On the seventh day after Shiver’s call, it dawned on me that I’d never unblocked his number. Initially, I’d only wanted to avoid him calling back while still drunk. I’d fully intended to unblock the number the next day, but completely forgot.
Even if he had called, now I’d never know it unless he’d left a message. Disappointed when there wasn’t one, I wondered if I should call him. How much of our conversation did he even remember, given how drunk he was?
I startled when I heard a knock at the door. When I opened it, instead of Zary, Gunner stood on the other side.
“Is everything okay?”
“I’m leaving in a little over an hour.”
“I see. Is there anything I can do?”
“I’d like Zary to stay over here while I’m gone. I’d say you should stay in our side of the duplex, but it would be harder to move all of Kazmir’s things. Would you mind?”
“Not at all.”
“Thanks, Orina. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
“I know better than to ask, but is it bad?”
“A couple members of our crew have gotten themselves in pretty deep water. I wouldn’t go otherwise.”
I nodded, understanding everything he didn’t say. It wasn’t just deep water; they had to be drowning.
“I wanted to ask you first before I talked to Zary about staying here.”
“Tell her it’s to keep me company.”
Gunner smiled. “Thanks. That was my plan.”
For a moment, I wondered if I should tell Gunner about my unease earlier in the week when we went to see the elephant seals, but decided against it. Zary had likely already mentioned it, and if members of their team were in trouble, he didn’t need another worry on his shoulders.
Within a half hour, Zary walked through the front door, looking as though she’d been crying.
“What’s happened?” I gasped.
She waved her hand in front of her face. “I almost don’t recognize myself sometimes. I get so emotional. Ava said it’s the pregnancy hormones.”
I remembered being emotional when I was pregnant too, but I hadn’t attributed it to hormones. Instead, I’d been running for my life and that of my son at the time, with absolutely no one to turn to, certainly not my baby’s father or a half sister.
“I’m sorry,” Zary apologized. “I didn’t mean to make you angry. I do that a lot.”
“You didn’t, and you don’t,” I lied, trying to shrug off the feeling of envy that crept in so often. “Come here and sit with me.” I motioned toward the sofa.
Zary sat and folded her arms.
“I’m not angry with you; it’s just that there are times that I feel very alone in the world.”
“You have me.”
“I do. And you have Gunner, your mother, your sisters…”
“I can’t apologize for that, Losha.”
“I’m not suggesting you should. In fact, if there is anyone I’m angry with, it’s myself. I don’t begrudge you any happiness, Zary. I’m just feeling sorry for myself.”
“Have you heard from Shiver?”
I shook my head. I hadn’t told Zary about his drunken phone call and didn’t plan to now. “Something’s just occurred to me,” I said instead. “Where’s your mother now?”
“She’s with Madeline, Gunner’s mother. They’re planning the wedding.”
“Your wedding?”
Zary nodded. “Thankfully, yes. I’m completely overwhelmed with my life as it is.”
“What do you mean?”
“Just because I seem happy doesn’t mean that I don’t have anxiety, Losha. It isn’t easy to go from having no one, as you said, to finding out my mother, who I believed died when I was a child, is still alive, or that I have half sisters. Gunner has been great about letting me take things at a pace I’m comfortable with. In fact, that’s one of the reasons he suggested we come here.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t think—”
“The truth is, the reason I’m truly happy is because you’re here. And Gunner, of course. With you, I don’t have to pretend that I have the slightest clue about being a mother or a daughter or even a sister. I can relax and just be myself, and no one is going to judge me for not knowing how to make scrambled eggs.”
“Wow.”
Zary huffed. “What?”
“Now I really feel like a mudak.”
Zary laughed. “You should feel better.”
Strangely, I did. Knowing Zary hadn’t just woken up to a perfect life, made me feel less sorry for myself, although not so much less of a zhopa about it.
“Do you think Kazmir would be up for a walk in town later?”
“I’m sure he’d be up for a ride in the pram. Oh, I’ve been meaning to ask—did you mention what happened the other day to Gunner?”
Zary’s eyes darkened. “No. I decided to wait to see if it occurred again. Do you think I should have?”
“No. It was probably nothing. I’ve been on the run so long, it’s hard to let go of the paranoia.”
“The paranoia kept us alive, Losha.”
“I’m starving,” I told Zary later after we’d walked from one end of the town to the other. “Should we go back to the house?”
“What, and cook?”
We both laughed.
“There are so many places to eat in Cambria. I think we should go to a different restaurant every night while Gunner is gone.”
“Sounds good to me.”
“Let’s start at the north end and work our way to the south. If we eat out for lunch too, we can probably get through them all.”
“And put on twenty pounds.” I’d been itching to start training again. I’d begun feeding Kazmir baby food, which meant he could go longer between nursing. “You don’t need to worry about it, but I do. I think it’s part of my problem; I don’t feel great about myself.”
“You have a full workout room downstairs.”
“I do?”
Zary nodded.
“Downstairs?”
“Yes, haven’t you been in the basement?”
“No. I didn’t know there was a basement.”
“I’ll show you later.”
“It’s this way,” said Zary after we got back, and she opened a door that I hadn’t noticed before.
“What is that?” she asked when we heard beeping.
“I have no idea.”
“Is it part of an alarm system?”
“I don’t know why there would be one separate of the main house.”
I walked in the direction of the beeping and froze. “Get out!” I screamed. “Get Kazmir!”
“What is it?”
“A bomb!”