has been expecting company. Beside it is a single crystal goblet filled with pale gold liquid.
It’s all so proper and precise and insane.
“Where is my family?” I ask, fighting to keep my tone level.
Instead of answering immediately, Dr. Shields walks unhurriedly to a cabinet and withdraws a matching crystal glass. For the first time, she doesn’t ask if I want any. Instead, she goes to the refrigerator, takes out a bottle of Chardonnay, and fills the goblet.
She sets it down in front of me as if we’re two friends about to share confidences.
I want to scream but I know if I try to rush her, she’ll prove her dominance by making me wait even longer.
“Your family is in Florida having a wonderful time, Jessica,” she finally says. “Why would you think anything else?”
“Because you sent me that text!” I blurt.
Dr. Shields arches an eyebrow. “All I did was inquire about their vacation,” she says. “There is nothing untoward about that, is there?”
She sounds so sincere, but I can see through her act.
“I want to call the resort,” I say. My voice is shaking.
“Certainly,” Dr. Shields says. “Don’t you have the number?”
“You never gave it to me,” I shoot back.
She frowns. “The resort name has never been a secret, Jessica. Your family has been there for three days.”
“Please,” I beg. “Just let me talk to them.”
Without a word, Dr. Shields rises and retrieves her phone from the counter. “I have the resort confirmation information here,” she says as she scrolls through her e-mails. It seems to take an inordinately long time. Then she recites a number.
I dial it immediately.
“Happy holidays, Winstead Resort and Spa, this is Tina,” a woman answers in a singsong voice.
“I need to reach the Farris family,” I say urgently.
“Of course, I’ll be happy to connect you. May I have a room number?”
“I don’t know it,” I whisper.
“Just a moment, please.”
I stare at Dr. Shields, who meets my gaze with her ice-blue eyes as, incredibly, cheerful Christmas music plays while I’m on hold: Claus is coming to town.
Then Dr. Shields edges my glass of wine closer to me.
I can’t bring myself to take a sip. I fight back an acute feeling of deja vu. I was just here a few days ago, confessing that I know Thomas is her husband, but that’s not what is prompting the unsettling sensation roiling through me right now.
The music abruptly cuts off.
“I have no record of any guests by that name,” the resort operator says.
My body buckles.
My vision swims and I dry heave.
“They’re not there?” I cry.
Dr. Shields picks up her glass and takes another delicate sip, and her unconcerned gesture is what unleashes my anger again.
“Where is my family?” I demand again, locking eyes with her. I push back my stool, nearly knocking it over, as I stand up.
She sets her glass down on the counter.
“Oh,” Dr. Shields says. “Perhaps the reservation is under my name.”
“Shields,” I say into the phone urgently. “Try that, please.”
Silence stretches across the phone line.
I can feel my pulse throbbing between my ears.
“Ah,” says the clerk. “Here it is. I’ll connect you now.”
My mother answers on the second ring, her voice so familiar and safe that I almost burst into tears again.
“Mom! Are you okay?” I ask.
“Oh my goodness, sweetheart, we are having the best time,” she says. “We just got in from the beach. Becky got to pet dolphins—they have a whole program here. Your dad took so many pictures!”
They’re safe. She didn’t do anything to them. At least not yet.
“You’re sure you’re all right?”
“Of course! Why wouldn’t we be? We do miss you, though. But what a wonderful boss you have to do this for us! You must be very special to her.”
I’m so disoriented by now that I can barely manage to end the call and hang up, promising to phone again tomorrow. I can’t reconcile my mother’s happy chatter with the terrible worry my mind had created.
I put my phone down.
Dr. Shields smiles.
“See?” she says calmly. “They’re perfectly fine. Better than fine.”
I splay my hands on the hard, cold granite countertop and lean forward, trying to concentrate.
Dr. Shields wants me to think it’s all me, that I’m unstable. But I didn’t conjure losing my job or losing Noah. Those are absolute facts; I still have the voice mails from BeautyBuzz on my phone. And Noah hasn’t responded to me. I’m positive it isn’t a coincidence that both things happened while I was in Thomas’s office. I can’t prove it, but Dr. Shields