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“Get behind the door,” Viv said to her, urgency in her voice, which scared Rae.
Viv shut and locked the door, looking relieved.
“I don’t think he saw you,” she said.
“Who was that?”
“A detective.”
Rae’s heart rate picked up, and she felt nauseous. “He was looking for me?”
Viv tossed her keys and purse on the entryway table and let out a huge sigh. “Yes, but I told him you no longer live here.”
“What did he want?”
“Let’s sit down,” Viv said, moving toward the couch.
Rae joined her, her nausea getting worse by the second.
Viv knitted her brows. “He’s helping the California police because your first name was given to them by the little girl you saved. She only knew your first name, your real name, but it’s unusual, and the police figured you might’ve been missing as well. They ran your first name for any missing people within the United States, and ‘Echo Phalin’ pulled up a recent missing persons case. Then they searched for credit applications and driver’s licenses under your name, and it pointed them straight here.”
Rae couldn’t believe it. Had her mother reported her missing? Maybe after her first call to her when she was still in California? Or perhaps it was her mother’s new spouse who reported her. She was so confused.
“Hon, they want to speak with you about what happened with the girl. They know you didn’t hurt her and that you saved her, but the girl is too young to say much else.”
Rae was too stunned to speak at first, but she calmed herself enough to whisper, “They didn’t ask about the fire or Clint and Bobby?”
“No, but I didn’t want to take any chances, so I lied about you living here.” Viv shook her head. “Shit, maybe I just made things worse.”
Rae took Viv’s hand. “I don’t want you to get in trouble.” She paused. “I think ... I think I should talk to him, find out what he knows.”
“I’m not sure if that’s a—”
“No,” she said, feeling more and more adamant about her decision. “I’ll talk to him, tell him I told you to lie because I was frightened the people who hurt me would find me. I’ll tell him what I can without saying what I did.”
“But what if they do know, and they connect you to the fire and their deaths?”
“I’ll take the chance. They need to know about Beth and Maria, so their families will know what happened to them. And if they arrest me for that, then ... then ...” Her tears cut off her words.
They clutched onto each other hard on the couch, and Rae felt like all her dreams were about to crash around her.
CHAPTER 28
RAE
2024
The Monday evening after her meeting with Dayton, Rae couldn’t help feeling like she’d made the wrong decision by telling him no on the party. It was that damn pleading look he gave her. He was invested in this case—that was easy to see—but something told her he had more at stake. Stupidly, for a second, she wondered if he was worried about something happening to her if the case wasn’t solved. Sometimes, she wanted someone to worry about her, someone who could hold and kiss her and say everything would be okay. It made her long even more to have someone greet her when she came home, someone who wasn’t an angry teenager or a hungry black cat.
Not for the first time, she thought of Viv and the deep connection she’d had with Frederick, the man who introduced her to kink. Rae had tried to share that part of herself with people she’d dated in the past, but finding a man who wasn’t intimidated by a dominant woman in bed was tricky. The only person who understood was Angel. Even then, she knew what she and Angel had wasn’t a romantic love, the kind theyboth deserved. And sometimes she wasn’t sure if love like the kind Viv and Frederick shared was possible for her. It wasn’t like she needed to give a partner pain, however much she enjoyed it. She scratched that itch during her work, after all. But she wanted someone she didn’t have to lie to about her past, about what she’d done to survive.
Without a single reservation, she knew she’d have to hold certain secrets until the day she died. For the most part, it didn’t bother her too much, but she missed intimacy. Not sex but true intimacy, where you share those dark, hidden parts and feel acceptance. Since she could never tell a partner, “Hey, I once killed two men in a fire I started,” what she wanted would never be in the cards for her.
Rae’s thoughts were interrupted when she heard Lily’s footsteps coming down the stairs. She was so tired, she almost stayed put on the couch with her apple-cinnamon tea warm between her hands, but she couldn’t allow Lily’s ghosting of her to continue. She padded to the kitchen and saw Lily searching through the pantry.
“I got you more of those Tate’s oatmeal raisin cookies you like,” Rae said.
Lily pulled the bag of cookies from a shelf as she offered Rae the tiniest of acknowledgments by glancing at her.
