“Okay.” I ball my hands into fists. “Good night,Brady.”
“Good night, Nora.”
But what he means is goodbye.
I close the door behind him before he even gets to the end of the walkway. I take a ragged breath, banishing all thoughts of Brady Mitchell from my mind. It’s better this way. Sure, he was a nice guy, and really great in bed, but I don’t need that complication. I don’t.
Really.
Now that Brady is gone, the cat seems to want to assert her dominance. She rubs herself against my leg and meows loudly. She’s hungry. Fortunately, I’ve got a ton of cat food. At least I can make somebody happy.
As I’m grabbing the can of cat food, it hits me that this is the perfect opportunity to get rid of the cat. All I have to do is put the bowl outside and quickly close the door. There’s no way this cat will be able to resist the food in her bowl, no matter how much she wants to stay in this house (for some reason). I don’t understand why she wants to be here so much. Nobody else seems to want to be around me.
I walk over to the back door with the can of cat food, and I throw it open. I put the bowl outside the door, then I empty the can into it. The cat lingers in the doorway, watching me with her yellow eyes.
“Come on, cat!” I say.
She doesn’t budge. Stupid cat.
I crouch down next to the cat, close enough that I can smell cat food in her breath. “Listen,” I say, “I’ll keep feeding you. I promise. But you can’t stay here.”
She meows at me. Which is about what I deserve for attempting to reason with a cat.
From my position crouched on the floor, I notice a white envelope on the ground. It’s slightly pushed against the wall, which is how I initially missed it. I reach for it, a sinking feeling in my chest when I see the name on the return address:
Aaron Nierling.
Again, there’s no postmark on it. I can’t kid myself that this letter resulted from another string of mishaps. The only way this could have gotten into my house is if somebody slipped it under the back door. Or worse, they left it on the floor after they were done planting that blood in my basement.
I wish the security places were open now. I need alarms on every door and every window in this house. Tomorrow morning. First thing.
I get to my feet unsteadily. I’ve ripped up every single letter my father sent me, but those were the ones he sent through the mail. None of them came through my back door.
I have to see what this says.
I collapse into a chair at the kitchen table. I stare at the writing on the envelope. I’ve gotten to know my father’s writing over the years, based on these weekly letters. This is his handwriting. Or if it’s a forgery, it’s an excellent one. But I think it came from my father.
My hands are trembling as I rip open the envelope.
It’s a single piece of paper. Folded into thirds. I carefully unfold it and stare down at the single sentencewritten on the paper:
Come see me, Nora.
And underneath, it’s signed “Dad.”
I want to do the same thing I’ve done to every other letter he’s ever sent me: rip it up into pieces. But I don’t know if I can ignore him anymore. If I want to find out who killed those girls, there’s only one way to do it.
I’m going to pay my father a visit for the first time in twenty-six years.
Chapter 32
When I was a kid, after my father was arrested and later sentenced, I wanted to visit him in prison. My mother had killed herself at that point, and he was the only parent I had left. I desperately wanted to see him.
“Not a chance in hell,” my grandmother said every time I brought it up.
“But why not?” I complained. “It’s not like he’s going to hurt me.”
“Because he’s an evil man and I don’t want you anywhere near him.”
