Page 95 of Heidi Lucy Loses Her Mind
She looks at me with an expression I can’t quite place; a mixture of surprise and hope and something else that breaks my heart—shatters it into tiny pieces.
“Aren’t you going to ask why I can’t have kids?” she says finally, her voice hoarse.
“Do you want to tell me?” I counter. Of course I want to know; I want to know if she’s okay, if she’s healthy, if this knowledge is something she struggles with. But I’m not going to push her.
“I had a surgery when I was younger,” she says. Her eyes are trained carefully on me, and I can tell she’s watching every microexpression on my face, trying to discern the truth of how I feel and what I think. “I had ovarian cysts when I was in high school. The doctor was worried they might be cancerous.” She inhales deeply and then lets the breath out again. “They weren’t, but they were large, and there were several of them. The surgery and the scarring afterward did some damage to the tissue. I’m fine now, but it’s unlikely that I’m able to get pregnant.”
My body has stilled. “You’re okay now, though?”
She nods, and I let out a shaky breath as my head drops to her knee. “Good,” I whisper, trying to ease the panic in my chest that flared when I heard the wordcancerous. “Good.” Then, before I can stop myself, I press a kiss to her skin, a smooth patch above her knee, where my forehead has been resting. “You’re okay. You’re healthy. Yes?”
I want to hear her say it one more time.
“Yes,” she says softly, and I look up at her.
I need her to be healthy and happy always and forever. I need those things regardless of whether I’m part of her life or not.
“Soren,” she whispers.
“Mmm.”
“I think—” She breaks off before continuing. “I think—”
I wait, but all she says is a quiet “Never mind.”
I shrug. I’m tired, and my brain is overloaded. It’s full of Heidi and our future, but it’s also full of Carmina and the future she’ll never have.
“How would we be able to find out if Mr. Foster bought rat poison?” I say, my voice musing. I get the sense Heidi wants to change the subject. So I settle more comfortably on the floor next to where she’s still sitting in her chair. “We’d need to see a receipt or search his garage or something, and neither of those are realistic.”
“A receipt,” she murmurs, clearly lost in thought. “You know, therewasa receipt…”
I turn my head sharply to look at her. “Where? When?”
“In Carmina’s purse,” she says slowly. “With the envelope of cash. I found them under the chair after all the stuff fell out of her purse, remember?”
“Yes,” I say, my pulse picking up once more. “You don’t still have it, do you?”
“No,” she says. “I threw it away.”
“Ah.” I nod. “It was probably nothing, anyway.”
“Probably.” Then she gestures to the door. “You should get going. Let’s pick this up tomorrow.”
* * *
But later that night,probably thirty minutes after I’ve gotten home, my vibrating phone jolts me from my half-asleep thoughts. I feel around for it on my nightstand, sitting up in bed.
“Hello?”
“Soren,” Heidi says. There’s something about her voice that wakes me up fully andimmediately; not just because it’s her but because of the buzzing, crackling energy that seems to be coming down the line. “I found a picture of the receipt,” she says breathlessly.
I blink. “Wait—what?”
“I took a few photos of the envelope of cash,” she says, the words falling quickly and piling on top of each other, “and the receipt is off to the side, andSoren—it was Phil.It was Phil.He bought rat poison one week before Carmina Hildegarde died.”
24
FROM THE LIFE OF CARMINA HILDEGARDE
