“I just remember him with you,” the dark-haired woman said again.

Izzy turned away to gather herself.

The first woman said, “I’m sorry for your loss.” She added, “If Lois were here, she could maybe help you.”

“Lois?”

The woman explained. The second owner of the place, a naturopath and mystic named Lois Black Hill, who’d been trained by healers in Brazil and India, had presided over the place with a black poodle named Andre at her side. She had come to the desert after a career as a singer, fashion model, designer, and club owner in New York, Paris, and Morocco respectively. Lois communed with a spirit named Omra and showed her guests videos of psychic surgery in which the surgeon reached inside their patients and removed strings of black substances with their hands.

“Where’s Lois?” Izzy asked.

“She died in ’96.”

“Oh.”

Some wind chimes tinkled like ice in a liquor glass, and Izzy rubbed at the goose bumps on her upper arms. The woman had said, “I’m sorry for your loss.” Was Cyrus lost? Or had he chosen to leave her? Was the piece of paper in her pocket the thing that would save her from grief (he was not dead, nothing nefarious had occurred) or plunge her into despair (he had left her, which was its own kind of death)? At this point, she believed it was the latter.

“You know, that makes me think—” The woman typed something into the computer. “Yes, there was something going on that weekend. The Heart House. Or something. Sometimes they have their retreats here.” She typed some more. “The House of Hearts,” she said, wrote it down on a piece of paper and handed it to Izzy who pocketed it, robotically, without even looking.

“You can leave some flyers,” the woman said, but Izzy was already half gone.

If Cyrus had stayed here without her, had he stayed here alone? Why wouldn’t he have mentioned it unless he’d been hiding something? Someone? And if Cyrus had left her, why? Because he’d met someone and had been too much of a coward to come out and say it? He’d chosen instead to make her think he’d harmed himself or been harmed in some unspeakable way? Because by leaving his truck and his keys, of course he’d known she’d think that. And what about the fact that without him she didn’t have the money to make it on her own? She’d have to give up the shack. Where would she go? How would she support herself? Was this other person the reason Cyrus hadn’t wanted to have a child with Izzy? Rage swept through her like a sulfurous wind off the shores of the Salton Sea.

◆◆◆

Izzy stopped for gas along I-10. Still adrenalized with anger, she got out and swiped her card, uncapped the tank, and jammed in the nozzle. The heat of the day, the gasoline fumes, and the lack of sleep dizzied her. The sky looked too vast, too blue. Clouds moved fast, as if in time-lapse, their images impossible to decode.