Free Retreat by Liv James Page B

When she got a recording
telling her the number was no longer active, she tried again, thinking she must
have dialed it wrong. But she got the same recording. She briefly considered
leaving a message for him at the office, but she knew his assistant normally
fielded his calls and his messages and she didn’t feel like having her name
snickered about in the hallways of her former company. They’d already garnered
enough gossip at her expense.
         She didn’t know Jon’s cell phone number, so
she returned the phone to its cradle and lay back on the soft bed. She’d search
for Marcy’s number when she got to the bungalow and have her give Jon a
message. She owed her a call anyway.
         Clara closed her eyes and settled down to
sleep, too tired to think about anything but the soft white case on the pillow.

 
         When she finally pulled into the bungalow’s
dirt driveway the next evening, Clara’s legs were cramped from too many hours
on the road and her eyes felt like sandpaper from the diuretic cocktail of sour
coffee and ultra-chilled air conditioning she’d used to keep herself awake for
the past two hours. She thumbed through the keys on her ring and found the
square one that slipped into the deadbolt.
         The old house was hidden in a patch of tall
pine and maple trees just far enough from the lake to stay dry when the winter
thaw caused the water to rise. The exterior was protected by light green
shingles that made the structure blend into the trees. It was a far cry from
the four-bedroom colonial she’d just vacated.
         Inside, the bungalow had six rooms,
including a bathroom that jutted off the master bedroom and a mudroom at the
back door. The front door opened into a modest living room that held a dark
green loveseat and chair, a dark wood coffee table and a matching end table.
Both the loveseat and chair were draped with multi-colored afghans that Grammy
crocheted long before Clara was born.
         The light wood paneling on the living room
walls gave way to blue-and-white flowered wallpaper in the kitchen. Now that
Grammy was gone Clara slept in the master bedroom, which was positioned just to
the right of the living room and was barely big enough for the full-size bed,
dresser and rocking chair it held. A smaller guest bedroom was tucked in the
back of the house beyond the kitchen.
         As she stepped inside the cool living room,
Clara was comforted by the familiar scent of lavender, which had seeped into
the walls from all the years Grammy had burned candles on the oval kitchen
table. She closed her eyes for a moment to soak in the unassuming nature of the
place, then clicked on the three-way lamp that sat on a tall, thin table near
the front door.
         She was pleased when soft light bathed the
room. She hadn’t been entirely sure that the utilities would still be on. She
didn’t warn anyone she was coming, so there would have been no reason to make
sure the place was prepared. Clara was grateful for the small stroke of luck.
         She trudged back out to her Acura and
retrieved her purse, her blue-flowered overnight bag and the Wal-Mart sack,
which now held her shoes and outfit from the day before and a nightshirt she’d
slept in at the hotel. She also grabbed a twelve-pack of beer she’d picked up
at a convenience store just before she crossed the state line into Pennsylvania. She set
everything on the tweed loveseat and headed toward the bathroom.
         After she showered, Clara dug through the
small closet in the bedroom searching for something to wear. She’d stored some
of her things there after college, but sorting through them now she wondered
why she’d kept them at all. Her tastes in clothing had changed a lot since
then. Fashion had, too.
         At the bottom of one box she found a pair
of navy blue sweatpants with her college logo on them and a white t-shirt with
a big Nittany Lion on it. She was relieved to see they still fit her.