Free The Hidden by Bill Pronzini Page A

couldn’t see much through it. The wind was little more than a medium-cool breeze down here, the beach sheltered by the high curving bluffs, the threads of fog drifting high overhead. The tide had started to ebb and as she neared the waterline she could see out to where exposed shelves of rock sloped off into deeper water. There’d be abalone out there, and in the early morning hours, divers off boats anchored offshore—legitimate abalone fishermen in season, poachers year-round.
    The sea’s salt-heavy breath sharpened her thoughts, the same old ones replaying on a stuttery loop but now with even greater clarity. She felt a sense of … what? Not exactly urgency, but a prodding restlessness, a growing need to stop waffling and start making decisions.
    Jay and the marriage.
    Yes, and Douglas, too.
    So far she had resisted sleeping with him. A casual affair was the last thing she wanted or needed. But the temptation was strong. He was an attractive man, easy to talk to, a good listener, and he seemed to understand her in ways Jay never had. She hadn’t had to tell him her marriage was in trouble; he’d picked up on all the signs—the bitterness, the loneliness, the faint undercurrent of tension that came from a love fading, maybe dying. He’d broached the subject himself the last time she’d seen him, over coffee after they’d both pulled all-nighters just before Christmas.
    “Are you happy, Shelby?”
    “What makes you ask that?”
    “I think you know. You’re not, are you?”
    “Does it matter that much to you?”
    “Yes, it does. I care about you. If there’s anything I can do …”
    “Such as what? Advice?”
    “I’m not Dear Abby. Or an advice nurse.”
    “What, then? Lend a sympathetic ear, offer a shoulder to cry on?”
    “If that’s what you need.”
    “Or a different bed to lie on, in case that’s what I need?”
    “Don’t be cynical, okay? I’m not going to hit on you—I don’t operate that way. If all I wanted was a casual affair, I’d’ve made a pass long before this.”
    “What do you want, Douglas?”
    “For you not to be unhappy.”
    He’d meant it. Meant everything he’d said, including not hitting on her. He hadn’t pressured her in any way, at least not overtly.
    But quiet persistence was a kind of pressure. So was the way he’d looked at her that morning, with low-burning heat showing beneath his empathy. There was no question that he felt the same sexual attraction for her that she felt for him. He really wouldn’t be satisfied with a casual affair any more than she would; he wasn’t that type of man. If she slept with him, he’d want a commitment to a relationship that was at least semipermanent. Was she ready for that, after all the years with Jay? And with a man she’d only known for a few months?
    Evidently not, or she’d already have done something about it.
    What was it she did want? To be not unhappy, yes—but what would make her happy again? For the marriage to work the way it had in the beginning? Or to be free, not just of Jay but of Dr. Douglas Booth as well? No complications, no pressures, just time alone to rebuild a life on her own terms?
    Maybe.
    Maybe the solution was to make a quick, clean break. Walk away from Jay, and from Douglas, too. Walk away from the known into the unknown. Could she do that? Six months ago, even three months ago, the answer would have been no. Now … it wouldn’t be easy, but she was pretty sure she could.
    The rocks close to the water’s edge were coated with lichen that looked slippery; she avoided them, poking among the storm detritus farther up. Shells, all broken by the pounding action of the surf. The remains of a dead seagull. A crushed beer can. Two plastic water bottles. A chunk of white Styrofoam that might have come from the lid of an ice chest. Large and small logs, splintered tree limbs, bits and pieces of driftwood sculpted by the elements into different shapes, some of which seemed almost artistically