Page 141 of Wicked Minds
“You were breaking and entering,” I say instead, focusing on Royce.
“It was weird,” he says with a frown, eyes on the beer bottle in his hand. “Aurora’s bedroom had been painted with care and love—a perfect bedroom for a little girl—but there were no pictures anywhere.”
“What do you mean?” I question, brows furrowed.
“I mean, if you couldn’t see your mom every day, wouldn’t you have photos of her all over your room? Wouldn’t Riley want to know that her daughter can see pictures of her at any time, know that her mom is with her in spirit, watching over her while she sleeps? Instead, any mementos of their time together were tucked away in a box as though they had to be kept hidden.”
“Dad removed any photos of Mom after she passed away,” I muse aloud. “Wouldn’t let me hold on to any keepsakes of hers. Said it was unhealthy to form such attachments.”
“Yeah, but Riley isn’t dead,” Logan bluntly points out, before acknowledging Royce’s comment. “That’s definitely weird.”
“Right?”
I agree, but I’m guessing that’s not the reason Royce brought up the topic.
“What else did you find?” I ask, moving on from the topic of bare walls.
Royce rubs at the back of his neck, brows pinched. “I went through her laptop and found an ad she’d put on Craigslist.” He pulls his phone from his pocket, tapping at the screen before sliding it our way. Logan and I nearly bump heads in our eagerness to see the screen.
“Person seeking key that unlocks hidden knowledge, where shadows whisper secrets and truth lies veiled?” Logan reads. “What the hell does that mean?”
Royce shrugs, seeming as baffled as Logan. “No idea.” Pulling the phone from Logan’s hand, I re-read the cryptic message again. “But I, uh, responded.”
“You didwhat?” Logan exclaims. “What did you say? What’s even the appropriate response to something like that?”
With another shrug, Royce says, “I told her I had the key.”
“The key to what, though?” Logan questions, as though one of us will suddenly have the answer to that when we didn’t a minute ago.
“Did she get back to you?” I interject before Logan can start spouting off a list of euphemisms forkey.
“Yeah. I woke up to a message from her this morning.”
“And?” Logan.
Pulling up a new message thread, he hands it over, and I note an address somewhere in Springview.
“That’s tomorrow,” I point out.
A moment of silence settles over us.
“What if it’s some weird sex thing?” Logan interjects, making me want to smack him over the head. “No, seriously,” he continues at the dark glower on Royce’s face. “What if key means likegiant, magical penis,and hidden knowledge is a euphemism formind-blowing orgasm?”
“Do shadows whisper secrets and unveil truths while you’re nutting into a sock?” Royce drawls.
Logan’s face scrunches. “Well, no, but maybe it’s different for women.”
I snort. “I don’t think it’s that different.”
Logan merely shrugs. “Well then, what does it mean?”
“Where shadows whisper secrets and truth lies veiled,” I murmur, mulling it over as my eyes scan the sentence for the dozenth time. “Sounds like she’s looking for information on accessing somewhere where, maybe, secrets are held?”
“Like a safe or a vault?” Logan supplies.
I shake my head. “I don’t think so.”
“I’d guess whatever it is is illegal or dodgy as fuck at best,” Royce states, and I have to say, I agree. The cryptic nature of it all would imply as much.
