warming her bare legs. As the lone car, she had the place to herself.
“This is going to be a good job, and a good place to stay,” she said aloud. She could feel it.
The shadow that followed her flickered.
With houses on either side of her and several chain hotels nearby, Taryn hadn’t expected the night to be so still. After slathering her legs with bug spray she pulled on her sweatshirt, grabbed a drink, and went out to the back patio to study the night sky and call Matt. He didn’t answer so she left a quick message and then sat down on a chair, her aching legs stretched out in front of her.
There were things in the night but they didn’t scare her. (Maybe the snakes and alligators scared her, but she wasn’t going to think about those.)
One of Taryn’s biggest secrets, and most embarrassing facts about herself, was that she was terrified of the dark. There was no rational explanation for her fear. But while it was true that the dark petrified her, it was only the artificial dark–the dark caused by turning out a light. She didn’t mind the night sky, the darkness caused by nature .
Her backyard looked into the small woodland but thanks to the glare of the porch light she could only see to the edge of the patio. The world beyond was obscured by blackness, like a curtain had been dropped down to cut her off from the outside.
When her phone rang, she recoiled.
“Hey, I’ve been texting you. You okay?” It was Matt and he didn’t sound happy.
“Sorry,” she replied sheepishly. “I got here, met the manager, ate, and then took myself on a tour. I just finished unpacking, I swear.”
She could feel Matt’s sigh of relief rather than hear it.
“When I didn’t hear from you I was afraid something bad happened, that you’d gotten sick somewhere along the way,” he complained. “The last time you called me, you were in Atlanta.”
“You mean the seventh layer of traffic hell,” she corrected him and they laughed together.
“So, tell me all about it. What’s it like?”
Taryn spent the next few minutes trying to describe what she’d seen so far. Matt listened attentively, asking all the right questions. When she was finished he said, “I might have to take a little vacation up there. I looked at the map and it’s just a few hours away.”
Maybe she was feeling exhausted and sentimental but the thought of her and Matt walking on the beach at sunset, sharing a pizza, and enjoying themselves on an island sounded wonderful and she suddenly wanted it desperately. They hadn’t been on a vacation together yet, not as a couple anyway. They’d been on tons growing up.
“Oh, try if you can,” she said. “I’d like that.”
“Really?” Matt sounded pleased. “You would?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“Because I’m usually the one showing up unannounced and weaseling in on your jobs,” he confessed. “I’m not always sure you like that.”
Well, it was true. He did have a habit of just showing up, especially when he thought she was in trouble. Which, granted, had been a lot lately.
“I don’t know,” she laughed. “I think I’m starting to depend on it now.” She wasn’t sure she liked that. Taryn had always been independent, even when she and Andrew lived together. And especially after Andrew died. She was trying to learn how to let go, though, and lean on Matt more.
Matt was now trying to explain to her something that had to do with his job at NASA. It was a complicated story but his even baritone was soothing so she leaned back and closed her eyes, trying to follow what he said.
And then something changed.
As long as she’d been sitting on the patio the air had been heavy with the early summer heat. The warmth had encircled her, loosening her muscles and washing over her like a blanket. The heady scent of the earth’s natural musk from the trees, ocean, marsh, and lush vegetation had settled over her and reminded her of everything she loved about nature. She’d