Page 48 of Tourist Season
Not your fault. Don’t worry about it, I don’t mind.
Still, I appreciate your help so much. Thank you.
Don’t thank me yet. I’m going to throw you under the judgy bus with “grumps” the first chance I get.
Fuck you, Harps.
I chuckle and pocket the device just as the curtain is swept to the side and the doctor enters with a nurse whose hospital scrubsstretch over her pregnant belly. With a smile that deftly straddles the line of comforting yet professional, the doctor gives me a nod in greeting as the nurse gets to work changing Arthur’s IV fluids.
“I’m Dr. Reid,” she says with a warm Jamaican accent. I recognize both her and the nurse from town, though we’ve never officially met. “You’re Harper? Arthur’s granddaughter?”
“Oh … no, I mean yes, I’m Harper, but we’re not related. Just friends. I understand if you need to wait and give his medical information to his grandson. He’s away for a meeting but I can call him if you’d rather speak with him directly.”
She taps on her tablet. “No, it’s fine. Arthur authorized you on his medical records.” I glance at Arthur’s bed. He’s still asleep, unaware that my heart has grown two sizes in my chest. “There doesn’t seem to be any sign of a stroke or internal hemorrhage after the fall. He’s got some bumps and bruises, of course, but nothing is broken. However, his bloodwork came back with a B12deficiency. Has he been particularly irritable lately?”
“It’s Arthur Lancaster. He’s always irritable.”
Dr. Reid does her best to suppress a smile, its faint traces fading as quickly as they appear. “What about any mention of pins and needles in his hands or feet?” I shake my head. “Problems with coordination and balance?”
“He crashed his golf cart yesterday.”
The doctor lets out a thoughtfulhmmas she taps her stylus on the tablet to note the detail. “Have his Alzheimer’s symptoms noticeably worsened recently?”
Blood threads across my tongue as I worry my bottom lip. I feel fucking terrible that I could have missed a constellation of symptoms that pointed to another health problem that could have beenfixed. “It’s hard to say. He’s been losing things more often. He’s a bit paranoid that someone is breaking into his house to steal his belongings. But this kind of thing has been happening for a while.”
The doctor nods, giving me a polite smile. “I understand. We’re going to keep him in for a few days so we can get his B12levels up and monitor for other symptoms. He’ll be transferred to the geriatric ward, where he’ll be much more comfortable. Once we get him stabilized—”
The doctor’s next words are lost to a sudden cacophony outside our curtained room—a crash of metal across the floor, slurred yelling, and raised voices. I share a worried look with the doctor and nurse, and then they’re rushing into the corridor as I follow on their heels.
A huge mammoth of a man is facing off against a doctor in a room across the hall, a stainless-steel cart lying on its side at the edge of the curtain, metal instruments scattered across the floor. Vomit glistens on his wiry ginger beard and stains the top of his white shirt. There’s an open gash through his brow, a suture needle dangling from a thread sewn into his flesh. The doctor who was treating him raises his hands in a placating gesture, and I can tell he’s nervous about being hemmed in between the gigantic man and a tangle of medical equipment and wires. “Mr. McMillan—”
“What is your fucking problem?” the man bellows, every word slurred and stretched. Two orderlies and the doctor and nurse who were attending to Arthur come closer, a halo of “calm down, sir” rising around him.
“Please sit down so Dr. Aspen can finish your stitches,” Dr. Reid says with calm authority. She’s only met with a tirade of drunken vitriol despite her polite request. “Sir, police will intervene if you do not calm down.”
“Stop telling me to fuckingcalm down.” The man rushes forward and tumbles over the cart, knocking over the pregnant nurse as he falls to the floor. She lands hard on her ass and lets out an agonized yelp. Both of the doctors immediately rush to her side while the orderlies keep the drunken man pinned to the floor. A police officer jogs in a moment later, and the doctors help the nurse up, her eyes shining with unshed tears, a protective hand cradled around her belly.
Fury rages through the caverns of my heart. My hands are folded into fists, fingernails pressing crescent imprints into my palms. When I look over my shoulder at Arthur, he’s awake, watching me with grim determination.
I turn back to the man subdued beneath the knee of the officer. The details of the room seem to sharpen as this unfamiliar man is handcuffed and dragged to his feet. I’m not sure if he really sees me when he meets my eyes across the corridor. But I see him.
When Dr. Reid returns, she only stays long enough to see if I have any questions. And after she departs, I turn all my attention to Arthur. I fill his paper cup with water and hold it to his lips. I unplug his phone from where I left it to charge and lay it beside his hand. He says he doesn’t need help as he shifts on his bed, but I still push his pillows around until they’re right where he wants them. He insists that I leave for my own benefit. I know he wants to rest, so I don’t linger, even though I feel like I should be doing more to make him comfortable. With a kiss to his cheek that he pretends to be disgruntled about even though he pats my hand, I leave him with the promise that I’ll return as soon as I can.
It’s nearly two in the morning when I get home, even later when I finally fall asleep. But I’m wide awake at six, ready for a full day of activity. I make coffee. Feed Morpheus. Check my garden for body part presents from my frenemy Nolan. There arenone. I frown at my bird feeder, though I don’t know why I should feel a needling sense of disappointment at the absence of a decapitated head. Then I head to the main house and clean up the blood on the marble tile in the kitchen from Arthur’s fall.
As soon as I speed through these mundane chores, I’m enacting the plans that kept me tossing in my bed until two in the morning.
I pry the loose floorboard up in the guest room of the cottage, where I hid some of the reminders of my old life when I first arrived in Cape Carnage.
This is a huge risk.
Sam was interested in my true identity and my disappearance four years ago when I first went missing, maybe just as much as he’s interested in the story of La Plume now. I was already trying to disappear before I made it to Maryland and fate intervened to give me the gift of Harper Starling. But I was careful to do everything I could not to leave a trail here. Though he’s given no indication that he’s figured out I wound up in Cape Carnage, he’s already spying on the property where I live. It’s not a stretch that he could recognize me despite the darker hair and stolen name.
But this might also be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to kill the rumor that Arthur is La Plume and get Sam off the old man’s back for good. And after feeling so fucking helpless at the hospital, it’ll be good to take charge and do something productive to keep my promises. With a deep breath, I steel myself and commit to my plan.
I pick a few keepsakes from my hiding place that might be interesting to Sam but not conclusive proof that I was here. An incense holder shaped like a crescent moon. It lived on the wood-burning stove of the van I shared with Adam. A Higonokami pocketknife. I used that in a few videos we took when we explained to ourfollowers how we set up camp at the various stops on our cross-country road trip. The unusual angle of the blade’s tip is easily recognizable to anyone as detail oriented as Sam Porter. A Texas Tech sweater that was Adam’s. I borrowed it so frequently that he finally declared it mine. I press my nose to the fibers and inhale. It doesn’t smell like us anymore. I sigh as I run my fingertips over the embroidered letters. I haven’t looked at these mementos in at least a couple of years, and there’s something reassuring about their presence in the house. But even in these last few days, I feel less attached to them. Maybe I’m not ready to give up some of the more personal relics that I keep hidden in this hole, but as I put the floorboard back, I think maybe I’m ready to let a few of them go.
I put the knife, sweater, and incense holder into a bag along with a few additional supplies, and then head to the garage next to Arthur’s house, borrowing his ancient Jaguar sedan to drive to the abandoned farmhouse off Clarke Road, twenty minutes outside town. I don’t even know whose land it is. I just know it’s not Arthur’s, and that’s the only thing that matters.
