Bone Dust White (36 page)
Authors: Karin Salvalaggio
“I’m right, aren’t I? You’ve had it all along. Brian kept the photos and you kept the money.”
“Does it matter? I got the girls back.”
“No, not really. I just want to know if I should waste any more time looking for it.”
“I think we should all move on.”
Macy puts two cups of coffee on the table between them and they sit quietly for a few minutes. According to Warren, the doctors offered Toby a paternity test, but he declined. Once he saw Grace and Isobel in the same room it didn’t seem necessary. It wasn’t long after that Toby was filing for divorce.
“How are you getting on with Toby and his family?”
“Okay, I guess. It’s not been easy with Pamela’s court date coming up.”
“I imagine it makes things a little awkward.”
“Hayley has been okay but I think that’s due to Jared. It’s been more difficult for Hayley’s daughters and her sister Janice.”
“She and Jared are definitely together then?”
Grace purses her lips. “He doesn’t seem happy though.”
“I doubt he knows what to do now that he has everything he wants. He’s grown too used to being miserable. What about Toby? How’s he been with you?”
She smiles but there are tears in her eyes. “He calls me every day to check on me.”
“You should know that Pamela has been talking.”
“Oh yeah, what’s she been saying?”
“She’s saying she made a deal with Brian because she wanted to protect Hayley and her granddaughters. She would deliver Leanne in exchange for Brian leaving town. Apparently, pointing us toward Toby was an afterthought.”
“I’ll never forgive Pamela, but I understand why she did it. When I couldn’t deny that Isobel was part of my family things changed. I would have sold my soul.”
“You are aware that this could have ended very differently.”
“I know, but this ending feels right for some reason. Somehow, I think we all got what we deserved.”
Macy holds up her cup but doesn’t drink. Even with the gun, the dog, and Toby’s daily phone calls, Grace seems as fragile as the day Macy met her. Macy puts her coffee down and brushes off her jeans.
“I need to get going,” she says, easing out of her chair.
Grace glances around like she’s looking for something. “I almost forgot. I have a present for you.”
“Grace, you didn’t need to do that.”
Grace hands her a gift wrapped in pale blue paper. “Please, put it in your bag and open it after you’ve gone.”
Macy feels the raised edge and knows it’s a frame. “I want you to call me if you need anything.”
“You have a child to look after, you can’t be worrying about me anymore. Besides, I’m fine here with Jack.”
Macy gazes out the window. The sun is just about to disappear behind the trees in the park. “You know, sometimes I forget I’m a mother.”
“It probably makes it easier to be away from your son.”
“Maybe you’re right,” she says, letting herself out. “It is better if I don’t think about it too much.”
Macy stands at the threshold and holds out a hand but Grace hugs her instead.
“Good-bye,” says Grace, finally letting go. “Try to be happy now.”
“Only if you promise to do the same.”
Behind her Grace’s door shuts with the softest of clicks.
Macy is waiting in her car at a red light when she pulls the gift from her bag. She turns it over in her hands before peeling back the paper. The pencil sketch is simple but beautifully rendered. Using the barest number of lines, Grace has captured a tender moment between Macy and her son. Macy remembers the evening Grace sat at the end of the hospital bed with a sketchpad in her lap. Macy had only given birth one day earlier and had felt irritated at the intrusion, but in the portrait she looks so serene. Macy continues to stare. The traffic light changes to green and car horns sound from behind. She places her fingertips on her son’s face. Nobody warned her what it would be like. She switches on the sirens and drives. It’s been a long day and she’s finally heading home.
Acknowledgments
Thank you to my agent, Felicity Blunt, whose belief never wavered; my friends Simon Curtis and Elizabeth McGovern for a key introduction—clearly it was fate; my editor, Matt Martz, and everyone at Minotaur Books, for saying yes and then bringing out my best; Curtis Brown UK—amazing, amazing, amazing; my dear readers Karen Drake, Nella McNabb, Paul McNabb, Atussa Dorudi Cross, Julia Bell, and Fiona Melrose, for reviewing those early drafts and then telling me in the nicest possible way to get back to work; my children, Daniela and Matteo, whose patience and encouragement saw us through all those evenings when I was writing and dinner arrived by motorbike; my parents, Karin and Graham Breck, who always knew I had it in me even if I couldn’t see it myself; my extended and loving family in California, Alaska, Montana, North Carolina, the UK, and Germany; my road and everyone who lives on it—I can’t name names but it is the best street in the world; my fellow scribes at Friday Night Writes, Tanya Datta, Terry Eeles, Tray Butler, Fiona Melrose, Timothy Graves, and Marissa Chen, whose guidance was key when things in Collier started to kick off; my patient friends Carolyn Morgan, Alison Lee, Diane Oakley, Nicolette Krajewski, Lynn Noyce, Genni Combes, Sue Smith, Monique Roffey, David Sinden, James Kennedy, and everyone else who let me go on and on about the bloody book I was writing—I consider myself fortunate that you’re all still speaking to me.
About the Author
KARIN SALVALAGGIO received an M.A. in Creative Writing from Birkbeck, University of London. Born in West Virginia and raised in an Air Force family, she grew up on a number of military bases around the United States. She now lives in London with her two children.
Bone Dust White
is her first novel.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
BONE DUST WHITE.
Copyright © 2014 by Karin Salvalaggio Ltd. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
Cover design and photo-illustration by David Baldeosingh Rotstein
Cover photographs: woods © Ilona Wellmann/Trevillion Images; footprints © Mark Owen/Trevillion Images; woman © Shannon Soule
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Salvalaggio, Karin.
Bone Dust White / Karin Salvalaggio.
pages cm
ISBN 978-1-250-04618-5 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4668-4632-6 (e-book)
1. Women detectives—Fiction. 2. Murder—Investigation—Fiction. 3. Missing persons—Fiction. 4. Mystery fiction. I. Title.
PR6119.A436B66 2014
823'.6—dc23
2013050958
eISBN 9781466846326
First Edition: May 2014