Page 56 of Darkwater Lane

“That puts her on the road to Knoxville the night Varrus was murdered.” Which suddenly makes her a more viable suspect. “I’m going to reach out to the Knoxville PD and let them know.”

“I’ll email a copy of the receipt I pulled. That should help them out.”

“Thank you, Taylor. Seriously. You have no idea how much I appreciate you looking into all of this.”

“Of course. That’s what friends do—we have each other’s backs. I’ll keep looking into Madison, though it might take me a couple of days. One of my other cases blew up last night when a client in a rather sensitive position misplaced his phone during a date with a sex worker.”

I’d worked cases like that before and knew how time-sensitive they were. “Whenever you get the chance,” I tell her. “J.B.’s work comes first. I get that.”

“Thanks, Gwen. Don’t worry, we’ll figure this out.”

We say our goodbyes, and I immediately call Detective Gutierrez. He’s not at his desk so I leave a message on his voicemail, telling him what I’ve found and letting him know I’m forwarding him a copy of the receipt.

Then I sit back in my seat and look out the window through the leaf-stripped trees to the sliver of lake visible from my office. It’s a beautiful day, the surface of the water reflecting the brilliant bluesky overhead. Sunlight glints off the ripples left in the wake of a boat speeding past.

I allow myself a moment of optimism. Rowan sounds like a potential person of interest in the Varrus case. At the very least, it should be enough to take the pressure off Sam for a bit while they investigate any potential ties.

When Sam and Connor get back, I pull Sam aside and tell him what I’ve learned about Rowan. He closes his eyes for a moment, and I watch as relief washes over him. “I know I shouldn’t be happy,” he says. “And I’m not. I hate the idea of Callie’s sister being capable of something so cruel and vicious.”

“But knowing that she blames me in part for Callie’s death and hates you for ‘sleeping with the enemy…’” I put air quotes around that last bit. “It gives her a motive for trying to set you up.”

“I know better than anyone how grief twists your mind. Sometimes, the pain is too great, and you have to channel it into something else. That’s why I got involved with the Lost Angels to begin with. It was easier to hate than to grieve. Still, I like to believe I never would have gone as far as Miranda, or Leo, or—potentially—Rowan.”

I like to believe that too, though he did go as far as tracking me down and renting a house next door so he could spy on me and eventually force me to confess my role as Melvin’s Little Helper. But what matters is that once he met me, once he met my kids and spent time with us as a family, he realized he was wrong.

But what if he hadn’t met you?a small voice in my head asks.What if you’d never hired him to fix the roof? What if he hadn’t brought Connor home after he was beaten up at school? What if he hadn’t sat in our kitchen eating all those dinners, or out on the deck drinking beer and watching the sunset?

What if we’d never gotten to know each other? He’d have never had the chance to change his mind. He would have continued harboring that grief and rage.

What, ultimately, would he have done with it? He wanted a confession. But when he didn’t get it, would he have turned violent? Would he have killed?

He says he never would have gone as far as Miranda, or Leo, or Rowan, but how can anyone know that until they’re pushed to the edge and beyond?

16

GWEN

I wake that night to the world exploding around me. There’s an eruption of shouting from outside and then the sound of splintering wood as someone breaks down our front door. Glass shatters. The alarm starts shrieking. I don’t have time to think. I act on instinct, the motions perfected from hundreds of hours of drilling and practicing. I dive for the safe under the bed. Within seconds, I’ve used my fingerprint to release the biometric lock and have my Sig Sauer in hand, its weight familiar and comforting.

As always, my shoes sit next to the bed, ready for me to slip my feet into them without having to pause. Across the room, Sam is also up and armed. His face is unreadable—his jaw set and eyes hard. Soldier Mode. He gestures for me to fall back as he crouches toward the bedroom door.

My kids, I think.Ourkids. Their rooms are off the hallway between us and the front door. Between me and whatever violence has just crashed into our house.

I need to get to them. It’s not an option. It’s a primal urge so deeply fixed that there’s no overriding it.

I sprint to the door.

“Gwen, wait,” Sam hisses, his voice barely audible over the blaring siren. But he knows better than to try to stop me.

I have the good sense to drop low when I ease open the bedroom door just wide enough to get a look down the hallway. The air is filled with shouts—commands. The words tangle with the screeching alarm. Beams of light cut through the darkness, spearing the walls and landing on Connor’s bedroom door.

A man dressed in all black with a helmet and flak vest sneaks down the hall. He carries an assault rifle, barrel not fully raised but not pointed at the floor either. His finger rests against the trigger guard, ready to fall against the trigger and start pulling. He looks military or police, but I can’t be sure.

“Gwen Proctor!” he shouts, voice low, and authoritative, and brimming with outrage. “Sam Cade! Drop your weapons and come out with your hands where we can see them.”

I glance at Sam. What the fuck? He shakes his head. He doesn’t know either.

A frisson of fear lances through me. I face a moment of indecision. My first instinct is to obey their order. It’s been ingrained in me since I was young to respect the police and their authority. However, twice men impersonated police officers to gain entry to our house. Both times, they kidnapped my son.

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