Page 24 of The Golden Hour

I stare after her until soft footsteps alert me to a presence. The same maid who locked the door appears beside me. She’s younger than I thought, mid-thirties, with a kind face and downcast eyes.

“I can escort you to your room now, miss,” she says in a soft accent.

“Thank you. What’s your name?”

Her eyes flicker up. “Selina.”

“Thank you, Selina. I’m Calli.”

“I know,” she whispers. “Welcome back, miss. Please, follow me.”

Five minutes later, with a locked door at my back and a richly appointed guest suite before me, I sink to the hardwood floor and bite my knuckle against a scream containing all the emotion I’ve kept locked away. Silent tears leak out, an overflow of repressed fear, doubt, and bone-deep fatigue.

Eventually I make it to the bathroom, then the bed, crawling beneath the smooth, pressed sheets fully clothed. I pass out in seconds, only to dream an old dream—an endless loop of being chased, captured, and locked in a windowless cell with fancy dolls wearing faces of the dead.

14

“Turn it up.”

Molly jabs her finger into the remote, cranking up the volume on the television. We listen in silence as CNN relays Callisto Avellino’s miraculous return to her family. We’d surmised from the letter that she was headed back to them, but hearing that she actually did it? It makes me question her sanity along with her motives.

As photographs of Vivian Avellino welcoming her stepdaughter home parade across the screen, Molly makes a soft sound of anguish. Even I flinch. It’s a bit like watching a Venus flytrap close around an unsuspecting insect. As the anchor babbles on, I stare at a pale slice of Callisto’s face, her chin tucked on Vivian’s shoulder. She looks numb, and my mind flashes back to the same blankness I saw on her face in the courtroom all those years ago.

What was she thinking in that moment? Was a part of her happy to be there, back in the dark fold of her family? Relieved?

I can’t help the doubts I still have about Callisto’s motives. Despite the seeming sincerity of her letter to Molly, something inside me rebels against the idea of trusting her. I know well how deeply the threads of childhood experience root, how subtly they can guide us as adults.

It’s not rocket science to assume that Callisto’s childhood left its mark on her in ways she might not fully understand. Or for that matter, have control over.

“What do you think she plans to do?” I ask as a commercial takes over the screen.

Molly shakes her head. She laughs, a little shrilly. “All I can imagine is her in a burglar costume with a flashlight in her mouth, looking through desk drawers in the dark. I have no idea what her intentions are, or how she plans to expose her family. But I know she’s not safe.” Her wide eyes find mine. “I’m scared for her.”

“I know.” Propping my elbows on my knees, I scrub my face with my hands. “I haven’t told you everything, Mol, about what my PI turned up.”

She jerks. “Tell me.”

So I fill her in, detailing the investigator’s voicemail, that he found something incriminating and died for it. Molly listens with wide eyes.

“We need to tell the police,” she says when I’m finished. “I know Rafael’s sentence being overturned gave you a bad taste in your mouth, but there are honest people in law enforcement, Finn. We need to find one. Let them look into what the PI found.”

“I wish it were that simple,” I tell her, “but it’s not. My PI died in a hit-and-run and there are no witnesses or leads. Did you know only eight percent of hit-and-runs were solved in Los Angeles last year? It’s a dead end.”

“But you can tell them—”

“What?” I snap, then sigh. “I’m sorry, but really, what can I tell them? A conspiracy theory? My gut instinct? Whatever proof he had, it was in his head and died with him.”

“What if it wasn’t—didn’t?” she asks mutedly. “Do you know where he lived?”

This conversation has crossed into surreal territory.

The news is back on, Callisto’s return left in the dust of the commercial break as the anchors eagerly focus on the next story.

“Are you suggesting we break into his house?” I ask, then shake my head. “The Avellinos are thorough. They would have searched his files and computer and destroyed whatever they found.”

Molly grabs my hands. Hers are ice-cold. I meet her gaze and am surprised by the ferocity I see in her eyes.

“We have to start somewhere, and this is as good a place as any.” Her lips quirk. “Besides, I wasn’t always the upstanding citizen I am now. I was a teenager with a lock-picking kit back in the day.”

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