And stopped.
The windows of the Cotton Exchange Building glowed against the dusk.
Harper & Associates.
He checked his watch.
Seven o’clock.
Eleanor should’ve gone home hours ago.
Reid closed the car door again and crossed the street.
Inside, the old building was quiet.
His footsteps softened as he climbed the staircase, the wood worn smooth from decades of use. A patterned Wilton runner wound up the center of the steps, its muted blues and rust tones catching the hallway light.
The second-floor hallway was lined with framed artwork: watercolor views of Sylva, the courthouse at sunrise, a few bold abstracts in deep greens and mountain blues.
She has good taste.
He smiled to himself.
Present company included.
When he reached the glass door of Harper & Associates, he leaned and looked inside.
Eleanor stood in the glass-walled conference room, bent over a spread of documents.
Her heels lay on the floor beside the chair.
She was barefoot, one foot tucked lightly behind the other as she studied the paperwork.
A glass of red wine sat beside the files, and next to it, her laptop screen glowed with a paused video frame: Lila Grant’s face on one side, the words
The Disappearance Of Caroline Simms
on the other.
Reid tapped on the glass.
She jumped.
Then turned.
For a second, something tight flashed across her expression—the look of someone who had been staring at a life being picked apart on the internet.
Then it melted into a smile.
She reached for the door and opened it.
Reid stepped inside, gesturing toward the wine and the frozen podcast screen.
“Well,” he said, “looks like I’m right in time for happy hour and light viewing.”
Eleanor laughed once, the sound catching at the edges.
“Barely. And I would not call that light.”
