Here, she silently repeated, fishing her keys out of her purse to let herself in. She held her breath as she unlocked the front door, the air still bottled in her lungs as she locked it behind her. Little spots danced before her eyes as she switched on the overhead light.
Come on, now, she told herself, breathe.
She did. Exhaled, inhaled, and repeated.
You can do this, she told herself. You can. Just walk, one foot in front of the other. Through the dining room, to the kitchen.
And that’s what she did, walking through the hall into the restaurant, switching on lights as she went past the hostess stand, winding through marble-topped tables on her way back to the kitchen.
Everything looked good. Surfaces sparkled.
Her gaze swept the interior, over the pale marble tabletops and counter, the creamy-white stone flecked with gold and shots of gray and black. The dark, polished wood gleamed. Inhaling, she smelled citrus and thyme in the air, and then turning the corner, heading for the kitchen, she spotted a potted lemon tree by the window, the dark green leaves dotted with milky-white blossoms.
Ridiculously emotional, Lauren stopped and gently touched one of the white citrus blossoms, then bent to sniff the scent. Sweet, so very sweet.
Eyes stinging, she peeled off her coat and hung it up on a hook in the massive broom closet before turning around to face the giant kitchen.
She was in here that morning, working, when she got the first call. June 13.
Heart twisting, pulse racing, Lauren reached out, put a hand on the counter, needing something solid next to her, feeling the past rise up, huge, so huge, so horrible.
But she hadn’t even known that first call was bad, hadn’t known it was the start of the end.
It seemed so innocuous. Napa High’s attendance office phoning to let her know that Blake had been marked absent that morning.
The second call came not even two minutes later, buzzing in as Lauren was trying to reach Blake on his cell phone. It was the mom of one of the girls in Blake’s car pool. Paige had just been marked absent. Was Paige maybe doing something with Blake? Mrs. Garrett knew they were just a few days away from summer, a few days from the kids becoming seniors . . . had they planned something today? Were they playing truant to go to the beach or lake?
I don’t know, Lauren had answered, trying to stay calm. I’ll let you know as soon as I talk to Blake.
But hanging up, she tried Blake again. He didn’t pick up.
She shot him a text next. Where r u?
And then another, still trying not to panic. What’s going on?
Lauren pulled the miniature banana cakes from the oven, set them aside to cool, and then tried phoning Blake again, this time leaving him a message. Blake, call me. This isn’t funny. I’m getting worried.
He didn’t call.
She didn’t know what to do. Blake, a serious student and a competitive athlete, didn’t ditch. He cared about his grades. He rarely partied. He had big plans for his future. But finals were over. His big paper was done, turned in last night before midnight at turnitin.com.
She mixed up the icing, her thoughts racing as the beaters whipped the powdered sugar into the softened cream cheese.
Maybe the kids were off to Santa Cruz for the day. Blake’s friends surfed and they’d been teaching Blake last summer.
They could be in an area without good cell reception.
It was going to be fine. Blake was a good kid. Responsible. He’d call as soon as he saw her messages.
And then her phone rang. It was Dad. He’d heard there had been a bad accident on Highway 112, a 1987 Camaro, which they both knew was Daniel Avery’s car, and Dad called, wondering if Daniel had maybe picked up Blake for school that morning . . .
Lauren’s legs buckled. She didn’t remember fainting. Didn’t remember waking up on the floor with Lisa and the kitchen staff around her, didn’t remember Matthieu in the hall on the phone himself, trying to get the facts after hearing on the news that there had been a horrific accident on Highway 112 involving four teenagers. The car had caught fire, and early reports had it that only one teenager had been airlifted to the hospital. The other three died at the scene.
It would be another hour before Lauren learned that Blake was one of the three who died at the scene.
It would be days before she believed it.
Months before she accepted it.
And now it was almost a year . . . almost a year since her boy had been taken, and Lauren hated this restaurant that wasn’t her restaurant but Lisa and Matthieu’s . . .
She hated it because it wasn’t Grandma’s Victorian house. She hated it because it didn’t have old wooden tables covered in white linen clothes embroidered with cheerful red thread. She hated that the little glass vases of miniature roses and daisies had given way to chic, potted citrus trees.