Trespass by Marla Madison Read Free Book Online Page B

managed to regain consciousness, I was reclining on the sofa in the porch exactly where I’d been when I’d fallen asleep. I had a dark memory of lying on the floor in the kitchen, and my displacement to another room felt as threatening as the night visitor. Had he been there, unknown to me? Had he moved me while I slept?
    I had an appointment with my doctor tomorrow; I was looking forward to the relief of sleeping pills. I was having a terrible time focusing on any one thing. So much had happened in the last few days: the explosion, seeing Carter, being near the scene of a possible murder. Carter and I had given our brief statements to the police and then repeated them once more to the detective who arrived, the same one who’d been at my house the morning after the explosion. We left the scene as soon as we could get away.
    Carter offered to stay with me, but I turned him down. I wanted to get my life back on track, and I couldn’t do that with old feelings for my ex-husband appealing to my loneliness.
     
    I returned to Lisa Rayburn’s office the day after I saw the doctor. Before we even sat down, she gave me the information about the support group. “The group had five members originally, but recently two left.” She must have seen my concern. “Oh, no,” she added. “They moved out of state; their leaving had nothing to do with the group.
    “The group meets once a week in the evening, and they’d love to have you join them. If you like, I’ll call and set it up, or you can call the therapist yourself. His name is Robert Bernstein. He may want to see you before your first meeting, and I know he’ll require a note from your doctor verifying that your problem isn’t physical.” She handed me one of his business cards, then looked at me expectantly.
    I blurted, “I’m glad you were able to get me in again before I joined them.” I told her about my meeting with Carter, the inheritance, and the incident with the girl who found her friend at the bottom of the steps. Lisa’s expression never changed, and she didn’t speak until I got it all out, including that I had received a clean bill of health, along with a prescription for sleeping pills, from my doctor. My sleep issues weren’t health related.
    “You’ve had quite a week. Is there one of these things in particular you want to talk about?” she asked.
    Was there? I knew in my heart what I should be discussing with her, but, for some reason, it was a subject I wasn’t ready to share.
    She sensed my hesitation. “Why don’t you tell me about your ex-husband? How did it feel to be with him again?”
    That I could handle. “It seemed odd at first. I was glad we met, though. I realized I did the right thing by divorcing him.”
    “Gemma, tell me about your divorce. What went wrong in your marriage?”
    There were so many things I needed to talk about, but how my marriage had ended wasn’t one of them. But so many things are woven together in one’s psyche; maybe I couldn’t get to an answer for one compartment of my mind without opening the other chambers. I took a deep breath, wishing I were stretched out on the chaise in the corner of the room with my eyes shut.
    After I concluded the tale of my marriage’s demise and the part my career as an escort played in it, I ended by telling her about last week. How I had turned Carter down when he offered to stay with me after we talked to the police.
    Lisa offered me a cup of tea. I gratefully accepted, happy to have a break from my lengthy discourse. I rose from the chair and stood at the window. The view of the lake displayed a lovely autumn scene: oak trees, waving rushes lining the shoreline, a lone sailboat gliding along the surface of the lake.
    After handing me the tea, Lisa didn’t comment on what I had told her, which I expected was how therapists worked, trying to draw you out rather than give their own opinion of what you revealed. Uncomfortable with the silence, I told her about my