I didn’t eat lunch with Adam and Wyatt and the other construction workers on the front lawn, despite their invitation to join them. I wasn’t ready to make idle conversation with anyone—did I still know how? I noticed Oliver didn’t eat with them, either. He stayed in his office, the door closed. So I walked to a nearby café called Nothing Fancy, savoring the music of Post Malone and Maroon 5 in my ears. I ordered a takeout chicken-salad sandwich and sat on a bench outside to eat it. I thought about the AA meeting I’d attended the night before. It had felt strange, being at an AA meeting with a group of nonprisoners, not to mention being in a meeting with mostly men. I hadn’t shared. Hadn’t uttered a word except when I asked the guy leading the meeting if he’d sign the form proving I’d attended. I was done with drinking, and listening to everyone’s sad stories only irritated me. I hadn’t had a drink in fourteen months. Even without the monitor on my ankle, I knew I was finished with it.
By four o’clock, I’d cleaned twelve of the squares and my work had given definition to part of a fishing vessel in the upper left of the painting as well as to the right arm of the hunky blond guy in the lower portion. Slowly, I came to realize the man was not holding a length of wood as I’d originally thought, but rather an ax, and something was dripping from the blade. Sap? I gently moved my cotton-tipped dowel over the lowest corner of the blade and gasped. The glistening drops were bright red. They could only represent one thing: blood. I stood back from the mural, clutching the dowel in my hand. Only a third of the man’s face had been cleaned and the paint was partly abraded, but I could see that he smiled. That he was handsome. That he seemed completely oblivious to the blood dripping from his ax. I felt a little sick. I thought of the newspaper image of Anna Dale. What had gone on in that strange head of hers?
I was dying to show what I’d uncovered to Oliver, but he was shopping for supplies, so I continued working. An hour later, I realized that I was no longer hearing the background sounds of hammers and saws and the pop of nail guns. I pulled out my earbuds and could tell that the guys were finishing up in the rear of the gallery. I would keep going, though. I had plenty more to do and nothing waiting for me back at Lisa’s.
Wyatt came into the foyer as I wound a fresh piece of cotton on the pointed end of the dowel. His dreadlocks were loose now, hanging long over his shoulders.
“Damn, girl, that’s rad,” he said, checking out the cleaned portion of the mural. “I had no clue that thing was so trashed.”
I felt myself beam. “Totally changes it,” I said.
His grin turned to a frown and he moved nearer to the painting. “Is that blood on his ax?”
I nodded. “I think our artist was a little whacked.”
“Ya think?” he said, then looked at me. “We’re all goin’ over to Waterman’s for a drink. Come with us?”
Oh, hell no, I thought. I could imagine the seductive smell of the place. The beer cold and foamy in tall glasses. Watching everybody drink while I nursed a Coke. Not a good idea.
“I can’t,” I said. A guy at the AA meeting had talked about focusing on his accounting business to keep from drinking. “I’m going to do some more work here.”
“All work and no play…” Wyatt teased.
“I know.” I smiled. “Have a good time.”
Another half hour passed before Oliver walked into the gallery, a soft leather briefcase in his hand. He stopped in the middle of the foyer to look at what I’d accomplished.
“That … is … awesome,” he said, loudly enough for me to hear with my earbuds in. “What do you think?”
I pulled out my earbuds. “I think I need to find a massage place,” I said with a laugh.
“You deserve it,” he said. “Seriously, great work today. Have you found any flaking paint?”
“I found something much more interesting than flaking paint.”
I moved the ladder aside to give him a clear view of the lumberjack’s ax blade, and I watched Oliver’s smile fade.
“Is that…?” He set down his briefcase and moved closer to the mural, studying the drops of blood. He turned to look at me. “What the hell?” he asked.
“I know. I thought it was tree sap or something when I first saw it, but once I cleaned it off, I realized what it was.”
“This makes no sense at all,” he said, hands on his hips as he stared at the painting. He was close enough that I was suddenly aware of his scent. Leather? Although the only leather in the entire foyer was in his briefcase yards away from us. It was a good scent—a delicious, heady scent, actually—and for a moment I had trouble remembering what we were talking about as I breathed him in. “Blood and a motorcycle,” he said, bringing my attention back to the mural.
“This must have to do with why Jesse told Lisa the artist went crazy,” I said.
Oliver nodded. “Well, it explains why they never installed it in the post office, that’s for sure.” He pulled his phone from his jeans pocket and checked the time. “I just stopped in to see how you’re doing before I head home with a night full of work.” He nodded toward the briefcase behind us. “You ready to call it quits for the day?”
“Not yet,” I said.
Heading toward the front door, he bent over to pick up his briefcase before looking back at me. “You’ll lock up when you leave?”
“I will.” Lisa had given me a key to the gallery that morning.
“See you tomorrow, then,” he said.
He left the gallery and I popped my earbuds back in, surprised by the sudden feeling of loneliness that slipped over me as I climbed the ladder again. Everyone was getting on with their lives this evening and I had no life to get on with. It would be worse if I went back to Lisa’s, though. I’d get on Instagram. I’d check out what Trey and my old friends were doing right now. I’d search for Emily Maxwell and stew in my guilt. Better to lose myself in the mural. I was curious to see if Anna Dale had left any other surprises for me to find.
I’d cleaned three more squares when I heard someone call my name from behind me. I turned to see Rebecca Sanders standing there, arms folded across her chest, an actual smile on her face. I guessed this was one of those surprise visits she’d warned me about. Thank God I hadn’t gone to the bar with the guys! I climbed down the ladder.
“So this is where you work,” Rebecca said. She pointed to the mural. “Are you cleaning that painting?” she asked. “That’s quite a difference.”
“Yes.” I set the dowel on one of the steps of the ladder and wiped my damp hands on my jeans. I motioned to the cleaned portion of the mural. “It’s taken me all day to do this much.” I didn’t think Rebecca was into art. She noticed clean and she noticed dirty, but she seemed disinterested in the images on the mural.
“I went to the address where you’re staying but the woman there—Lisa Williams?—told me you were probably still at work, so I’m glad to find you here.”
I nodded, glad she had found me there as well. “Everyone went out drinking, but I thought I should stay here.” I winced. I sounded as though I expected a medal for not going with the guys.