BooksBarbecue
Back Alone in the Woods
Chapters (63)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Chapter One
  4. Chapter Two
  5. Chapter Three
  6. Chapter Four
  7. Chapter Five
  8. Chapter Six
  9. Chapter Seven
  10. Chapter Eight
  11. Chapter Nine
  12. Chapter Ten
  13. Chapter Eleven
  14. Chapter Twelve
  15. Chapter Thirteen
  16. Chapter Fourteen
  17. Chapter Fifteen
  18. Chapter Sixteen
  19. Chapter Seventeen
  20. Chapter Eighteen
  21. Chapter Nineteen
  22. Chapter Twenty
  23. Chapter Twenty-One
  24. Chapter Twenty-Two
  25. Chapter Twenty-Three
  26. Chapter Twenty-Four
  27. Chapter Twenty-Five
  28. Chapter Twenty-Six
  29. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  30. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  31. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  32. Chapter Thirty
  33. Chapter Thirty-One
  34. Chapter Thirty-Two
  35. Chapter Thirty-Three
  36. Chapter Thirty-Four
  37. Chapter Thirty-Five
  38. Chapter Thirty-Six
  39. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  40. Chapter Thirty-Eight
  41. Chapter Thirty-Nine
  42. Chapter Forty
  43. Chapter Forty-One
  44. Chapter Forty-Two
  45. Chapter Forty-Three
  46. Chapter Forty-Four
  47. Chapter Forty-Five
  48. Chapter Forty-Six
  49. Chapter Forty-Seven
  50. Chapter Forty-Eight
  51. Chapter Forty-Nine
  52. Chapter Fifty
  53. Chapter Fifty-One
  54. Chapter Fifty-Two
  55. Chapter Fifty-Three
  56. Chapter Fifty-Four
  57. Chapter Fifty-Five
  58. Chapter Fifty-Six
  59. Chapter Fifty-Seven
  60. A letter from Charly
  61. Acknowledgements
  62. About the Author
  63. Also by Charly Cox

Elizabeth plucked at the fabric on her love seat. When she spoke, her words were hushed. ‘I waited for him at the library where we were supposed to meet – that’s where we most often met up, unless it was at his house, where we mostly hid out in his room – but he never showed. At some point, his parents reported him missing when their calls went unanswered, and none of his friends, myself included, knew where he was.

‘His car was nowhere to be found.’ Here, Elizabeth closed her eyes and breathed in through her nose once, twice, three times before reopening them. ‘When the police searched his room, they found a partially packed suitcase on his bed. That’s when his parents noticed two other suitcases missing, along with most of his clothing. The police asked his parents if he had a reason to run away, and when they eventually showed up at my house, I had to admit to what we’d been planning. Soon afterwards, they closed the case, insisting he’d run off, having decided he was too young to be, quote, “saddled with a wife and kid – especially with such a promising future in front of him.” Those were their exact words, by the way.’

‘What promising future were they referring to?’ Sandra asked.

‘Baseball, but what they didn’t know is that while Hayden loved the sport and had even been offered a scholarship to play for some college in Cali, he had no intention of making it his career. He was far more interested in architecture at the time.’

‘I see. Please go on.’

Elizabeth’s hand dropped to a throw pillow beside her as she absently twirled the lace edging between her fingers. ‘None of Hayden’s friends, no one in his family, and certainly not me believed for a second he would do something like that. Hayden was simply not the type of person to shirk his responsibilities. And we were in love. Anyone could see that.’

Sandra cocked her head to the side at Elizabeth’s proclamation that ‘anyone’ could see how in love she and her high school boyfriend had been, and Alyssa wondered if it was because, like her, she couldn’t tell if Elizabeth was a woman remembering or a woman forcing herself to believe what she wanted to be true.