Page 67 of It Happened on the Lake

H arper couldn’t get out of bed.

Devastated and heartbroken, still wearing her nightgown, she stared at the ceiling in her room at the cottage. Bandit lay on the pillow beside her, the bedside lamp turned low, the February wind rattling the panes of the windows.

With effort, she forced herself to roll from beneath the covers.

She was cold from the inside out, testament to her grief and the gray winter day.

She peered out the window, wondered if it might snow, and without thinking, plucked at a spot near the window frame where the wallpaper was stained and pulling away from the casing.

Her mother would never have allowed the discoloration or the tiny tear. When Anna was alive, this room was awash with light, the woodwork was a bright white, the curtains crisp, the rug a thick shag.

But after Anna died, the room had seemed to fade and Harper had spent more and more time at Gram’s big house.

The books and toys still on the shelves were still the same as they had been for years.

The only nods to her becoming a teenager were the portable record player that was set up on her desk, a scattering of 45s on the floor, and a small television with rabbit ears that had once been Evan’s.

She flopped back onto the bed and heard her father and stepmother downstairs, smelled coffee brewing, and closed her eyes. She knew Marcia was angry that Dad insisted they stay here, at the cottage, rather than the condo in downtown Portland. She’d overheard several fights between them.

Didn’t care.

Hadn’t cared about anything since the night when Gram died.

Somehow a week had passed.

All in a blur of police interrogations, reporters’ calls, funeral preparations, and lawyers’ visits. The “big house,” as Dad called it, had been crawling with cops, reporters at the gates. The whole town of Almsville and the world beyond were caught up in the scandal and mystery.

Another weapon in Marcia’s arsenal in her fight to move back to their penthouse.

“We’d be protected there, Bruce. There’s a doorman and security. We could be away from all of this madness. It would be good for us, you and me, and for Harper as well.”

“Not yet,” her father had replied. “I’m not uprooting Harper. She’s been through enough trauma as it is.”

The fight had ended with the bedroom door slamming so hard the whole cottage had shuddered. But they’d stayed.

Absently, Harper petted Bandit, barely feeling the dog’s rough fur.

Her heart ached, not just for Chase, wherever he was, but for Gram as well. Harper couldn’t imagine life without her grandmother.

Never had Harper felt so all alone. Even when her mother passed, Gram had remained stalwart, just as she had when Evan, too, left them.

But now?

Now?

Who was she left with? Her father and his wife.

She let out a sigh. Daddy had always been somewhat distant, he’d been closer to Evan.

Then there was Marcia, a stepmother who was only ten years older than Harper but one of those women who acted and appeared a generation older.

Marcia’s taste in clothes, hairstyles, music, makeup, you name it, was part of an older generation.

More Marilyn Monroe than Twiggy. Just like Dad was more Dean Martin than Mick Jagger—but then he could be excused.

He was from another generation. An older one.

And now there was a new one—or would soon be.

Harper swallowed hard and her hand went to her abdomen where, she knew, a baby was growing.

She hadn’t been to a doctor, it was too early for that, but she’d skipped not just one period but two.

She’d have to tell Dad and Marcia before they guessed the truth.

It should have been a time of joy. With the baby’s arrival, Chase would be safe from the draft.

Or something like that. But now, it was a time of worry. Fear.

“I’ll take care of you,” she promised her unborn child.

She squeezed her eyes shut tighter against the hot tears that were always there.

Marcia suspected the truth and had confided as much to Harper’s father, a few days earlier. Harper had heard the conversation wafting up the stairs and had crept down to a spot where she could surreptitiously peer through the railing and watch what was happening in the kitchen.

“Something’s up with Harper,” Marcia stated. She was at the kitchen sink, her back to the room.

Dad looked up from his paper. “What do you mean?”

“I think she might be pregnant.”

Harper’s heart went still. She knew ?

“What? Oh, for the love of Christ, Marcia, why would you even think such a thing?”

From her hiding spot, Harper hardly dared to breathe as she listened to more of the damning conversation.

Marcia was saying, “I’m the one who cleans out the trash in the upstairs bathroom, and there hasn’t been any evidence that she’s, you know, having her period.”

“Marcia!”

“I’m just saying that girl was pretty regular and I could tell, not just by her moods but by what I found, or more precisely didn’t find, in the garbage.”

“That’s ridiculous!”

“Is it?”

“You shouldn’t snoop.”

“Not snooping, Bruce. Being ahead of the game.” Marcia went on spinning so quickly from the sink, Harper was certain she’d be seen.

But Marcia hadn’t looked through the archway, instead pinning her husband in her glare.

“She spends half her time, maybe more, over at that huge house with all of its rooms and a doting grandmother who has no rules. It probably happened there!” She snapped a terry-cloth towel from a peg near the sink and furiously dried her hands.

“You don’t know that.” Dad laid down his paper.

With a sigh, he said, “She’s going to Olivia’s tonight, and it’s not to meet Chase. She’s taking care of her grandmother. Matilda has the night off.”

“Why?” Marcia demanded.

“No idea. I figure that’s between Olivia and Matilda.”

Marcia asked, “But does Harper know that she’s on grandma duty?”

“Yes. It’s all been decided,” Dad assured his wife. “Harper’s spending the night.”

Harper’s mind was already spinning ahead. Tonight would be the perfect time to meet Chase on the dock because he could boat across the lake.

Marcia scoffed. “I’m just telling you your daughter’s boy crazy, and right now she’s all over that Hunt kid. It’s ‘Chase this’ and ‘Chase that.’ When she isn’t with him, she’s talking about him. As a matter of fact, he’s all she thinks about.”

“It’ll pass. You remember how things were in high school. Everything was overblown. High drama. So don’t worry about Harper. She’s a smart girl. What’s going on now, it’s just a crush. Besides, Chase is at college, surrounded by other girls. He’ll outgrow her.”

“Maybe,” Marcia allowed, not sounding convinced. “But it might already be too late.”

“I don’t want to hear this, Marcia,” he warned, scooting his chair back. “Don’t borrow trouble.”

“There’s no borrowing it. Trouble’s brewing. Coming our way. In fact it’s already here.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Don’t I?” she threw back at him, her voice rising. “Just don’t come whining to me when you find out you’re going to be a grandfather!” She threw the towel down and Harper scurried quietly up the stairs.

“Enough!” Dad reprimanded. “That’s just crazy.”

“Is it? I guess time will tell.” Harper heard Marcia’s clipped footsteps retreating from the kitchen.

She’d felt sick inside. Why hadn’t she been more careful about hiding her pregnancy?

Not that she’d expected her stepmother to be tracking her every move.

But it didn’t matter, she’d told herself.

Because she was going to tell Chase that she was pregnant, and they’d find a way to get married and have a baby and .

. . Even to her own ears, it sounded like a dream, but she’d closed her mind to all her negative thoughts.

Tonight would be perfect. She’d set up a time to meet him and tell him the news.

Even if she had to twist the truth a little.

Now, nearly a week later, as Harper lay on her bed, she heard the drone of the television downstairs. The phone rang. Again. Her father’s voice drifted up the stairs as he said succinctly, “No comment!” then slammed down the receiver.

One day, when the phone had rung incessantly, Dad had even taken it off the hook, leaving the receiver to hum loudly, reminding them that no one could get through.

That had been a temporary solution because they couldn’t be without a phone for any length of time.

There were important calls from the police and the accountants and the lawyers and friends who needed to speak to them, funeral arrangements to be made.

Oh, she’d heard bits and pieces of the conversations rising to the second floor.

Her father’s stern messages to the reporters who called, and then Marcia’s whispered concerns to whatever friend had phoned: “We don’t know what to do .

. . she won’t eat . . . no, no, won’t come out of her room .

. . nearly comatose, if you ask me . . .

oh yes, yes, very concerned and the police won’t leave us alone.

It’s a nightmare. Bruce is beside himself .

. . oh, I don’t know. I wouldn’t think so .

. . no, no, she adored her grandmother .

. . yes, I know . . . Umhmm . . . if you ask me, he bailed, left his family high and dry .

. . no, no, I don’t have any proof, of course .

. . no one knows what really happened. . .”

That was the truth.

Chase was still missing despite multiple attempts by divers to locate him in the lake. Since the water was up, it had been hypothesized that he’d drowned and floated down the spillway to the river. If not located soon, his body could be swept toward the ocean.

Hope was fading that he would ever be found.

Harper was devastated.