When Love Runs Dry novel · Chapter 23 of 32

Chapter 23: Clean Hands

Delaney took one step back on the porch.

Her heel caught the edge of the mat.

"You're lying," she said.

It came out small. No sugar in it at all.

"I took the clinic's call two years ago," I said. "I tried to tell him for two nights. He didn't want to hear it either."

"He'd have told me."

"He didn't know until November."

Her eyes went to the street, to her car, back to me.

I watched her do the math.

Every day since November, he'd looked at her stomach and said nothing.

"You're a jealous, dried-up..."

"Careful," said Opal from the kitchen door.

Delaney turned and went down the steps too fast.

She slipped on the ice at the bottom and caught herself on the railing with the hand that had the ring on it.

She didn't look back.

The Range Rover pulled out with its tires spinning.

Opal came and stood beside me in the doorway with her dish towel.

"Well," she said. "Now she knows what you know."

"Now she knows."

"Shut the door, Merry. You're heating the whole street."

The next morning I was on the Main Street bridge with the first selectman.

The river had dropped two feet.

It had left a brown line on every building at the low end of the street, and mud on every step.

Half the town was out with shovels.

The diner had its doors propped open. The post office lady was hosing down her sidewalk.

At ten o'clock a black Mercedes stopped in front of the Spaulding storefront.

Tobias got out. No driver.

He saw me on the bridge and lifted one hand, just a little.

Then he went inside.

The shovels slowed down.

Nobody on Main Street pretended not to watch the glass.

Two minutes later the door banged open.

Delaney came out first, in the cream coat, white as the coat.

Tobias came out after her and stopped on the step.

"Laney."

"I'm not doing this here."

"You did everything else here," he said. "You did the shutoffs here. You did the news here."

The man with the shovel nearest them stopped shoveling entirely.

"My board removed me yesterday," Tobias said. "Seven to two. They kept you. They like your numbers."

"I know. I'm sorry, babe. I am."

"I made an appointment," he said. "My doctor. Tomorrow at ten. A blood test and an ultrasound."

"I'll drive you there. I'll hold your hand the whole time."

Delaney's hand went to her stomach.

"I have my own doctor."

"Then call her." He held out his phone. "Right now. Put her on speaker."

She didn't take it.

The first selectman beside me let out a long, quiet breath.

"You don't trust me," Delaney said. Her voice wobbled up into the sweet register, the tears coming on cue. "After three years. After the baby."

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