Page 11 of Cornered

Lainie’s question in lieu of a greeting made her smile. “I am. I’m sad and mad and craving justice for Brenda, but I’ll be okay.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Thank you. And thank you for checking on me. It’s a long weekend with Labor Day, so at least I have an extra day before I have to face her empty desk again.” Not that the day would really help, but...

“I’m just sorry. I wish I had other words that were helpful, but I don’t.”

“I know. It’s okay.”

“I’m sure he told you,” Lainie said, “but James said anyone who wanted to come to the lake house on Monday is welcome. Do you think you’ll feel like coming?”

Her brother lived on Lake City Lake with his boat and other fun water accessories and enjoyed hosting his friends and family whenever possible. Lainie would move in after the wedding, but her two dogs, Rex and Tex, had already made the place their home. “I’m planning on it. What about everyone else?”

“Everyone who can will be there.”

Which meant Kenzie King, Cole Garrison, Jesslyn McCormick, Kristine Duncan, and others. All close friends Steph usually enjoyed spending time with, but with the shadow of Brenda’s death hanging over her, she’d almost feel guilty having fun. Not that her friend would want her to stop living just because she was gone. In fact, the opposite was true.

But still ... “Okay, well, I’ll just have to see how I feel, but I’ll plan on doing my best to enjoy the day with you all.”

“That’s the spirit.”

Her phone buzzed with an incoming call. “Hey, Lainie, I have another call. Let me grab this and we’ll talk later.”

“Bye.”

Steph swiped the screen. Cherry Bolin, a longtime friend who worked just about every waking hour at her family’s ecotourism company. They owned Bolin’s Nature Nurture Expeditions, and she and her brother ran it while their parents did a lot of traveling. She’d also been Brenda’s boss one weekend a month.

“Hi, Cherry.”

“Hey. I’m calling to see if you’re okay. I honestly don’t even know what to think. I can’t quite process that she’s dead and won’t be walking through the office door.” The last word ended on a sob, and Steph closed her eyes to hold back her own tears yet again.

“I know,” she said. “She loved working with you, though. Both at the business and having you for a client.”

“And she was good at it too.” Cherry cleared her throat. “Would you want to get together to just visit and have coffee sometime soon? Brenda and I were supposed to do that and ... didn’t. So, I’m just trying to ... well ... you know.”

“Reach out to people you care about and let them know?”

“Yes. Something like that.”

“I’d love to. Give me a couple of days and we’ll figure out a good time.”

“Sure.”

They talked for a few more minutes before saying their goodbyes, and Steph hung up to sit in silence for a moment.

Yeah, that wasn’t going to do.

She turned the television on low for background noise, then pulled her phone from the table to open it to the pictures she’d taken of the pages from the notebook. She squinted at the small print and huffed. “I’m too young to need readers,” she muttered. But printed the pages anyway.

Once she had them from the printer, she curled up in the recliner with a pencil and stared at the letters and numbers. “What in the world were you doing, Brenda? All these letters. Two letters and four letters and random numbers and ... ugh!”

She didn’t even know where to start. With her earlier attempts, she’d tried the obvious—the alphabet for the first twenty-six numbers—and that had been a bust. She’d also tried it backward, and nothing.

So, what next? Every second letter? Every third? This was definitely going to take some time.

For the next two hours, she worked and came up empty. When she finally yawned for the third time in as many minutes, she put the pages aside and leaned her head back, eyes focused on the picture of her, Brenda, and Lainie on the mantel. They’d gone white water rafting and had laughedfor hours. Steph loved the outdoors, but not like Brenda. The woman would have lived in a tent and off the land if Greg had been willing.

The Monday after the one weekend a month Brenda worked with the ecotourism company, Brenda would come to work refreshed and glowing.

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