Heartbreak Bay (Stillhouse Lake) by Rachel Caine (red white royal blue TXT) 📗

order, of course, someone got hold of our home phone number. I’m not terribly concerned; I have a device attached to block unknown numbers, and a one-button block for harassers. So far, no sign of our cell phones being compromised, which is my biggest worry. I do not want these assholes getting to my kids.

He hadn’t signed his earlier work, the initial email, but now he has a handle he’s using. MalusNavis. I make a note of it. That’s striking enough that I’m confident I can track it down.

I take a little while to decompress, and go back to Kez’s case. Sheryl Lansdowne and her shadow identities. Kez doesn’t answer her phone, so I start putting it all into an orderly email document.

Kez calls me back before I finish. It’s a short conversation, but I can hear the stress in her voice. She’s relieved about the new leads I provide, but at the same time, she can’t fail to understand how much this complicates her investigation.

I’ll need to help her however I can. It isn’t like Kez has unlimited resources in Norton, and I’m well aware of the TBI’s jurisdictional supremacy. They won’t want her in their business, and she isn’t going to give it up . . . so I’m in it too.

It occurs to me that I’ve done nobody any favors opening this up as a multistate investigation; the FBI will have their hands on it soon, and that sidelines Kezia even more.

I’m making tea when I hear a door open quietly, and the pad of footsteps coming down the hall. I look up to see Lanny standing there. She’s got on a black Henley tee, Halloween bat-themed pajama pants, and a pair of battered bear-feet slippers that Vee bought for her about the same time Vee’s white yeti slippers made their first proud appearance.

I make her a mug of hot tea, too, and add honey just the way she likes it. We sit down in the living room—the farthest point from the other bedrooms—together on the couch.

“Couldn’t sleep?” I smooth her hair back from her face. Instead of the rainbow colors she’s been dyeing in, she’s redone it to a softer hot-pink shimmer in the front, darkening to purple at the edges; it looks cool, I have to admit.

“Not really,” she says. “You know what the flyers mean, don’t you? When we go to school today, somebody’s going to have it. And it’ll blow up all over the place. Next thing you know, people will be sending me clips from true crime shows. Like I haven’t seen them.”

“You watch—”

“No shit, Mom. I mean, we’re mentioned in at least four of them. You know that, right?”

It’s more than four, and I don’t tell her. “Language, Atlanta.” My heart’s not in it.

“The actress playing you was crappy in the one I watched. They played her like she was probably guilty. And they had that prosecutor on, you know the one. He thinks you got away with murder.”

I’ve seen every one of the documentaries, listened to at least half of the podcasts. Most of them think I got away with it, or at least that I was aware of what Melvin was doing. I wasn’t, and the injustice of it still burns, but I’ve grown a lot of fireproof skin for that kind of stuff. It hurts that my kids have to walk the same inferno. But I know I can’t keep them out of it either.

I put my arm around her and hug her close. She doesn’t pull away. We lean against each other, sipping tea, and it feels good and peaceful and right until Lanny says, “School’s going to be awful today.”

“It’ll be awful for a while,” I agree. “And yet you’re going to go. Right? Head up, shoulders back, face the world. You know how we do it.”

She gulps the last of her tea. I do mine as well. “How come we always have to be the brave ones? How is that fair?”

“Because we can,” I tell her. “Because we have to. And no. It isn’t fair, not even remotely.” I relent a little bit, because I can feel the tension in her. “Let’s make a deal: half a day at school. Then we do something fun.”

“You’ll be here?” She glances over at me, then quickly away.

“In the afternoon I will,” I tell her. “I have to do some work this morning, sweetie. But this is Sam’s day off, so he’ll be here until I get back. Okay?”

She nods and takes our cups into the kitchen. I check my watch—it’s nearly 6:00 a.m. now—and as I do, she yawns and pauses in the doorway. “I think I’ll go back to bed for a little bit,” she says. “Thanks for the tea, Mom. Next time, just come talk to me, okay? I’m not a kid. I can help with stuff.”

I’ve known that for a while, but I’ve been looking at it completely wrong. I’ve seen it as conflict, as pulling away. But people change. God knows I’ve changed from the naive child I was when I married Melvin Royal to the terrified, paranoid person I was when I arrived at Stillhouse Lake to the woman I am now—who’s maybe got a handle on the fear, if not the paranoia.

Lanny has filled in the spaces of her own life. And she has helped. She can be my ally, and so can Connor. I only need to let go of the fear that keeps me from seeing that clearly.

At least I know what’s holding me back, even if I can’t get there instantly.

So I hug my daughter and tell her I love her, and I put her in charge of getting her brother up, ready, and to school. I’ve never done it before, but I give her the keys to my SUV. She looks at them, shocked, then at me. “I—I can take them?”

“Yes,” I tell her. “I’ll borrow Sam’s truck. He won’t mind. I know you’ll be careful.” The urge to