gave her hope. She would have to find a new way. A new path.
The car slowed, downshifted, and came to a stop. She had not been quick enough. The driver had spotted her.
CHAPTER TWO
LIBBY
Saturday, June 6, 2020
Bluestone, Virginia
They said bad luck came in threes. But that was not really true. Bad luck could come in threes, fours, fives, or any number it chose.
Today’s first stroke of bad luck arrived with a hard shove to Libby McKenzie’s shoulder and a voice shouting in her ear, “Get up!”
Wrenched from sleep, she sat up quickly, swung her legs over the side of the couch, and knocked over the empty wineglass on the coffee table. Her head spun, and her stomach churned as she pushed back a tumble of dark hair. “What?”
“Libby, get up! You have to be at the wedding venue in one hour.” The shouts came from her friend Sierra Mancuso. They had grown up together, her family living next to Libby’s, and until Libby had gone to boarding school at age thirteen, they had been inseparable.
Libby’s mouth was as dry as cotton. “What about my alarms? I set two.”
“The two I just shut off?” Sierra glared down at her best friend. Her blonde hair was slicked back into a bun, and she wore a black shirt and pants along with sensible shoes. All were telltale signs that Sierra was working a catering gig today.
Both thirty-one, they had been through several life-altering losses together. Sierra’s major life setback had been her husband’s death to cancer last year, and the right cross that had taken Libby down a peg had been three miscarriages and a divorce. They were both the walking wounded and had retreated to their hometown of Bluestone, into their parents’ homes, until the dust settled.
Libby looked at her phone and the purple clock that had been hers since seventh grade. The red digital numbers read 8:02 a.m. “Damn.”
“I’ve started the coffee.” Sierra clapped her hands. “I’m making eggs. Chop-chop.”
“I’m on it.”
Libby jumped to her feet and dashed up the stairs toward the small bathroom. After stripping off her oversize T-shirt, she turned on the hot water and waited as the old pipes rumbled and the water heated.
Her dad, Dr. Allen McKenzie, had been the town pediatrician for thirty years. He had never said no to a patient, not even toward the end, when he had been sick. He had died six months ago.
All promises of never returning to her hometown aside, Libby had moved back to care for her widowed father toward the end, and after he passed, she just decided to stay. It made good economic sense versus living in a rented apartment in Richmond. After the divorce, it was hard to afford anything on a photographer’s salary. Since January, the plan had been to regroup, save up some money, and then get back to living a real life in a real city by Christmas. She was going on six months of regrouping, and she still was not back up on her feet.
Steam finally rose from the water, and she quickly hopped under the hot spray. Adrenaline had her in and out of the shower in under five minutes, and she toweled off and crossed to her old bedroom.
Her room was as neat as she had left it when leaving for college thirteen years ago. The same SAVE THE EARTH posters hung on the wall along with an Ansel Adams print of the Montana skyline. She had yet to sleep in the twin sleigh bed still made up in the paisley purple coverlet purchased from IKEA when she was sixteen. It was one thing to move home, but it was another level of sad to sleep in her first bed again. It felt equally weird to sleep in her parents’ room or the third bedroom, which was her father’s office. The upstairs simply held too many memories that hinted at her parents’ troubled marriage. That left the couch in the living room.
From the open suitcase on the neatly made bed, she removed a dark pair of slacks and a white blouse. She fished a brush from the side of the suitcase and pulled her hair back into a smooth ponytail. Next came her makeup kit, and she quickly applied mascara and rouge. She replaced all the items in her suitcase and then wiped off the bathroom counter and hung up her towel. By 8:12 a.m. it looked like she had barely been there. Perfect.