Instead of a honeymoon, there was a funeral.
Black dresses. Sympathy casseroles. Soft voices saying meaningless things like, “She knew you loved her.”
And underneath all of it, one terrible thought kept clawing at me.
Claire had been trying to tell me something.
A week later, Ryan left for work.
Twenty minutes after he drove away, my phone rang.
“Alice?” Megan’s voice sounded tight and urgent.
Megan was Claire’s closest coworker.
“There’s something here for you,” she said. “Claire left a phone and a note on my desk. I just found them this morning. You need to come now.”
I drove forty-five miles into the city barely able to breathe.
Megan met me near reception looking pale and shaken.
On her desk sat an envelope with my name written in Claire’s handwriting.
Beside it was Claire’s phone.
I had thought it was lost forever beneath the river.