goose egg that appeared on Leo’s head while her in-laws were babysitting—the origins of which they had not the slightest idea—that Caitlin herself could perhaps benefit from an occasional Xanax. Obviously he’d never come to know her very well; the idea was ridiculous. Beneath her smooth surface, Caitlin was far too anxious to take an anti-anxiety pill. What if it affected her strangely? What if she didn’t feel like herself? Or what if she liked it too much? What if she did something out of character in front of the boys?
No. Not for her.
Caitlin lifted the first prescription bottle timidly and read its label. Then another. And another. Her ears strained for any sounds of Finn rousing.
The only way Finn would let her walk out of here with Bear was if Finn was unable to stop her. And the only way that was going to happen was if he didn’t have his faculties about him. Confusion or exhaustion probably wouldn’t cut it. She was going to have to render him unconscious.
But she didn’t want to harm him. It would have to be just enough for him to perhaps feel sick, to let his guard down and doze off, and to not be easily woken. By the time he came to, she might even have made it all the way to Asheville with Bear and the twins. At least, she’d have a pretty good head start. She’d never driven directly there from here, but she guessed it to be about three hours.
After much deliberation, she twisted the childproof top off the bottle of Ambien. She shook out an oblong white pill and touched it briefly to the tip of her tongue. She couldn’t detect much of a taste. Some chalkiness, maybe a bit of a mineral flavor. She’d have to mask it, to be sure, but at least it didn’t have the strong bitterness of, say, a Tylenol that didn’t go down with the first swig of water.
Ambien it was.
She would have to slip it into his morning coffee, the first chance she got—there was no telling what else the day might bring. That meant she’d have to use enough of the sleep aid to overpower the caffeine. She shuddered at what could happen if she gave him too much—but it was risky to underdose him, too. How to determine the sweet spot in between? She knew better than to search the Web. She couldn’t afford to leave any evidence of her plan, in case something went horribly wrong.
Just as when she’d gotten in the car and driven down here, she was going to have to wing it.
21
AUGUST 2016
In another universe, one where things had played out differently, Violet might have been glad—giddy, even—to find out all these years later that Finn had looked for her right away after all. That he had flown home from the beach, as she had, still thinking of their encounter, of how he might find her against the odds, of the fact that there was something unfinished between them—something that could be the start of something new, something wonderful, something real, something meant to be.
So what if he had been detoured on his path to finding the woman he’d been looking for all along?