Force of Nature Read Free Page A

her.
    Pam’s funeral was lovely, of course. Pam had made all the arrangements herself, in advance, and her parents were there to see that it went off without a glitch. Annie had sat in the back of the church, too tired and still too angry at her best friend to cry.
    The house—a rustic New Hampshire farmhouse that Pam had renovated with her artistic flair two years before she was diagnosed as inoperable—sold almost immediately, mere hours after the hospice bed was removed from the front parlor.
    It had felt as if it were all happening too quickly to Annie, but in her heart she knew it was a good thing. As much as she’d loved that house, as much as she thought of it as a home, it wasn’t
her
home and she didn’t want to stay.
    Annie had gone back to Boston. Templar, Brick and Smith hired her back, just as they said they would. Eunice Templar, known throughout the business world as the Dragonlady, had gotten tears in her eyes when Annie had explained she couldn’t just take a month’s leave of absence, that she was moving to New Hampshire for an indeterminate amount of time so that her best friend, Pam, could live out her last months at home, instead of in a hospital, surrounded by strangers.
    After Pam died, Annie went back to work at the accounting firm. She found an apartment in Newton, and took her furniture and business suits and shoes out of storage.
    This was when, the hospice coordinator and the grief counselors had all said, she would slowly but surely find her life returning to normal. It would take time, though. She should be patient. Expect bumps in the road.
    It would feel strange at first, going back to work in a cubicle, after spending so much time outside. It would feel surreal, even. Almost as if she’d never left, as if the past few months hadn’t happened.
    She should continue with counseling, they’d told her, so she dutifully went. Once a week, as part of her new/old routine.
    But it had been months now, and still none of it seemed even remotely familiar—at least not until the phone rang tonight, interrupting Jon Stewart, at a quarter after eleven.
    It was Celeste Harris, the woman who had bought Pam’s house, and she was clearly distressed. Pam’s dog, Pierre, a tiny mutt, part poodle, part mystery, had run away from his new home with Pam’s mom and had shown up again, in Celeste’s backyard. She’d tried to coax him inside, tempting him with food, but he’d shied away. It was cold out and getting colder. She’d called the town dogcatcher, but he couldn’t make it out there until the morning.
    Celeste was afraid that would be too late—that Pierre would freeze to death by then.
    So she’d called Annie, hoping she could help.
    And here Annie was. Heading to the rescue. North on Route 3. Shivering as her car took forever to warm up in the cold New England night.
    She’d called Pam’s mother, who reported Pierre had run away a full week ago—she hadn’t wanted to bother Annie with that bad news. That dog was such a trial. Always hiding under the desk in the kitchen. Refusing food. Pooping at night on the dining-room floor.
    Pam, who’d arranged every detail before she’d done the unspeakable, had made sure Pierre would go to live with her cousin Clive, of whom the little dog had grudgingly approved. But when Clive was offered a promotion and a move to his firm’s London office, Pierre went to live with Pam’s mom.
    It was nearly 1 A.M. when Annie turned off the road and onto the crushed gravel of the drive that led back to Pam’s house. Pam’s former house.
    The lights were still on, both porches lit up. The kitchen windows glowed, too, and the back screen opened with a familiar screech as Annie parked and got out of her car.
    “Thank you for coming.” Celeste came out onto the back porch, followed by her two daughters.
    Pam would’ve loved the fact that children were living in her house. She wouldn’t have loved the hatchet job they’d done on her beloved mountain