Shaking my head, I’m thankful for my sunglasses because I am so ready to cry. “No one can heal in the same place that made them sick,” I say, my voice raw. “So if that makes me a bad person—a rotten friend—then so be it.”
“Liv, I…”
“You’ve had Mike—the most perfect boyfriend in the world. The rest of us aren’t always so lucky,” I say. “Matt wasn’t only a cheater; he was a narcissistic sociopath. While he was charming all of you, he would take little jabs at me to wear away at my self-esteem. No one wanted to hear about that because it was inconvenient for the rest of you. No one wanted the guy who made everything fun to go away, just the girl who was reminding them of his flaws.”
No one says anything, but like everyone else today, I’m on a roll.
“So yeah, I moved away, and I didn’t always come home to visit. You may not believe it, but every one of those last-minute cancelations was one hundred percent true. I am many things, but I’m not a liar.” I wipe away a stray tear. “But there were also times I just didn’t want to come, and I used my job as an excuse. It wasn’t a lie because I am always working. Always! Hell, even this vacation is a working one. But no one gets that. If I don’t write, I don’t get paid. If there are no books or no words, then my career is over. Do you have any idea how stressful that is?”
“You never mentioned…”
“I did,” I interrupt. “I have mentioned the stress I am under so often that I’m not even surprised that you stopped listening.”
In the distance, I hear a door slam, and I just assume that Roxie’s taking the dogs for a walk and didn’t want to walk past any of us to do it.
“And Roxie? Do you even realize what her marriage to Theo was like?” I ask Loren specifically. “Did you know that he had a drug issue? That he would wipe out their bank accounts and disappear for days or sometimes weeks at a time? He worked in the medical field, and he was stealing drugs from the clinic he worked at! Roxie was killing herself to keep them from getting evicted, and he would just belittle her every time he screwed up. Their marriage didn’t end because she didn’t put in the time, Loren. Their marriage ended because Theo’s a pill-popping scumbag.”
Now I’m done.
I grab my sarong and my floppy hat and calmly walk away. Hopefully walking the dogs has calmed Roxie down and maybe we can all sit and talk like adults.
The last thing I want is to ambush her at the door, so I slowly make my way up to her room and figure I’ll wait for her there. But when I get there, the room’s empty. The dog beds are gone, her side of the closet is empty, and the bathroom vanity is cleared of all her stuff.
“Shit!”
Racing back down the stairs, I run to the door and whip it open, but her car’s gone too.
“What’s going on?” Vanessa asks as she comes in from the deck.
“She’s gone! Roxie left!” I go in search of my phone and can’t remember where I left it.
“Why would she leave? She had to know we were all going to make up in a little while!” Van whines. “I have my phone. I’ll call her.”
“Who’s she calling?” Loren asks when she finally comes strolling in.
“Roxie left,” I snap. “She packed up all her stuff and the dogs and she’s gone.”
“Oh.”
I don’t even have the energy to demand that she take responsibility for this, so I rush over to Vanessa to see if she’s gotten through to Roxie.
“It’s going to voicemail.” She looks at me. “And you’re sure she took everything? Like…maybe she just decided to go for a drive.”
Shaking my head, I huff out a breath. “Everything’s gone. What are we going to do?”
“Okay, okay, okay…let me call the guys and get them back here. I know for a fact that Roxie mentioned a specific spot she likes to stop for the dogs. Remember when we were on our way here? There’s a park that’s at the halfway point? Do you remember the name of it?”
Crap, I don’t.
“Look on Google Maps and map out our trip and see where the halfway point is. Maybe it will be on there?” I’m almost frantic at this point.
“Good idea. I’ll do that. Can you text Ash?”
“Um…I don’t have his number.” Huh. Should I have that?
“Okay, you do the map thing. I’ll call Zayne!”
Nodding, I run back outside to the deck, and it feels like everything’s happening in slow motion. I walk all around and finally find my phone on the table where we had lunch. Whew! I tap and scroll, and scroll and tap, and discover that there’s a big community park ninety minutes from here and it seems like I vaguely remember Roxie talking about it.
