When my phone was charged, I saw that I had a half-dozen missed calls— all of them from my grandmother. Nonna had raised seven children. She had nearly two dozen grandchildren.
One less now. I’d spent five years living with my father’s family. Kate was the cousin closest to my own age, just three years my senior. And now, she was dead—strung up like a scarecrow and burned alive. Because of me.
You did this, I thought. I forced myself to repeat the words a second time, aiming them not at myself and not at the UNSUB.
Every instinct I had said that the person who’d marked my cousin for death was the one person I’d loved more than anything—forever and ever, no matter what.
You wanted me out of Gaither, didn’t you, Mom? You wanted me safe. You wouldn’t bat an eye at trading Kate’s life for mine. You’ve done it before.
My mother had left her little sister—the sister she’d protected for years— with an abusive father as soon as she’d found out she was pregnant with me. She’d traded Lacey’s future, her safety, for mine.
You knew that if the ties to our previous cases didn’t work, if those didn’t get me out of Gaither—this would.
“What are you going to do?” Sloane asked me quietly. We were back at the hotel.
“Malcolm Lowell is in the wind. We solved the Kyle murders.” I paused, looking out the window at historic Main Street. “My mother knew exactly what I would do.” I swallowed hard. “I’m going to go home.”
I had one stop to make before leaving Gaither. I’d spent years not knowing if my mother was dead or alive. I’d lived that limbo, unable to mourn, unable to move on.
Ree Simon deserved to know what had happened to her daughter.
When we got to the diner, the others split off, giving me the space to do what needed to be done. As Michael, Dean, Lia, and Sloane slid into a booth, Agent Sterling came up beside me. “Are you sure you want to do this alone?”
I thought of my cousin Kate. We’d never been close. I’d never let her get
close. Because I’d been raised to keep people at a distance. Because I was my mother’s daughter.
“I’m sure,” I said.
Sterling and Judd took seats of their own. Agent Starmans joined them several minutes later. It occurred to me, on some level, to wonder where Celine had gone, but when Ree saw me standing in front of the counter, I did what I could to keep myself in the moment.
To feel for her what I couldn’t feel for myself.
After filling cups with coffee for both Sterling and Judd, Ree turned to me. She wiped her hands on her apron and gave me an assessing once-over. “What can I do for you, Cassie?”
“I have something to tell you,” I said, my voice surprisingly solid, surprisingly even. “It’s about your daughter.”
“Sarah?” Ree arched her brows, her chin thrusting slightly outward. “What about her?”
“Can we sit down?” I asked Ree.
Once we were ensconced in a booth, I laid a folder on the table between us and removed the picture that Celine had drawn. “Is this Sarah?”
“Sure is,” Ree replied steadily. “She looks a bit like Melody there.”
I nodded. My mouth wasn’t dry. My eyes weren’t wet. But I felt those words, all the way to my core.
“Sarah didn’t leave Gaither,” I told Ree, taking her hand. “She didn’t leave her kids. She didn’t leave you.”
“Yes,” Ree replied tersely, “she did.”
I amended my previous statement. “She never left Serenity Ranch.” Knowing in my gut that Ree wouldn’t believe me without proof, I withdrew a photograph from the file—Sarah’s body.
Ree was smart. She connected the dots—and abruptly rejected the conclusion. “That could be anyone.”
“Facial reconstruction says it’s Sarah. We’ll do a DNA test as well, but a witness has verified that Sarah was killed ten years ago by a man named Darren Darby.”
“Darby.” That was all Ree said.
You never looked for her. You never knew.
“Melody is home now.” Ree stood abruptly. “I suppose I have you to thank for that.” She said nothing, not a single word, about her daughter. “I’ll get you some coffee.”
Watching as Ree busied herself with the task, I pulled a picture up on my phone, one I’d taken months before of a locket that Laurel had worn around her neck—and the photo inside. In it, my half sister sat on my mother’s lap.
How many times had I looked at this picture?
How many times had I wondered who—and what—my mother was now?
“Mind if I join you?” Celine slid into the booth across from me. “Where have you been?” I asked, my gaze still on my mother’s picture.
“Here and there,” Celine replied. “Bodies don’t creep me out. Murders do.
I decided pretty quickly that Creepy Serial Killer House probably fell closer to your expertise than mine.”
Ree returned with two cups of coffee, one for me and one for Celine. “Here you go.”
Ree didn’t want to talk. She didn’t want this—any of it—to be real. I could relate.
“Who’s that?” Celine asked, craning her head to get a better look at the photo on my phone.
“My mother,” I replied, feeling like that answer was only half true. “And my half sister.”
“I see the resemblance,” Celine replied. Then she paused. “Mind if I take a closer look?”
She took the phone without waiting for a reply. I closed my eyes and took a long drink of my coffee. Instead of thinking about my mother, about Kate, strung up like a scarecrow and burned alive, about Nonna and what this would do to her, I fell back on an old game, profiling everyone around me.
Behavior. Personality. Environment. Without looking, I knew that Dean was facing away from me. You want to come to me, but you won’t—not until you know that I want you to.
I switched from second person to third, playing this game the way I would have when I was young. Michael is reading me. Lia is next to Dean, pretending that she’s not worried. Sloane is counting—the tiles on the floor, the cracks in the wall, the number of patrons in the room all around her.
I opened my eyes, and the room swam around me. I thought, at first, that there were tears in my eyes, that thinking of the family I’d found in the program had broken the dam inside of me and let in the grief for my family of blood.
But the room didn’t stop spinning. It stayed blurred. I opened my mouth to say something, but words wouldn’t come. My tongue felt thick. I was dizzy, nauseous.
My right hand found its way to the cup of coffee.
The coffee, I thought, unable to form the words out loud. Even my thoughts were scrambled. I tried to stand up, but fell. I grabbed for the booth, and my hand hit Celine’s thigh instead.
She didn’t move.
She’s slumped over. Unconscious. I fought my way to my feet. The world kept spinning, but as I stumbled forward, I realized—the room was silent. No one was talking. No one was coming to help me.
Dean and Lia, Michael and Sloane—they were slumped in their booths,
too.
Unconscious, I thought. Or…or…
Someone caught me under my armpits. “Easy there.” Ree’s voice came to me from a great distance. I tried to tell her, tried to make my mouth say the word, but I couldn’t.
Poison.
“It’s not that I don’t appreciate what you did for Melody—or for Sarah.” As the world went black, Ree leaned down. “But all must be tested,” she whispered. “All must be found worthy.”
