Rocky Road Read online

  “Over twenty years. I’m sorry to hear about your ex-husband, too. This has to be a very difficult time for you.”

  Lori was quiet for a few seconds as she sliced a honeydew in half. “I’m not sure anyone has shared their condolences for me, specifically.”

  “Really?” Sadie asked, surprised.

  “I’m the ex-wife,” Lori said, as though Sadie had forgotten.

  “But you were married to him for ... how many years?”

  “Thirteen,” Lori said, a hint of sadness to her voice.

  “That’s a long time to spend with someone. Of course it’s hard when something like this happens to him. Especially when you have children together.”

  “Do you girls need any help in here?” Nikki interrupted, poking her head in the doorway.

  “I think we’ve got it handled,” Lori said with a smile. “But thanks.”

  “Good deal—I’m on the hunt for tablecloths, then.”

  She disappeared, and Sadie worried that the interruption had ruined the flow of conversation, but Lori picked it up right where she’d left off, which showed how much she wanted to talk. This wasn’t surprising. Most people did want to talk, and for whatever reason, people really seemed to like talking to Sadie. “I know we’re divorced and everything, but I can’t believe he’s really gone.”

  “How long ago did you two get divorced?”

  “Four years next month,” Lori said, shaking her head as though surprised to admit it.

  “I’m so sorry—divorce is already so hard.” Sadie tried to ignore the way her brain was filing away all this information. She finished cutting up the second half of her melon. “How are the kids dealing with this?”

  Lori’s face fell completely. “Hard. I think it’s harder to deal with not knowing than it would be if he’d had an accident or we at least knew what had happened. Joey, especially, is really upset about this memorial service—it’s making it all too real for him, I think. My daughter—well, she’s fifteen, and this is just one more thing to make life miserable. Is there a worse age for a girl than fifteen?”

  “Not that I can think of,” Sadie said, remembering both her own experience and that of her daughter, Breanna. Even a mellow “fifteen” was awful.

  “But we’ll get through it,” Lori said, with just enough forced brightness in her voice to sound sincere. “And we need this memorial. As hard as it is to face it, we all need to accept that Trent isn’t coming back. I’m really hoping that we can finally start healing now.”

  Sadie nodded her understanding. “My kids were really little when their dad died. I asked a friend to take pictures at the service and graveside so that as they got older, I could show them and let them see that they were part of saying goodbye to Neil.” A bubble of emotion rose in her chest at remembering that time—that day, specifically. The heaviness of the loss had been compounded as her children faced their own mourning, which was spread over years as they continued to grow in their own understanding of what it meant not to have their dad. She blinked quickly and cleared her throat. “Sorry,” she said, embarrassed. “Even after all these years, it catches me off guard sometimes.” She looked at Lori and attempted to turn the focus back to her. “I hope no one makes you think that you don’t have every right to mourn him. Divorced or not, he was a big part of your life, and there will be emotional journeys for you to take through this.”

  Lori was staring at her, and Sadie realized how presumptuous she must have sounded.

  “I’m sorry,” she hurried to say, turning back to the fruit. “I don’t always know where my boundaries should be. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

  “No,” Lori said, shaking her head, still looking at Sadie. “No one else seems to think I have any right to be broken-hearted over Trent’s death. In fact, one friend of mine told me how lucky I was—that she’d love for her ex-husband to disappear.” Lori turned back to her cutting board. “I’m not in love with Trent anymore but he was my best friend once upon a time, and even though we didn’t end up being right for each other, he was a good man and a terrific dad. I can’t believe he won’t be at the kids’ graduations or weddings ... I’m not sure how we’ll get along financially without his support—he was generous in the divorce. It’s been frustrating that people think I should somehow be unaffected by this.” She shook her head at the very idea.

  “Absolutely,” Sadie agreed. Dr. Hendricks was beginning to feel like a real person, and that both frightened and invigorated Sadie. There would be consequences for letting herself feel close to this—to invest in it on a personal level. But Sadie could relate to Lori in several different ways, and those answers that Caro and Tess had so wanted to discover began morphing from vague hopes to important stepping-stones toward healing for Lori and her children. And what about Dr. Hendricks’s current wife? His parents? Siblings? Friends? Patients like Tess who credited him with their continued existence? The more she thought about these things—concretely—the more she wondered how she could have so easily shot down the idea of finding solace for these people. That she’d been so confident in her decision not to proceed, however, continued to hold her back. Was she being caught up in feelings and emotions that were unwise to encourage? It could be so difficult to know the right direction at times, and she wasn’t sure that she could trust her own decision about what was right.

  A silence lagged between them, and Sadie struggled within herself about what to do—and yet, when she opened her mouth, she wasn’t the least bit surprised that her question was a leading one.

  “Did you guys get along after the divorce?”

  “Better than we had for several years of our marriage, in fact.”

  “Really?” Sadie said, but what she meant was, “Tell me more.”

  10 cups fresh fruit of your choice, such as mangos, strawberries, bananas, and grapes, cut into 1-inch pieces (well-drained canned fruit may be used)

  1 cup plain Greek yogurt

  2 tablespoons maple syrup (real maple syrup is best)*

  1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

  1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

  Place fruit in large mixing bowl. In small bowl, mix yogurt, syrup, and vanilla together. Pour dressing over fruit; toss to coat. May be made the night before.

  *Shawn likes a few handfuls of mini marshmallows added because syrup just isn’t sweet enough.

  Note: Lasts well in the fridge (as long as no bananas are used) for up to five days. (If you use bananas, add them just before serving.)

  Note: To slice grapes easily, line up a row of grapes on your cutting board. Get a rectangle-shaped plastic lid and hold it against one end of the grapes, leaving the other end poking out. Use your knife to cut down the middle. Easy-breezy.

  Chapter 6

  It was as though once we knew we didn’t have to make it work, we both just calmed down and became friends again. It wasn’t enough to save our marriage, but it managed to preserve our relationship.”

  “Did he see the kids regularly? You live in Vegas, right?”

  Lori nodded, and sliced open another melon. “I moved down there to go to school, and he didn’t love it, but he supported me in it all the same—even paid my first year of tuition until I was able to get some scholarships. He was really good about staying involved with the kids and would drive all the way to Vegas when they had school things or sporting events whenever he could. I’m really glad that the kids have so many good memories.” She paused a moment and her face fell slightly. “My dad was a bum, and when he died a few years ago, I felt nothing but relief. It’s bittersweet but ultimately a good thing that the kids have reason to miss their dad.”

  “And his new wife—do they get along with her?” Sadie couldn’t remember the new wife’s name.

  “They like Anita. In fact, she invited the kids to stay through the weekend. They’ve always been involved in the cancer walk for the foundation, and she set aside little jobs for them to do this year, too. I’ve got class Thursday and Friday, so I’l
l head home after the luncheon and be back for the walk Friday night. I don’t know what their relationship with her will be like in the future, but I’m glad she’s kept them a part of things this year. Helping with the luncheon is my way of showing that I’m still here—that I still want to be a part of the Hendricks family, and that I don’t consider myself no longer a part of it.”

  “You are an impressive woman,” Sadie said. “I’m not sure many women in your shoes could encourage that relationship like you are.”

  Lori shrugged but she seemed to appreciate the compliment. “Maybe you just got me at a good moment. I’ve certainly had my share of blind ones, where I can’t see anything but the ugly.”

  “No one can fault you for that. It’s a very complex situation.”

  They both went back to cutting their fruit, and Sadie noted that they were halfway finished, which meant that Sadie’s chance to talk to Dr. Hendricks’s ex-wife would be coming to an end. Someone Sadie hadn’t met came into the kitchen to get a washcloth and asked if they needed help. Lori assured her that they had things covered.

  Sadie cut into the first watermelon and scowled at the juice that immediately began pooling beneath the heavy fruit—she hated cutting watermelon. There was no way around the mess, however, and so it must simply be tolerated. “When did you last talk to him?”

  “A few days before he disappeared. He was supposed to have the kids that weekend, but called me to cancel a few days earlier—we had words about it.”

  “Did he cancel very often?”

  “No,” Lori said with a shake of her head. “But that was the third time he’d canceled since Christmas, so I was a little bugged about it. And he was supposed to take Joey on an overnight hike for a Scouting thing he needed so he could finish his Second Class, so Joey was really bummed about it, too.”

  “But then Dr. Hendricks went hiking on his own?” Sadie asked. If he’d planned to go backpacking anyway, why didn’t he take his son with him?

  “I know, right?” Lori’s look said that she questioned Dr. Hendricks’s actions but that she wasn’t bothered by the inconsistency as much as Sadie was. She shrugged. “Like I said, I’m really hoping this memorial service will help me be able to move forward and make peace with what’s happened.”

  “What do you think did happen?” Sadie asked, moving more watermelon to the bowl. She realized too late that they had filled one bowl with cantaloupe and honeydew and the other bowl with watermelon, rather than mixing all three in both bowls. “To Dr. Hendricks, I mean.”

  “I think he fell.” Lori said sadly. She was slicing more slowly than she had been, with thoughtful and ponderous motions. “He’d taken up backpacking a few years ago—he never did that kind of thing when we were married—but I don’t think he was as skilled as he thought he was. He’d told me about some canyoneering he’d done by himself, and I made him promise never to do that with the kids. I think he got in over his head on that last hike and either fell or got lost or something. Maybe that’s why he canceled with Joey—because he had plans to do something Joey couldn’t do with him.”

  “It seems strange that no one found any of his gear.”

  “It isn’t all that uncommon,” Lori said. She started slicing off the rind of her second watermelon. “After Trent disappeared, I spent a lot of time Googling similar situations—wanting to find some reason to believe that he’d come back, you know? There were dozens of cases where nothing was ever found or something was found years afterward. If he hiked into the red rock—which is what he loved—there are all kinds of crevices and slot canyons. That was his favorite thing to explore, and since he didn’t tell anyone where he was going, he could have gone anywhere. I really wish they’d found something, though. It would be easier for all of us to know for sure what happened to him.”

  Sadie felt compelled to ask the next question even though it deserved a better foundation than she felt she had time to create. “Have you ever wondered if he just ... left?” She felt the need to qualify the question. “Remember how in that Julia Roberts movie she faked her own death in order to start over again? What if that’s why they never found anything?” Sadie held her breath a little, knowing that question was more pointed than the others.

  Lori flicked a guilty look at Sadie and then turned back to the watermelon. She was quiet for several seconds while Sadie finished her section of watermelon and put it in the bowl. Juice continued to drip from the cutting board to the counter and onto the floor. Sadie was itching to get a mop, but she retained her focus. “I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought about that, but he went to school for twelve years to have this life as a doctor, and he and Anita were really happy together—and I know he loves our kids. Besides that, when I last heard anything about the case, there was no money missing, no activity on his credit cards, and his phone was in his car. How could he disappear without any money? And what would he be running from? Especially so soon after Anita was sick? It just doesn’t fit his character.”

  “Sick?” Sadie asked, startled by new information she hadn’t expected to hear. “Anita was sick?”

  “She’s fine now,” Lori explained, looking up. “Didn’t you know she was diagnosed with breast cancer last year?”

  “No,” Sadie said. Had that been in the articles Sadie hadn’t read? “That’s awful.”

  “Stage one, I guess. Which meant a lumpectomy and a little chemo was all she needed. She claimed to be cancer free in March, but it’s one more reason I can’t imagine Trent leaving.”

  “How had Dr. Hendricks coped with her diagnosis?” Sadie asked. How would it feel to have your wife diagnosed with the disease your foundation was attempting to combat? And yet it didn’t sound like it was a serious case, not like Tess’s cancer that had resulted in a double mastectomy at the age of twenty-nine.

  Sadie thought of the photograph that showed Dr. Hendricks’s Cherokee not being at the Chuckwalla Trailhead that Sunday and felt a wave of realization finally wash over her—a realization she’d been trying to ignore since Caro had first showed her those articles. Dr. Hendricks had not gone hiking on a Friday afternoon in April and never come back, which is what everyone believed until Tess and Caro made the connection with the photographs. Unless Tess or Kathryn were lying about the date the photos were taken—and Sadie didn’t believe they were—there was a mystery here. A pretty big one. The answer to why his car wasn’t there the Sunday before it was discovered mattered.

  Sadie felt a rush of adrenaline as she faced those two realizations full on. Tess and Caro must have already felt this, embraced it, and deemed it factual. Sadie was slower on the uptake, but now that Dr. Hendricks was more real to her, and Lori had given her more information, she knew she wouldn’t be able to let it go. Maybe she was becoming personally invested after all.

  Lori continued speaking, and Sadie tuned in again. What had she asked about before zoning out? Oh, yeah, how had Dr. Hendricks coped with Anita’s cancer. “Trent didn’t talk to me about it, but Nikki said it seemed to really impact him—he even started going back to church, which he hadn’t done for years. I imagine it must have been really difficult for both of them—Anita pretty much runs the foundation. Having her own diagnosis after watching so many other women through the years must have been surreal, you know?”

  Sadie nodded, but was now more focused than she’d been before. “Could he have had debts, or an addiction that he was struggling with?”

  Lori shook her head. “He wasn’t that kind of guy. He was raised with really high standards and worked hard and smart. There wasn’t room in his character for those kinds of things.”

  If something had happened to Dr. Hendricks, someone could have put his car at the trailhead to make it look like he’d gone camping. If he’d disappeared on purpose, he could have done the same thing for the same reason. Caro had posed these exact scenarios, but Sadie hadn’t taken them in. Now it was like rediscovering the possibilities. “What about another woman?”

  Lori looked at her q
uickly, but with boldness. “Not Trent.”

  Sadie met her eye. “You’re so certain?”

  Lori went back to the fruit. They were almost finished. “My father was married to someone else when my mom got pregnant, and my mom went on to have two more kids with two more men before she finally settled down with a complete creep who was never faithful to her. It created chaos for all of us that I swore I would never repeat. Trent’s reasons for being faithful were different—he was raised religious, and even though he ended up with questions about the theology of the Mormon church, he believed in abstinence and fidelity, which they draw a hard line on. He wouldn’t cheat. Besides that, Anita is a perfect companion for him. She’s domestic and elegant and smart. She helps run the office and the foundation and the boutique. She hosts dinner parties for his friends and golfs with their wives. I was never that kind of woman—which I’ve come to realize is likely the biggest reason why it didn’t work for us—but Anita gave him everything he wanted. And she’d just recovered from cancer.” She turned to look at Sadie. “I know why you’re asking and, like I said, I’ve wondered the same thing, but every time I go down that road of thought I end up with only one possibility: something happened to him out there in the backcountry. I can’t come up with any reason he would leave this life on purpose.”

  But Sadie had more questions. “Could anyone have wanted him not to come back? Even if he was living a clean life, like you said, maybe he made some enemies along the way.” But people who lived clean lives didn’t make those kinds of enemies.

  Lori shook her head. “Everyone liked Trent. He wasn’t the type of guy who had conflicts with people. In fact, this one time we had a property dispute with a neighbor, and after months of back and forth, Trent just signed over the few feet we were arguing about. We had to redo our sprinkler system and our fence line, but he said it just wasn’t worth the fight. He and that neighbor ended up being golfing buddies after that. Really, he was a good guy—who overestimated his backcountry skills.”