Nora
Salve’s fingers gently brush over the spot that still smarts from Agent Brown’s slap. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” I answer and lift my chin.
Salve backs away a few steps. “Nora, what did you mean?”
I sigh. “About what?”
“About holidays and game nights?”
“I meant nothing. It was stupid to say.” I tuck my hair behind my ears. “Can I really leave tomorrow?”
Salve rubs a hand on his head. “Yes. Although you have to continue to see Dr. Richardson weekly and you can’t travel until this storm’s over.”
“I should call Aubry. So they can plan to pick me up when it’s safe to drive.”
Salve nods but says nothing.
“I don’t want to talk to Brown again today.”
Salve smirks. “I don’t think she wants to talk to you, either.”
“Can Eve stay? I don’t mind visiting with her.”
“I can ask.”
I nod. Salve brings me an ice pack from the nurses station and I want to laugh. A little sting from an open handed slap doesn’t need an ice pack but I don’t tell him that. I have to choose my words carefully.
“She has a gift for making people uncomfortable,” Eve says from the doorway.
“What?”
“Agent Brown.”
“Oh. Yes. She’s . . . an irritant.”
“She’s only trying to help, Nora.” Eve comes to the chair near my bed and sits.
“Yes. Help Lotte.”
“She’s the only one who needs it.”
“But what about Holden?”
“He’s broken the law. He has to be punished for what he’s done. Nora, he’s killed people.”
I look at my lap. I don’t like to be reminded of some things. What significance do laws hold? What about his laws? Don’t they count? Who is to judge right and wrong when they are only shades of gray?
Eve huffs. “Okay. Listen. Let’s talk about something else. You can talk about Holden with your shrink. Are you excited to finally go home?”
I look at Eve. At this woman who I don’t like but who has known Holden. A link to him. “I am loth to go. What does home hold for me now?”
Eve doesn’t speak, but she has raised her head, chin resting on her knees now. “How do I go back to my life before? It seems . . . lurid.”
“Your words confuse me. Can you just say what you mean?”
“Home seems pale in comparison to the last year. The mountains are so beautiful. The landscape so peaceful. Everything here is so loud and intrusive.”
Now Eve nods. “I had that feeling, too. It was hard to sleep for a long time. Partly because of the nightmares and partly because every sound kept me up. I swore I could hear electricity.”
“Yes! Me, too. I can hear it. It is so different up there. Silent and calm.”
Eve stares out the window at the snow tumbling down. “Nora, do you love Lotte?”
“Like my own child.”
“What did you mean, ‘come with you’?”
“Live in my house with me. Come home with me. You don’t have a home here and Holden won’t be stupid enough to bring Lotte into town now.”
“Tell me she’s still my sister. Tell me she’s not . . .” A tense silence hangs between us.
“Like me?” Eve won’t meet my eye but I understand what she’s getting at. I wish, on some base level, that I felt bad for my feelings but I don’t. “Let’s see. Oh, I know.”
I have the perfect memory to share with Eve.
I can’t find Lotte and Holden isn’t back from hunting yet. I call her name throughout the cabin but get no answer. Stepping onto the porch, I faintly hear a scraping sound in the distance. I walk toward the room Holden’s been working on for weeks now. It’s almost finished. When I round the side, I see Lotte. Lotte never looks at the structure Holden builds, in fact, she avoids it when possible.
“What are you doing?” She’s holding a hand saw and cutting a rectangular shaped chunk from the base of the structure. Her eyes widen and she stops her sawing motion. She closes her eyes for a brief moment, as if steeling herself for what she’s about to say.
“Please trust me,” she says. I blink absently and frown.
“Lotte, Holden will be mad that you’re ruining his hard work.”
Lotte looks at the saw. Her face scrunches into a determined look. She passes the saw through the wood one more time, until a wooden brick chunk falls to the grass at her feet. She picks up the wooden brick and slides it back into the wall. Holden’s truck echoes as it approaches. Lotte jumps with a squeak and picks up the saw. Setting the saw back on the stump where it was earlier, she turns and says, “Nora, don’t tell.” I’m flabbergasted. Lotte has never shown such petulance before but the emotion in her eyes pleads with me. Whatever she believes she’s done, she truly believes it’s for a good reason. It’s plain as day in her expression.
“Come wash up, we’ll talk about it later,” I say. Lotte visibly relaxes. I can’t help but wonder what she’s up to as I follow her back into the cabin.
Tears spill over Eve’s cheeks. “I didn’t mean to upset you,” I say.
She shakes her head. “You didn’t. It just . . . it hurts knowing she went through all that horrific stuff with me, then went through it again with you. It scares me, knowing she was alone with him for months before you showed up.”
“She’s okay.” Eve lays her head on the edge of my bed. I rest a hand on top of it. “I’ll get her back.”
Eve lifts her head. She shoots me a look. “Nora, how?”
I reach an arm inside the neck of my gown and finger the thin raised line. “He will come for me.” I tell her.
“He has no way to get off the mountain. No money. A missing girl with him. He’s not stupid.”
“You’re right and wrong. He has money and he is not stupid. But he is in love.”