Live To Tell
Wendy Corsi Staub
Avon Books, March 2009

PROLOGUE

New York City

He lunges across Sixth Avenue mid-block and against the light, leaving in his wake squealing brakes, honking horns, angry curses through car windows.

No need to look over his shoulder; he knows they’re back there, closing in on him.

Darting up the east side of Sixth, he blows through an obstacle course of office workers on smoke breaks, tourists walking four abreast, businessmen lined up at street food carts. Ignoring the indignant shouts of jostled pedestrians, he searches the urban landscape as he runs. July heat radiates in waves from concrete and asphalt. Sweat soaks his tee shirt.

Just ahead, across Fortieth Street, he spots the subway entrance. For a split second, he considers diving down the stairs. If a train happens to be just pulling in, he can hop on and lose them–at least for the time being.

If there’s no train, he’ll be trapped like a rat in a hole--unless he hoofs it through the dark tunnel and risks being electrocuted by the third rail or flattened by an oncoming express.

No thanks.

Nothing can happen to him. Not now. Not when the plan is about to come to fruition.

Not when sweet victory is so close he can taste it like sugar.

He races past the subway, his thoughts careening through various scenarios of how the next few minutes of his life might play out. They all end the same way: he’s apprehended. Incarcerated.

Even if he could possibly hide in midtown Manhattan in broad daylight with the cops hot on his trail, it makes no sense to try. The NYPD aren’t the only ones looking for him.

At least if he’s arrested, he’ll be safe–for now.

But first, he has to stash the file where no one can possibly stumble across it–and where he himself will easily be able to retrieve it and resume his plan. When he’s free.

Where? Come on, think. Think!

If only he had time to open a safe deposit box somewhere.

If only he could bury it like treasure, entrust it to a stranger for safekeeping, throw it into an envelope addressed to a trusted friend in a far-off place...

Before all this, he had a circle of confidantes.

Now, he trusts no one other than Mike.

He tried to call his old friend yesterday, since he has a vested interest in this thing.

He did leave a message: “Mike, it’s me. Dude, I was right. It’s bigger than I thought. I’ll be in touch.”

Now that he’s had time to think things through, though, he’s glad he didn’t reach Mike. Better not to drag him into this dangerous game.

He bounds across Fortieth and up the wide concrete steps into Bryant Park, zigzagging northeast past dog walkers and the carousel; past stroller-pushing nannies and office workers eating lunch out of clear plastic deli containers.

Approaching the crowded outdoor dining patio of the Bryant Park Cafe, he spots a commotion beside the entrance. A young wife tries to soothe the screaming baby propped against her shoulder as her agitated husband argues loudly with the hostess about a reservation. The baby’s stroller is abandoned in his path, a fuzzy pink stuffed animal lying on the ground beside it.

Seeing it, he’s struck by an idea–one that’s either so far out there it’ll never work, or so far out there that it has to work.

There’s no time to sit around considering the odds.

Rather than leap over the stuffed animal, he scoops it up as he passes, hoping bystanders are too busy watching the argument at the hostess stand to notice. He doesn’t bother to look back, and nobody calls out after him as he cannonballs down the wide concrete steps on the north side of the park.

Emerging onto West Forty-Second Street, he hurtles eastward, passing the main branch of the library. He scoots across Fifth Avenue amid hordes of pedestrians in the crosswalk, then across East Forty-Second against the red Don’t Walk sign. With the stuffed animal tucked under his right arm, high against his chestlike a football, he sprints the remaining block and a half to Grand Central Terminal.

No one–not even the national guardsmen on patrol in this post 9/11 era--gives him a second glance as he races at full speed from the Vanderbilt entrance toward the cavernous Main Concourse. Otherwise-civilized people zip pell-mell through here all the time. The MTA conducts its Metro North commuter line on a precise schedule; a few seconds’ delay might mean waiting an hour to catch the next train to the northern suburbs.

It’s been awhile, yet he knows the layout of vast rail station very well. Knows the location of the ticket counters and subway ramps, the arched whispering gallery near the Oyster Bar, the upper and lower level tracks, the Station Master’s office, the food court, the Lost and Found...

The Lost and Found.

Looking furtively over his shoulder, he spots a blue uniform at the far end of the corridor. Changing direction, he veers toward the steep bank of escalators leading to the subway station below Grand Central, slowing his pace just enough to be sure the cop has time to spot him. Then he skirts down the left side of the escalator with the harried walkers, past the line-up of riders holding the rubber rail along the right.

At the bottom, he hops the turnstile. Predictably, those behind him protest loudly. He races through the familiar network of corridors to an exit and a set of stairs leading up to Grand Central Terminal again, closer to Lexington Avenue. Again, he runs toward the main concourse, emerging at last beneath the domed pale blue ceiling with its celestial markings.

He takes the stairs beneath the balcony back down to the lower level, and then ducks into a doorway leading to an empty track.

Panting, huddled in the shadows against the wall, he turns the stuffed animal over and over, looking for the most unobtrusive spot.

There.

With his index finger, he probes at a seam in the synthetic fur. The toy is well made; it takes a few moments before the stitching gives way. He creates a small tear just wide enough.

Then he takes the memory stick from his wallet and shoves it into the hole until it disappears into the stuffing.

Swiftly examining the toy, he convinces himself no one could possibly discover the gap in the seam unless they were looking for it.

He tucks the animal under his arm again and scurries back out into the station and down a short corridor to the Lost and Found.

“Can I help you, sir?” asks the middle-aged woman at the service window, looking up from sorting through a labeled bin marked February: Mittens and Gloves.

Winded, he holds up the stuffed animal. “I just found this.”

She reaches for a pen. “Where? On a train?”

“No...on the floor.”

“Where on the floor?”

“By the clock,” he improvises.

She doesn’t ask which clock. In this terminal, “the clock” means the antique timepiece with four luminescent opal faces that sits atop the information booth, a meeting spot for thousands of New Yorkers every day.

“All right—“ She reaches for a form— “if you can fill this out and--”

“Sorry,” he cuts in, “but if I don’t catch the 4:39, my wife is going to kill me.”

“It’s only–“

He’s already out the door.

He takes the stairs back up to the main concourse two at a time. Nearby, at the base of the escalators leading up to the Pan Am building, a transit cop scans the crowd while speaking into a radio.

A moment later, the cop spots him, and he knows it’s over.

For now.


CHAPTER ONE

Glenhaven Park, New York

“MOMMY, HEEEEELLLLLLLLLPPPPP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Startled by her daughter’s scream, Lauren Walsh drops the apple she was about to peel and bolts from the kitchen, taking the paring knife with her, just in case.

Sadie is in the living room–in one piece, thank God, and sitting on the couch in front of the television, right where Lauren left her about two minutes ago. Tears stream down her face.

“What’s wrong, sweetie? What happened?”

“Fred! Fred’s gone!”

She immediately grasps the situation, seeing the contents of Sadie’s little Vera Bradley tote dumped on the couch beside her: a sticker album and stickers, a couple of Mardi Gras necklaces, a feather boa, and the pack of Juicyfruit Lauren bought her at Hudson News right before they got on the train.

So there’s no intruder to fight off with a paring knife. She loosens her grasp on the handle, the notion of using it as a weapon suddenly seeming laughable.

Almost laughable, anyway.

Lauren has never been the kind of woman who checked the closets and under the bed. She spent dauntless years on her own, single in the city, before she met Nick.

But this is different. Living alone with a preschooler in a sprawling Victorian while the older kids are gone at sleepaway camp and their dad is–well, gone–has bred a certain degree of paranoia, no doubt about it.

“Mommy, find Fred!” Sadie’s cherubic face is stricken, her green eyes filled with tears.

Before Nick moved out last winter, Fred was just another stuffed animal on Sadie’s shelf. Someone brought it to the hospital back when Sadie was born, with a mylar It’s A Girl balloon tied to its wrist.

When Nick left, all three of the kids developed strange new habits. Ryan took to biting his nails. Lucy pulled out her eyelashes. Poor little Sadie, already a notoriously fussy eater, now lives on white bread, peanut butter, and the occasional sliced apple. She also regressed to thumb sucking and pants-wetting, and started dragging the pink plush rabbit, newly christened Fred, everywhere she went.

Which wasn’t much of anywhere until recently, because Lauren couldn’t bring herself to leave the house most days. She felt as if the whole town was talking about her husband leaving her for another woman.

Probably because they really were talking about it. In a tiny suburban hamlet like Glenhaven Park, the gossip mill runs as efficiently as the commuter train line.

“Mommy.”

“It’s okay, Sadie. Where’s Chauncey? Maybe he took Fred.” God knows their border collie has been known to steal a fuzzy slipper or two—which is why he hasn’t been allowed upstairs in the bedrooms in years.

“No, Fred wasn’t in my bag. He didn’t come into the house with me.”

“Okay, so he’s probably in the car.”

“Go look! Please!”

Lauren is already headed for the kitchen to exchange the paring knife for her keys, biting her tongue. It’s probably not good parenting to say, “I told you so” to a four year-old.

But she did tell Sadie not to bring Fred with them to the city today. And when she insisted, Lauren wanted to carry the stuffed rabbit herself, worried Sadie would lose it.

Sadie protested so vehemently that it was simply easier to give in. More bad parenting.

And the fact that Lauren’s about to serve apple slices with a side of peanut butter for dinner doesn’t exactly cancel it out. But why bother cooking for two—one finicky preschooler and one mom who lost her appetite, along with a lot of other things, in the divorce drama.

The screen door squeaks as Lauren steps out the back door into the hot glare of late afternoon sun. The neighborhood at this hour is so still she can hear the bumblebees lazing in the coneflowers beside the small service porch.

She could cut some of the purple and white blooms and bring them inside.

But again, why bother? It’s just her and Sadie.

Why bother…why bother…

So goes the depressing refrain.

There was a time when she didn’t consider cooking or gardening a bother at all.

She remembers wandering around the yard with pruning shears on summer days as Ryan and Lucy romped on the wooden play set. She’d fill the house with a hodgepodge of colorful flowers arranged in Depression-era tinted glass Ball jars discovered on a cobwebby shelf in the basement. Then she’d feed and bathe the kids early, letting them stay up just long enough to greet Nick off the commuter train. He’d tell her about his day as they shared a bottle of wine over a home-cooked dinner for two, something decadent and cooked in butter or smothered in melted cheese.

That was before Nick became overly health conscious—which, surprise, surprise, was not long before he left.

But she doesn’t want to think about that.

Nor does she necessarily want to think about the good old days, but she can’t seem to help herself. It was on one of those hot summer nights, Lauren recalls, that Sadie the Oops Baby was conceived, after an unhealthy, fattening romantic dinner laced with cabernet and Van Morrison.

The pregnancy put on hold their plans to remodel the house. They were going to expand the kitchen, add a mudroom, replace the back stoop with a deck–something that wouldn’t clash with the Queen Anne style. Nick was a big believer in preservation of architectural integrity.

Only when it came to marital integrity did he run into trouble.

They never did get around to remodeling.

Now they never will.

Lauren gazes up at the house–two stories, plus a large attic beneath the steep, gabled roof.

The clapboard façade, fish-scale shingles, and gingerbread trim are done in period shades of ochre and brick red. The classic Victorian design—tall, shuttered bay windows, a cupola, and a spindled, wraparound porch--charmed her the first time she laid eyes on it, years ago.

Painted Lady Potential, proclaimed the ad in the Sunday Times real estate section.

She kept reading. It got better.

Four bedroom, two bath fixer-upper in family neighborhood. Eat-in kitchen, large, level yard, detached garage. Walk to shops, train, schools.

It was located, the Realtor told her when she called about the ad, on Elm Street in Glenhaven Park. Elm Street—evocative of leafy, small town charm. Elm Street—where families live happily ever after.

Sight unseen, Lauren was sold.

Nick was not. “Nightmare on Elm Street,” he told Lauren. “Ever see that movie?”

She hadn’t. But lately, she’s been feeling as though she lived it.

How did she end up living alone in the house of their dreams?

She’ll never forget the day she and Nick first set foot inside, looked at each other, and nodded. They knew. They knew this house would become home.

It—like the fact that they’d found each other, fallen in love, gotten married—seemed too good to be true.

They marveled at the china doorknobs, gaslight fixtures, cast-iron radiators, chair rails, and pocket doors; high ceilings with crown molding; the ornate wooden staircase in the entrance hall. There were even a couple of hidden compartments where the nineteenth century owners had stashed their valuables.

Yes, the place needed work. So what? They were young and had a lifetime ahead of them.

Now Lauren wonders, as she often has for the past few months, whether she’ll have to sell the house. Some days, she wants to list it as soon as possible. Others, she’s certain she can’t bear to let go.

What’s the old saying?

If something seems too good to be true, it probably is.

She takes a deep breath, inhaling the green scent of freshly mown grass. The lawn service guys must have been here today while she and Sadie were in the city. The flowerbeds have been freshly weeded and the boxwood hedge has been shorn into a precision horizontal border.

The yard looks a lot tidier than it did in summers past, when she handled the gardening and Nick mowed. But when they moved up here from the city, they never wanted that manicured landscape style. They never wanted to become one of those suburban Westchester families that relied on others to maintain the yard, the house, and the pets, even the kids.

Yeah, and look at us now.

First came the weekly cleaning service Lauren’s friends insisted on hiring for her right after she had Sadie. By the time the two-month gift certificate expired, colic was in full swing and Lauren was relieved to let someone else continue to clean the toilets and do the laundry.

She kept the cleaning service.

By the time Sadie was toddling, her older siblings’ travel sports teams kept the whole family on the go. Chauncey was left behind so often that Lauren was forced to hire a dog-walking service. Sure, she occasionally misses those early morning or dusk strolls with Chauncey–but not enough to go back to doing it daily.

She kept the dog walkers, too.

Nick hired the lawn service last March, just in time for the spring thaw, as he put it–ironic, because it was also just in time for the killing frost that ended their marriage.

Yes, she had seen it coming. For a few months before it happened, anyway. That didn’t make it any easier for her to bear.

And the kids--Lauren hates Nick for their pain; hates herself, perhaps, even more. She was the one who’d gone to great lengths to maintain the happy family myth, such great lengths that the separation blindsided all three of them.

Nick had wanted to tell Ryan and Lucy last fall that they were seeing a marriage counselor. But Lauren was afraid they’d start piecing things together, suspecting the affair. Or that they’d ask pointed questions that would demand the ugly truth or whitewashed lies.

Nick was probably right–though she wouldn’t admit that to him. They should have given the kids a heads up when things first started to unravel.

He was right, too, that sending Ryan and Lucy away to camp for eight weeks was the healthiest thing for everyone.

When he suggested it back around Easter, Lauren–who for years had frowned upon parents who shipped their kids hundreds of miles to spend summers in the woods among strangers–had taken a good, hard look at what their own household had become. She was forced to recognize that her older children would be better off elsewhere while she picked up the pieces.

Still, she didn’t give in to Nick about camp without a fight. God forbid she make anything easy on him in the blur of angry, bitter days after he left. She wanted only to make him suffer.

In the end, though, Ryan and Lucy went to camp.

They were homesick at first–so homesick Lauren was tempted, whenever she opened the mailbox to another woe-is-me letter, to drive up there and bring them both home. Now that it’s almost August, though, it’s clear from their letters that Ryan and Lucy are having a blast in the Adirondacks.

Lauren has only Sadie to worry about for the time being, while she figures out how to move on after two decades of marriage.

She has yet to come up with a long-term plan. It’s hard enough to keep her voice from breaking as she reads bedtime stories in an empty house, to fix edible meals for two–and to keep tabs on Sadie’s toys.

Find Fred.

She walks down the back porch steps, past fat bumblebees lazing in the flowers, and crosses over to the Volvo parked on the driveway.

Please let Fred be in the back seat...

Please let Fred be in the back seat...

Fred is not in the back seat.

A lot of other crap is: crumpled straw wrappers, a dog-eared coloring book and two melted crayons, a nearly empty tube of Coppertone Kids, a couple of fossilized Happy Meal fries, and one of Sadie’s long-missing mittens whose partner Lauren finally threw away in May.

Lauren carries it all back into the house and dumps it into the kitchen garbage before returning, empty-handed, to the living room.

Sadie, tear-stained and sucking her thumb, looks up expectantly.

“Sweetie, you must have dropped him, somewhere in the city. I couldn’t find–“

Cut off by a deafening wail, Lauren helplessly sinks onto the couch. “Oh, Sadie, come here.” She gathers her daughter into her arms, stroking her downy hair–not as blonde this summer as it has been in years past.

Is it because she’s growing up?

Or because she’s been stuck hibernating with a shell-shocked mother who’s barely been able to drag herself out of bed and face the light of day…

Riddled with guilt, Lauren says, “I’m sorry, baby.” About so much more than the lost toy.

“I want Fred! I love him! Please,” Sadie begs. “I need him back”

I know how you feel.

In silence, Lauren swallows the ache in her own throat and fishes a crumpled tissue in the back pocket of khaki shorts that last August felt a size too small. Now they’re a few sizes too big, cinched at the waist with her fourteen-year-old’s belt.

The Devastation Diet. Maybe she should write a book.

Lauren wipes her daughter’s tears, then, surreptitiously, her own. “Come on, calm down. It’s going to be okay.”

“I want Fred!”

Lauren sighs. “So do I.”

I want a lot of other things, too.

Looks like we’re both going to have to suck it up, baby girl.

“Please, Mommy, please...where is he? Where? Where?”

“Shh, let me think.”

Mentally retracing their steps, Lauren is sure the stuffed animal was with them in the cab from her sister Alyssa’s apartment to Grand Central, because it almost fell out of Sadie’s bag when they climbed out on Lexington. She remembers carrying both Sadie and the bag across the crowded sidewalk, through the wooden doors, along the Graybar passageway. She set Sadie down and gave the bag back to her when they stopped to buy a New York Post and some gum at Hudson News.

“You must have dropped Fred at the station or on the train. Next time we go to the city we can check Lost and Found at Grand Central,” Lauren promises.

That’s not going to cut it: Sadie opens her mouth and wails.

Now what?

Lauren closes her eyes and lifts her face toward the ceiling.

Where the hell is Fred?

Never mind that, where the hell is Nick?

Why does he get to start a new life and leave Lauren here alone to handle the fallout from the old? Lost toys, lost souls...none of it seems to be his problem anymore. No, he’s moved on to a two-bedroom condo down in White Plains–furnished with “really cool stuff,” according to Lucy. Complete with a “gi-mongous, kick-butt flat-screen,” according to Ryan. On a high floor, “close to God and the moon,” according to Sadie.

“Good for Daddy,” Lauren says whenever the kids tell her stuff like that. She tries hard to keep sarcasm from lacing her words because you’re not supposed to speak negatively about your ex to the children. That’s got to be right up there with letting them have their way, saying Why Bother? and I Told You So, and giving them apples for dinner.

Then again, as far as Lauren’s concerned, any bad parenting on her part is vastly outdone by the ultimate worst parenting on Nick’s. Walking out on three kids pretty much takes the prize, right?

Sadie sobs on.

Lauren’s eyes snap open.

“You know what? Daddy will get Fred for you.”

That’s right. Let Daddy deal with something for a change.

THE BEST GIFT
Written as “Wendy Markham”
(Sequel to IF ONLY IN MY DREAMS)

PROLOGUE

New York City

October 2008

This isn’t the first time Clara Becker has ridden the rickety old elevator to the fourth floor in the prewar Bronx apartment building, and she doesn’t like to think that it might be the last.

But reality can’t be ignored, and so she does her best to memorize the exquisite grillwork on the elevator door, and the echoing creak as it slides open, and the scent of pot roast that greets her in the corridor.

Always pot roast. Maybe one of the fourth floor tenants actually cooks the same thing day in and day out. Or maybe it’s simply a homey cooking smell that evokes the nostalgia of pot roast, and family, and cozy rainy days indoors.

Today is a rainy day, all right—but she hasn’t spent much of it indoors. She ran errands all morning, then met her good friend and former makeup artists Jesus DeJesus in Tribeca for lunch.

“What’s the occasion?” he asked, when she suggested an upscale bistro, her treat.

“No occasion, I just miss you,” she told him—not the entire truth. Yes, she does miss him; they don’t see each other nearly as often now that she’s married and no longer a regularly employed actress.

But that’s not the only reason she wanted to have lunch. She was pretty sure, though, that if she said she had something to tell him, he’d get the wrong idea. Aware that she’s been auditioning again lately, he might assume she’s landed a plum role in some film—or at least back in the soaps, where she spent her early career.

That couldn’t be farther from what she had to tell him—and when she broke the real news, his reaction was even more dramatic than she’d anticipated.

“Noooooo!” he wailed. “How could you do this to me?”

She didn’t bother to point out that it wasn’t really about him. Jesus has a notorious flair for making everything about him. She used to find it an endearing quirk, but it wore thin pretty quickly today.

“Can’t you just be happy for me?” she interrupted his ongoing lament.

“How can I be happy knowing this is going to be the final nail in the coffin of our friendship?”

Clara was emotionally spent by the time she left the restaurant and hopped on the subway to the Bronx. Hopefully, Doris won’t take the news as hard.

Reaching the door marked 4D, she knocks loudly with the heel of her palm, the way Doris taught her to do.

“Don’t be shy--for God’s sake, give it some good solid whacks,” the old woman told her on her first visit. “Otherwise I’ll never hear you and you’ll stand out here for days.”

“Hold your horses, I’m here, I’m here,” a familiar voice calls now, from the other side of the door. When it flies open, Clara momentarily expects, as always, to find herself looking at an adolescent tomboy with red pigtails, freckles, and impish blue eyes.

The eyes are impish, all right, and the same deep shade of blue. But they’re peering at her through a thick pair of bifocals. It’s been decades since the freckles faded from a face now trenched in wrinkles, and the red pigtails gave way to a snow white up-do.

Decades since this octogenarian was a precocious kid sister. Jed’s kid sister.

“What a nice surprise!” She hugs Clara. “You poor thing, you’re drenched. Don’t you have an umbrella?”

“I do, but it’s that sideways kind of rain that soaks you anyway.” Clara tries to shake the droplets from her long brown hair, but wringing it out would probably be more effective.

“Oh, and I brought a little treat for you.” She hands over a white paper shopping bag.

Doris peeks inside, then lets out a delighted squeal. “Licorice snaps! Aren’t you a sweetheart. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

“You really shouldn’t have. I know money is tight, and these aren’t cheap.” Like a little girl, Doris tears into the package and pops a couple of the bright-colored candies into her mouth. “Do you know that when I was a girl, these used to sell for two cents a box?”

Clara does know, because Doris told her. Several times. Like most elderly people, she likes to reminisce and tends to repeat herself. But of course, Clara hangs on every word because Doris’s memories are particularly meaningful to her.

“They came in a red box back in the old days. I used to go to the movies with my brother Jed, and he’d buy them for me.”

Clara smiles. She knew that, too. But not because Doris ever told her.

Jed did.

Doris pries a piece of licorice from a tooth with her fingertip and smacks her lips.

“Everything changes in this world, but licorice snaps still taste the same. Only problem is, when I was young I didn’t have to worry that they’d rip out my dentures.” She offers Clara the box. “Here, have some.”

“Oh, no thanks. I wouldn’t want anything to happen to my dentures.”

Doris, who always appreciates even the weakest quip, chuckles at that. “Come in, come in, let’s go sit on the couch and visit.”

Watching her close the door and turn away, Clara says, “You really should slide the deadbolt and the chain, you know, Doris. This neighborhood isn’t as safe as it used to be.”

“Oh, ish kabibble. If anyone wants to come on in, they can just help themselves to anything they want--except my licorice snaps,” she adds slyly, leading the way to the knick-knack cluttered living room.

The two large windows are spattered with raindrops, and there are several hummingbird feeders hanging outside. Doris collects everything related to hummingbirds—figurines, jewelry, even feeders, though she admits it would be unusual to see the tiny birds buzzing around her urban fire escape.

“Still, I never say never,” she likes to say—about hummingbirds, and various other topics.

“You know, my kids finally gave up on trying to get me to move in with them.”

“I don’t think that would have been such a bad idea, though.”

“It’s a terrible idea. They’re scattered all over the damned globe.”

Well, not exactly. But Doris’s family is pretty spread out—a daughter in Reno, a son in Boston, another who just retired to Florida.

“Then they wanted to talk me into one of those horrid places filled with old coots, but—“

“Assisted living,” Clara cuts in, sitting beside her on the couch, “and they’re actually kind of nice. My mother and stepfather are—“

“I’m sure other people do just fine, but me, I’m staying put. This is my home. I like it here.”

“But—“

“Honey, if it works, don’t fix it. That’s what I say.”

That is what she says—often. Along with ‘never say never,’ and countless other phrases Clara has come to consider “Dorisisms.”

“Like I told my kids, when I leave this place for the last time, it’ll be in a body bag.”

Clara cringes. “Doris, don’t—“

“And my kids, when they’re not harping on me to move, they’re telling me it’s about time I started unloading some of this stuff.” She waves a wrinkled hand around the room.

“Why?”

“I’m sure they think I’m going to kick the bucket any second now, and they’ll be stuck having to come back here and clean it all out.”

“Oh, Doris, I’m sure they don’t—“

“Of course they do, and it doesn’t bother me at all. I’d be thinking the same thing if I were them. That’s how it was when my mother was getting up there in years.” With a conspiratorial twinkle in her eye, she adds, “I made good and sure my brother Gilbert got stuck with cleaning out the old house—which I’m afraid didn’t work out so well for you, my dear.”

Doris is referring to the fact that Gilbert accidentally gave away to an antique store a gift-wrapped package that had been stored in the attic since the early 1940’s, intended as a Christmas gift from their brother Jed to his wartime sweetheart.

“Oh, it worked out in the end,” she reminds Doris.

“So it did.” With weathered fingertips, Doris pats Clara’s left hand—the one that has worn a gold wedding band since her wedding last year. “And now, you believe in magic. As you should.”

Clara smiles too. But it fades when she remembers why she came here today.

“Doris—this isn’t just a social visit. I have to tell you something.”

“Is it good news, or bad?”

“That depends on how you look at it.”

“Do I need something stronger than licorice snaps to hear it?”

Clara grins again—but it’s bittersweet. She’s going to miss Doris terribly.

“Do you remember how I told you that my husband lost his job at the investment firm?”

“Your husband, and everyone else on Wall Street. Hard times.”

It’s impossible to tell by looking at Doris or her modest home that she once made a killing in the stock market. She prefers to live a low-key lifestyle, money or not, in the same rent controlled apartment where she shared a long, happy marriage with her late husband.

“Are you okay?” Clara asks her now, caught off guard by the grim look on her face. “Financially, I mean.”

“I had a lot of investments. You win some, you lose some.” Doris shrugs. “Let’s put it this way: I’ve got enough money to last a lifetime—as long as it’s just whatever’s left of this one. Tell me about your husband.”

“He’s been looking for something else, but it hasn’t been easy. And I’ve been auditioning again, but once you’ve dropped out of sight for awhile—well, that’s not easy, either. Anyway, he finally found something decent, and they made him an offer last week, more money, even, than he was making, and he accepted, and it’s a great opportunity…”

Doris claps her hands together. “Wonderful!”

“…in California.”

Doris raises a white eyebrow.

“He starts next week.”

“You’re moving away.”

Clara nods. “The job is in the Bay area, and that’s where he’s from, so we’ll have family there…”

“That’s important.” Doris pats her hand. “And remember, you’ll always have family here, too.”

Clara swallows a lump in her throat. “It’s going to be really hard to leave. I’ve lived here all my life.”

“Goodbyes are always hard. But you can’t let that stop you. This is a wonderful opportunity for you and your husband to build a new life together. Smile when you look back, but don’t be afraid to move on. You have to go live. Live for today, live for each other, live for yourself.”

“You’re the smartest woman I ever knew, Doris. I’m going to miss you.”

“I’ll miss you, too, my dear. But we’ll see each other again, I’m sure.”

“I’m sure,” Clara echoes, but she isn’t at all.

“I know what you’re thinking.”

She looks up in surprise to see Doris watching her closely, blue eyes sharper than ever.

“You’re thinking exactly what my kids are thinking.“

“Doris! Of course I’m not—“

“No, not about cleaning out all this crap I’ve accumulated over the years, but about my kicking the bucket. Come on, who are we kidding? I’m getting up there in years. I might not be around the next time you get back to New York for a visit.”

“Don’t say that.”

“You listen to me, Clara. I’ll be around. If not here—if not in this lifetime—I’ll catch up with you sooner or later, right? Because I believe in magic, and so do you. Don’t ever forget it.”

Clara smiles through her tears. “I won’t. I won’t ever forget.”

CHAPTER ONE

Christmas Day, 2009

San Florentina, California

Sitting cross-legged on the rug beside the lit Christmas tree on her favorite day of the year, Clara clutches the mug of untouched coffee her husband insisted on preparing for her when she rolled out of bed forty-five minutes ago.

Drew shakes the gift-wrapped box. “Hey, it rattles.”

She smiles. “No kidding.”

He shakes it some more, watching her face for a clue. Clara glances away, feigning profound interest in a floating dust particle, afraid that if Drew looks into her eyes, he’ll know.

She admires the living room, its mission woodwork, tall windows, leather furniture, warm-hued carpets and draperies all bathed in the soft glow of twinkling white lights. They moved into the house just in time for Clara to deck the halls.

Having been named for Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker ballerina, she’s always been crazy about the holiday season.

Her gaze sweeps the massive boxwood wreath on the exposed brick above the fireplace, the pair of embroidered Christmas stockings hanging from the wooden mantle, the precious antique snow globe nested on it, amid potted poinsettias and her childhood collection of dark-haired angel figurines.

Beyond the snow globe’s delicate curved glass is yet another brunette angel, one with a broken wing tip. If you wind the key on the globe’s base, it plays “I’ll Be Home for Christmas.”

Drew found it in an antique shop and gave it to her the Christmas they met, back in New York. Of course, he had no idea just how meaningful—or magical—it really was. Maybe someday, she’ll work up the nerve to tell him.

In any case, it’s the best gift she ever received from her husband.

From anyone.

And now, Drew is about to open one that’s even better.

“You know, I really have no idea what this can be.”

“Well, let’s see...” Carefully masking her expression, Clara dares to look his way again. “It can be something that rattles.”

“No kidding. Like what?” He shakes it again, and she grins.

Right here, right now, on Christmas morning in the wonderland living room of their dream house, a bank of fog that almost looks like snow swirling beyond the wall of glass windows, Clara can’t help but feel as if she finally has everything she ever wanted.

No, she hasn’t become a Hollywood superstar. She blew that chance when she got sick and dropped out of what would have been her first major film.

The Glenhaven Park Dozen, which opened last year, was nominated for a slew of Oscars, including Best Picture—and Best Actress for the newcomer who was recast in Clara’s role.

That stung a little, because she did love acting, and she does miss it.

Just not enough to make all the necessary sacrifices that go with the territory.

Like spending months on location away from Drew.

Or giving up her privacy.

Or watching every morsel she puts into her mouth in an effort to stay starlet-thin. Having cancer taught her to love her body because it’s strong and healthy now, even if she did go up a jeans size or two.

Maybe someday, she’ll want to give her career another shot. But for now, things are perfect just as they are.

Almost...too perfect.

So perfect that if she allows herself to think about it, she might just worry that it could all go away tomorrow.

That’s how it happens. One minute, you’re living your too-good-to-be-true life, and the next minute, you’re...

Well, not.

Please don’t let it happen to me. To us.

“It sounds like box of pebbles,” Drew tells her.

“Why would I give you a box of pebbles?”

“To remind me of that weekend we spent at Pebble Beach last fall?”

“Um, no.”

“That would have been a romantic gift.”

“Trust me,” she says, “this is much more romantic.”

As romantic as being married to the love of her life, a kind-hearted man with the warmest, most reassuring brown eyes she’s ever seen. A man whose vow to stay with her in sickness and in health, for richer and for poorer, for better and for worse, has already been tested and held fast.

Her breast cancer, his losing his investment banking job in Manhattan and finding a new one that meant a cross-country move, building their dream house only to have Drew lose his new job, too, thanks to a tanking economy…

They’ve survived all of that, and then some. Life is good. After some financial struggles, Drew found another promising job. He started just last week. Clara has passed the three-year anniversary of her diagnosis, and remains cancer free.

“Everything looks great,” her west coast oncologist, Doctor Federman, remarked after the last round of routine tests in November again showed the all-clear. He snapped his folder shut and smiled across his desk at her and Drew. “You two should go out and celebrate.”

They promptly drove over to Napa and splurged on a romantic inn on a vineyard. A candlelight dinner, a bottle of good champagne, a wonderful featherbed…

When she later looked back, counting days on the calendar, and realized that was when it happened, she wasn’t really surprised. It had been a perfect night.

There’s that word again. Perfect.

Stop being a worrywart. Life is good. Enjoy it.

Yes, here on a windswept cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean, Clara is ready to put down roots, raise a family, grow old together with Drew.

“Something rattle-y and romantic. A box of diamonds?”

She rolls her eyes.

“Captain Crunch?”

“How is that romantic?”

“It’s what we had for breakfast the first time you spent the night at my apartment. Don’t tell me you forgot?”

“No, I remember, but, enough already! Just open the present and find out what it is!”

“All right, all right, I’m opening, I’m opening.”

Uh huh. Most people would tear into the paper. Not her husband.

Nope. He takes his time, deliberately–and maddeningly--slipping one fingertip beneath the seam to loosen the tape.

“Nice wrapping paper.”

Clara nods and smiles through clenched teeth.

“Is this one of the rolls you bought from the little girl next door for that school fundraiser? What’s her name?”

“Amelia. Amelia Tucker,” she adds, wondering if he’s trying to drive her crazy on purpose.

Can he possibly know what’s inside and he’s somehow...reluctant to open it?

Nah.

If he knew, he wouldn’t be reluctant at all.

Anyway, after almost two years of marriage, she knows that’s just the way he is: always savoring the moment.

And it’s just the way she isn’t. A native New Yorker, she is, as Drew likes to say, in a perpetual state of hurry, scurry, and flurry.

It was all she could do not to coach him along as he painstakingly opened all the other presents she gave him, then meticulously folded every shirt, sweater, and tie back into their boxes and stacked them neatly under the tree, along with her big splurge for him: the Filson duffel bag he’s been coveting for years.

Clara, on the other hand, is surrounded by crumpled paper and a heap of new treasures: a decadent designer purse, the pair of ridiculously expensive shearling slippers she paused to admire every time they passed the window display at Triangle Shoes down the street, a couple of books, emerald earrings Drew sweetly said match her eyes, and a bikini for their annual February trip to the Caribbean.

“Isn’t it a little...skimpy?” she asked in dismay, holding it up.

“Hell, yeah.” He grinned. “And I can’t wait to see you in it on the beach”

Ha.

Little does he know.

“Are you going to open that,” she asks now, watching him put aside the wrapping paper and shake the gift again, “or just play with the box?”

“Play with the box.”

She sighs inwardly and pretends to take a sip from her mug as he re-examines the package, unaware that the mere smell of coffee makes her sick. So, lately, does the smell of Thai food, her favorite cuisine; it was all she could do not to vomit when Drew brought home a bagful of white cardboard carryout containers to surprise her the other night.

“I know you always like to save the best gift for last,” he notes, “but that duffel bag was pretty damned good. How can you possibly top it?”

“You’ll see.” She offers her best mysterious smile.

“I have one more present for you, too, you know.”

“You do?” Looking around, she doesn’t see any more unopened gifts. “But you already got me so much, and—“

“Well this time, I saved the best gift for last, just like you. I’ll open yours, and then I’ll give you mine.”

“So it’s not something I have to open?”

It’s Drew’s turn to offer a mysterious smile.

“Why do I feel like yours involves the bedroom?”

He laughs and reaches for her. “I didn’t say that, but if you’re in the mood for—“

“Drew! Just open the present!”

At last, he lifts the cover off the box and lifts out...

“A baby rattle?”

“Uh-huh.” Tears rapidly fill her eyes and the puzzled look on his face disappears into a watery blur.

By the time she’s blindly set aside her mug and wiped her eyes on the sleeve of her bathrobe, his clueless expression has been replaced by one of wonderment–and some tears of his own.

“Clara...?”

She nods, her throat too clogged with emotion to say it aloud.

He grabs her, hugs her fiercely.

“We’re going to have a baby?”

Recovering her voice, she sob/sings the word that’s been joyfully pirouetting through her head since she got the news weeks ago: “Yes!”

Yes, yes, yes!

After months of trying, she, Clara McCallum Becker, is finally pregnant.

Dr. Svensen, her oncologist back in New York, had promised her that it would one day be possible. That the breast cancer treatment she’d endured three years ago wouldn’t harm her reproductive organs.

But she wasn’t so sure it was meant to be. Month after month, they tried. Month after month, she waited, prayed, hoped...to no avail.

And then, in November, in Napa, it happened.

She took a positive pregnancy test on the first Saturday in December, just before she and Drew went to see The Nutcracker in San Francisco. For her, the ballet is a lifelong holiday tradition--she was named after the little girl whose Christmas gifts come magically to life.

But this year, for the first time, she was too caught up in her own miraculous drama to focus on Tchaikovsky’s.

Keeping the pregnancy secret from Drew was one of the hardest things she’s ever had to do.

But it isn’t the only secret she’s ever kept from him.

At least this one is more believable, she thinks wryly as he releases her, grinning like the post-reformation Grinch.

Chances are he wouldn’t be smiling like that if she told him her other secret.

“Hey, Drew,” she’d say casually, “guess what? A few years ago, when I was filming The Glenhaven Park Dozen, I traveled back in time to December 1941 and fell in love with the real Jed Landry, one of the soldiers the movie was based on. Oh, yeah, and one other thing? The real Jed was killed in Normandy, but he was reincarnated. As you.”

Uh-huh. Not going to happen.

In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter how he came to her. All that matters is that he’s here.

PROLOGUE

New York City

Monday, October 8

1:46 p.m.

If you look hard enough, you can always find it.

The wise man who once said that to Laura wasn’t talking about the internet, but the phrase has become her mantra for all things.

He was right, of course.

There it is.

She’s been looking, and she’s found it.

Her hand trembling on the mouse, she leans closer to the monitor and clicks to enlarge the window.

LOCAL WOMAN ARRESTED IN FLORIDA

Local woman.

Sharon Logan.

Whenever Laura has a chance to get to a computer, she enters the name in a search engine and prays nothing will come up.

Today, her prayers went unanswered.

According to the online news account from her hometown paper, Sharon Logan is being held without bail in Tampa for attacking a girl named Calla Delaney and trying to drown her in her family’s swimming pool. She’s also being questioned about the murder last summer of the girl’s mother, Stephanie Delaney, originally ruled an accidental fall down the stairs.

Those poor people.

Jaw set grimly, hand unsteady on the mouse button, Laura closes out the screen. That’s all she needs to know.

It was only a matter of time before something like this happened.

That’s why she had to get away. She just couldn’t take it anymore–the constant tension, the growing paranoia, the constant, smothering attention; being treated as if she were still a child, even now that she’s in her twenties.

Laura knew that if she stayed, eventually something would have to give. She didn’t want to be there to witness it.

But...murder.

She never really imagined it would be that extreme.

And...Florida?

What was she doing in Florida?

Who are the Delaneys?

Does it matter?

Maybe it should.

But after all those years of being the girl who lived in the purple house with the crazy lady, all Laura cares about is that she’s finally free.

Free, and not looking back.

“Excuse me, Miss...are you done with that computer? Because we have people waiting to use it.”

She looks up to see a librarian. Not one of the friendly ones she’s gotten to know since she started coming here a few months ago; rather, the one who shushes people and scowls a lot at people who hog the computers.

“Oh...sorry. I’m finished.”

She grabs her backpack, makes her way through the hushed library, and emerges on a crowded Manhattan street.

People rush past without giving her a second glance. No one knows who she is. Who Sharon Logan is. No one cares.

That’s why she’s here. That’s just the way she wants it.

Especially now that Laura knows it finally happened. The crazy lady finally snapped.

Murder.

Laura knew, when she woke up this morning, that today would be the day the search engine would yield something.

If you look hard enough, you can find it.

Years ago, when he said those words, he was talking about hope.

About finding hope, in the midst of despair.

“If you look hard enough, Laura,” he said, handing her tissue after tissue to dry her tears, “you can find it.”

She clung to those words, somehow managed to find a glimmer of light on the darkest days; just a shred of hope to keep her going.

Yet now that it’s all over–now that she’s here, and Sharon Logan is a thousand miles away, in jail for murder...

Now, ironically, Laura’s mantra has been altered.

Every morning, she wakes up thinking it, praying it:

If you really, really, really want to get lost–really need to get lost–then no one can ever find you.

CHAPTER ONE

Lily Dale, New York
Monday, October 8
1:46 p.m.

“All right. Tell me everything. And I mean everything!”

Calla Delaney and her father look at each other, then back at Odelia Lauder, standing in the front hall waiting impatiently for one of them to start talking.

“Gammy, it’s really complicated.” Calla sets down her heavy duffle bag and shifts the laptop computer bag to her other shoulder, wishing her grandmother hadn’t pounced on her and Dad the second they walked in the door from the airport.

It’s been a long day already, saying goodbye to the Wilsons down in Florida, driving to the airport in Tampa, flying from there to New York City, then from New York to Buffalo, waiting for the luggage, renting a car, then driving almost an hour south to reach Lily Dale.

Odelia’s little two-story cottage with its peeling pinkish-orange paint was a welcome sight. They arrived just as a cold rain began falling from an overcast sky, typical weather here in southwestern New York State.

Calla, in jeans and a fleece sweatshirt, was prepared for it.

Dad, wearing shorts, flip-flops, and a tee-shirt, was not.

“I’ll get some warmer clothes when we get there,” he told Calla earlier when she warned him that his outfit, which is fine for Florida--or southern California, where he’s been on a teaching sabbatical since August--just won’t cut it up here.

Poor Dad. It’s not like he even had a chance to pack a bag for what’s turning out to be an extended, unexpected trip east. He hopped on a plane from L.A. on Saturday when the Tampa police informed him that his daughter had just been attacked by a lunatic killer.

Again.

Only Dad doesn’t know about the first time, well over a month ago.

That, of course, was a different lunatic killer.

Right.

Incredible, really, the things that have happened to Calla since she came to live with her grandmother in this tiny, gated lakeside village filled with century-old gingerbread cottages...and psychic mediums.

“Odelia,” Dad says, “there’s a lot to discuss.”

“I’m listening.” Gammy looks from him to Calla to him to Calla. “Hello?”

Not knowing where to begin, Calla avoids her grandmother’s expectant gaze. She stoops to pick up Gert, who’s rubbing against her ankles, purring, welcoming her back.

“Why don’t we let Calla go up to her room and relax,” Dad suggests, “and I’ll fill you in.”

“That’s a great idea. Calla, why don’t you–”

”No!” She protests so loudly that poor Gert leaps from her arms and flees up the steps past Miriam, who’s materialized about halfway up, keeping a ghostly eye on things.

Both Dad and Odelia gape at Calla., who scowls back at them. “Please don’t shuttle me off to my room like a little girl. I’m not. I’m almost eighteen.” Well, she will be, in another six months. “I can deal with what happened. I mean, it happened to me, remember? Maybe I want to talk about it. Maybe I need to.”

She does?

You do?

Hmm. The protest sort of popped out of her.

Who knows? Her head has been spinning since the plane touched down. Maybe she does need to get everything out into the open.

Then again, just a few moments ago, the last thing she wanted to do was rehash the events of the past few days.

Face it. You really don’t know what you want.

“Oh, sweetie, you’ve been through so much. It just breaks my heart.” Her grandmother throws a pair of strong maternal arms around her.

Suddenly, for all her longing to be seen as an adult, Calla feels as though she’s about to crumple and cry like a baby.

“I’m okay,” she manages to squeak out unconvincingly.

No, she isn’t. She used to be okay. Before everything–before she lost her mother. Before her life fell apart.

She used to be sweet, and accommodating, and happy, and normal...

“You can’t possibly be okay. And you don’t have to be. Not yet. But you will be,” Odelia promises, reaching out to brush strands of Calla’s long brown hair back from her face.

Then, for the first time, she seems to notice the laptop bag. “What is that?”

“Mom’s computer. Now I’ll be able to check my email and do research for homework right from here, Gammy.”

Among other things.

“But this house isn’t wired for the internet, sweetie.”

“That’s okay. All I need is a phone jack. I can do a dial-up connection.”

“Well, then, you’re in luck. We have a few of those. In fact, there’s one right in your bedroom.”

“Really?” She never noticed it before.

Odelia nods. “Your mother begged me for her own phone when she hit twelve or thirteen. Back then, we didn’t have cordless, and she wanted privacy to talk to her friends. She used to be on it forever.”

Calla finds it hard to imagine her hyper-efficient mother lounging around chatting on the phone for hours. Mom wasn’t big on leisurely conversation–telephone, or otherwise. She liked to get right to the point, and then move on. In both business situations and in personal ones.

“Let’s go into the kitchen,” Odelia suggests. “I made lunch. You haven’t eaten yet, have you, Jeff?”

“We grabbed a couple of bran muffins at the airport earlier this morning, but Calla barely touched hers.”

“Well, they probably didn’t put the Raisinettes in, like I do when I make them.”

“What?” Dad’s eyes are wide.

“Didn’t you ever hear of raisins in bran muffins?”

“Raisins, yes. Raisinettes, no.”

“Well, chocolate is good in anything,” Odelia tells Dad with a shrug, eyes gleaming behind the pink plastic cat-eye frames of her glasses–which of course clash violently with her frizzy dyed red hair and her purple sweater.

If Calla were in a chatty mood, she might bring up the “snicker-noodles” her grandmother served for dinner one night--with cut-up Snickers bars as a featured ingredient.

Was that only a few weeks ago? It seems like a year, at least, has passed since that night.

And it seems even longer since Calla’s had any kind of appetite.

“Who am I to question your recipes, Odelia? You’ve always been a great cook.” Dad sniffs the air. “Something smells good. Tuna melts?”

Calla doubts that. Tuna melts would be far too ordinary for a creative chef like Odelia.

“No, but you’re close,” she tells Dad. “Come see.”

Calla smells tuna, too. Tuna...and a faint hint of Lily of the Valley.

That can only mean one thing.

Aiyana is here.

She darts a quick look around the room for her Native American spirit guide, whose presence is always accompanied by the scent of Mom’s favorite flower.

No sign of Aiyana, but...

Calla sniffs again. Yes, the floral smell is real, and of course there’s not a blossom in sight. Fragrant Lily of the Valley only blooms in springtime.

Aiyana...where are you?

Calla wonders if she’s just too worn out today to connect with spirit. She’s still new to this–she needs more practice when it comes to tuning into the energy.

Tuning out, as well. Sometimes, she finds herself bombarded with images and voices. It can be frightening.

Her grandmother promised she’d get the hang of it, though. That’s why she enrolled Calla in a Beginning Mediumship course with classes every Saturday morning.

Aiyana, are you trying to tell me something?

“Calla? Are you okay?”

She turns to see Odelia watching her with concern.

“I’m...fine. Just a little spacey, I guess. Maybe I need to go upstairs and lie down.” And see if Aiyana comes to me there.