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sweetie.”
    Nick wrapped his arm around her, tucked her into his side. They were a perfect fit. I watched him brush aside wisps of his wife’s blonde hair with his fingertips. He kissed her on the forehead, eyes briefly closing. Their caress was intimate. My heart twisted. I’d lost my opportunity to have that with James.
    “Will you be OK tonight?” Nick asked me.
    Did I have a choice?
    “I’ll be fine.”
    “Call if you need anything.”
    “Thanks.” I shut and locked the door after they said good-bye, listening to Nick drive away. I slid to the floor, my back to the door, and my eyes drifted close. I felt myself floating from the wine. Sounds and smells penetrated my foggy mind. Ticking from the mantel clock. Humming from the air conditioner. Scents of lemongrass and coconut from burning candles.
    My eyes flew open. I needed to blow out the candles.
    I eased up and a small scrap of paper underneath a kitchen chair caught my attention. It was bent in half and propped like a miniature tent. I went over and picked it up, peered at the text.
    Lacy Saunders.
    The psychic from James’s funeral. I’d almost forgotten about her. Nadia must have left the card when the contents of her purse spilled. I stared at the card.
    James is alive.
    Lacy’s words whispered through my head.
    What a nut job. I tossed the card onto the countertop and moved through the house, blowing out candles, locking doors, and turning off lights. I double-checked the garage, and sure enough, Kristen had left on the single overhead light. I flicked it off only to flick it right back on.
    Behind my VW Beetle was a large empty space where there should have been eight boxes loaded with James’s bubble-wrapped canvases. They were gone.
    I walked around my car and gazed stupidly at the bare cement floor. Only one box remained. Where were the others? How long had they been gone? I’d been so out of sorts these past months the boxes could have disappeared at any time. Maybe James had wanted more space in the garage and had moved the paintings to his company’s warehouse.
    Thomas might know where they were. I should call him. Tomorrow, I thought, yawning.
    I returned inside and crashed in bed.

CHAPTER 4
    OCTOBER
    Days came and went, each blurring into the next. Endless nights out with Nadia, dinners with Kristen and her husband, and countless evenings alone watching movies from the couch. When there wasn’t anything interesting to watch, I baked.
    Every so often I drove to The Goat and worked my shift, but the certainty it would close soon only served as a reminder that I’d have to figure out what to do with my life. So I stopped going.
    Mail piled higher. Newspapers stacked taller. Dishes collected in the sink. Glasses littered any available surface through the house. Casseroles, cakes, and cookies sat uneaten on the kitchen table. The washer and dryer were used only when my situation was dire. Like when I’d run out of underwear.
    I packed my days and crammed my nights until I crashed. When I woke, my mind and body dragging, I got creative with espresso. I mixed exotic beans and syrups to keep me wired, and then I baked some more. My house was a mess. My life was a disaster. I was a wreck.
    Until the day I woke up.
    It was to the sound of a lawnmower. I peeked through the front window blinds and saw Nick move back and forth across the lawn. The front door opened and Kristen gaped at me. “You’re awake?”
    “I thought I’d join the human race.” I thumbed out the window. “He’s got to stop doing that.”
    Kristen shut the door. “He wants to help, and I think it helps him.”
    I collapsed an empty tissue box. “How so?”
    “He misses James.”
    “We all do.” I collected dirty glassware around the front room. “The yard looks gorgeous, but it’s been eleven weeks. He can’t cut my grass for the rest of his life.”
    “So said the woman who just returned to the land of the living.” Kristen followed me into the kitchen.