Free Haunting Olivia by Janelle Taylor Page B

adoption, as you’d been told was the plan.”
    She looked at him. “It must have been so hard.
    Seventeen years old and taking care of a newborn.
    All alone, no help.”
    He nodded and slipped his hand away. “It was hard. But I had the money, and you bet I used it. I needed it. I found support in Boston, a center for fathers in my position. I accepted all the help I was offered. And I worked my ass off so that I could go to college. Thank God I had a good babysitter, a retired nurse whose own grandchildren lived far away. She took good care of Kayla while I was in school and worked.”
    “Kayla. Her name is Kayla?”
    He nodded.
    It was all she could do not to burst into tears. “My middle name is Kaye,” she whispered.
    “I know,” he said.
    Again, they sat in silence for a few moments.
    “What did you tell her about me?” she asked.
    “I’ve told her the only truth I knew: that her mother was very young when she was born and needed to get her life together and one day, perhaps, she would come back.”
    Olivia nodded.
    “The sole reason I moved back to Blueberry was so that you would be able to find us if you ever did come,” Zach said.
    “Where do you live now?”
    “I built on the water, at the end of Spider’s Cove.
    Do you remember all that wild brush and that sad 78
    Janelle Taylor
    weeping willow? I got rid of most of the brush, but the weeping willow is in my front yard.”
    “I always loved that tree,” she said, so many memories hitting her at once. She and Zach had sat under that tree just twice, sharing French fries, sharing stories.
    “Zach, will you tell Kayla about me? That I’m here?”
    “I need to sleep on all this,” he said. “Kayla is going through a tough time.” He mentioned the suspension. The recent questions about Olivia and the pageant.
    “I can’t quite process that this is my daughter we’re talking about. My child.”
    “ My child,” Zach snapped, as he stood up.
    She glanced up at him.
    He threw a twenty on the table, then put on his coat. “I need to think, Olivia. Until I call you, you’re not to go within two feet of Kayla. Do we have an agreement?”
    She nodded, and in an instant, he was gone.
    Olivia drove home, her fingers white on the steering wheel. She was relieved to be finally back at the cottage, where she could collapse and not think about Zach. About Kayla. About everything she’d learned and still couldn’t wrap her mind around.
    She turned her key in the lock of the front door but was surprised that it wasn’t locked. She distinctly remembered locking the door behind her; it had offered her a few extra seconds before leaving the safety of the cottage to go meet Zach. Had Johanna, the caretaker, been by? Did she have a key?

    HAUNTING OLIV IA
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    Huh. In everything that had happened today, Olivia had forgotten all about Johanna. Anyway, why would Johanna come by in the evening? Olivia had been told the caretaker would stop by every morning at eight. And Johanna had said the same thing this morning.
    She stood outside on the porch, the cold night air slapping at her cheeks. She wasn’t sure about going in. This isn’t New York City, she told herself.
    You’re perfectly safe. And you probably just left the door unlocked.
    But she knew she hadn’t.
    She opened the door and peered in. And then gasped. The collection of beautiful figurines that had been on the console table in the entryway was smashed on the floor. And on the mirror above the table, someone had scrawled with a marker: “Go away. No one wants you here.”
    Her heart hammering, Olivia turned and ran for her car.

    Chapter 7
    What the—
    As Zach pulled up to his house, he saw Olivia sitting on the steps. She jumped up and raced over to the car.
    “Someone was in the cottage,” she said in a pan-icky rush, her shoulders trembling. “The entryway is trashed and there is a note scrawled on the mirror.”
    He got out of the car and walked her up to the steps, gesturing for her to