Adrienne knelt in her rose garden, gripping a shiny trowel in both hands high above her head. With a strangled cry she stabbed the tool deep in her husband’s throat, expelling a low grunt as the metal bit and buried to the hilt. Spongy soil as reluctantly yielding as human flesh, the image bright in her brain. Vibrations resonated in her fingers, in the bones and tendons, calling up a bloody memory that made her shudder and slam a mental door.
From living on the streets of Oakland to marrying a successful man in Marin, her leap across the Golden Gate Bridge should have been a Cinderella story. But Adrienne felt like an actor in her own life. A paper doll. I don’t know if I’m suffocating or drowning. I only know I can’t breathe.
She substituted visions of murder for a calming exercise some therapist from her past suggested; write down what you cannot change and throw it away. Let it go. She drew in the dirt:
I want
I need
Sweeping her hand across the words, she scattered them into oblivion. What do I want or need? Not Dustin’s glib reply to her suggestion of a vacation. “A vacation from what?” His sneer echoed in her brain and kept her anger boiling, a reminder that her wants and needs were irrelevant. Furious with Dustin, impatient with herself for expecting anything different from him. Why be mad at a dog for acting like a dog?
Dustin had left for work hours before she woke up, and the crunch of footsteps on decomposed granite did not compel Adrienne to turn around; he amused himself by sneaking up on her and she played her part by acting surprised. He would apologize for the heated discussion (nothing so passionate as an argument) of the night before and life would go on as it had for years.
A hand fell heavy on her shoulder. Adrienne turned with a ready false smile, expecting bland blue eyes but seeing pale green-gold hazel. She rose, stumbling on the knee pad.
“Gabriel,” she said, her voice breathy with surprise.
“Hello, Mrs. Berg.”
“Please, call me Adrienne,” she said automatically. “Did you bring Dustin home?”
“I dropped Dustin and his crew in Santa Barbara. They expect me to fly them home this afternoon.”
“Santa Barbara?” She shrugged. “I never know where he’s going.”
Adrienne shaded her eyes and craned her neck to see his face. She had only met Gabriel once, at a cocktail party a few days before. He was out of context in her backyard. Surreal. Electrifying.
***
The night they met, Adrienne was doing her practiced best to avoid conversation. Positioned at the fringe of a large group, she was close enough that no one felt obligated to rescue her, but far enough that she could feign interest without active participation.
She scanned the room and paused on a man leaning in a shadowed doorway—a big man, broad-shouldered and tall. When her gaze landed on his, they locked eyes and a jolt shook her, as if he had touched her with a lightning bolt. He had the clean-shaven jawline of a marble statue, a craggy nose that had been broken at least once, and a hint of curl in his black hair; light hazel eyes glowed in the olive of his skin. His mouth curled in a slow smile and Adrienne’s heart skipped a beat, butterflies took flight in her lower belly. She jerked her attention elsewhere.
When she looked back, he was gone. She had time to feel simultaneous frissons of relief and disappointment before a presence loomed over her. Even before she turned, Adrienne knew it was that man. The man with the golden eyes. He radiated heat, his scent earthy, warm and spicy. Dark chocolate and peppercorns.
“You look bored,” he murmured in a voice like rough silk. “Let’s tell each other stories about these people.” His last words nearly a parody of the perfect mouth, marred only by a purple scar in the divot of his too thin lip.