by Ava Barry
I knew that if I didn’t answer Thierry, he would sulk. I decided to give him the abbreviated version. “When Theo was arrested, there was a second set of footprints found in the garden, near Eleanor’s body. There was a long-standing theory that he had an accomplice, but they could never figure out who it was.”
“I haven’t proved that the footprints belonged to Rebecca,” Petra went on. “Not yet. But here’s where it gets interesting. She spent some time in Vermont.”
“I don’t see the connection.”
She took out her notebook. “I wrote down that strip of numbers from the back of the photograph of Theo dancing with that woman,” she said, then read out, “Oh-two-one-six-six-four, G-F-N-V-T.”
“I’ve been mulling over them for a few weeks now. What do you think they mean?”
“My mom was really into photography for a while when I was growing up, always had tons of sleeves of photographs that she’d gotten developed. I went to visit my parents after I quit the Lens. There’s not much to do at their place—bad Internet—so I was looking through old family photos. There were similar numbers and letters on the back of these photos, except these ones all started with CA. I realized that the letters were state abbreviations.”
I felt goose bumps on the back of my neck.
“Fuck, Petra, you’re incredible.”
“V-T is for Vermont,” she said. “The numbers are a date in February, nineteen sixty-four. And that meant that G-F-N was a town in Vermont. I pulled up trusty old Google and went through all the town names in Vermont. The only one that makes sense for that configuration of letters is a little town called Grafton.”
Thierry let out a low whistle. “Your girl has mad skills, Hailey. Maybe instead of subjecting her to the ritualistic slavery of an unpaid internship, you can give her gainful employment.”
“He was in America the whole time,” Petra said quietly. “All those stories about seeing Theo in another country were lies. Why do you think he’d stay in America, rather than leave?”
“It’s easy to hide in plain sight,” I said.
“Maybe.”
I reached into my bag and dug around until I found the photograph of Theo dancing with the woman. I studied the small patches of snow on the ground, the caps of white on the roofs.
“I looked into Grafton,” she went on. “There used to be a corner drugstore that developed film, but it’s been razed and turned into a Starbucks. They were probably the ones who developed this film. It’s too bad we can’t ask them about Theo.
“But I did a little more digging,” she said. “To try to find out where the picture might have been taken. Apparently, in the sixties, there was a controversial center run by nuns. It was at the edge of town. Unwed mothers and their children were sent there until they were able to get back on their feet.”
“Any idea what it was called?”
“Saint Lucia’s.”
It took a moment to connect the dots. “Do you think—I mean, that has to be Lucy’s,” I said. “With Connie, at Lucy’s. Right?”
Petra tapped the photograph. “I think Rebecca was at the women’s center, and that’s why Theo went out there.”
“Where does Connie fit into all of this? Have you figured out who she is yet?”
“Maybe there’s a way to find out,” Petra said. “The buildings are still there.”
“Is it still a home for unwed mothers? Those don’t exist anymore, do they?”
“I don’t think so. The center went bankrupt and the original owner passed it onto her kids, but according to what I could find, now it’s filled with squatters. Grafton’s one of those cutesy, picturesque Eastern towns where people go to see the fall leaves, and everyone hates those buildings.”
I looked at Petra in admiration. “Did you find all this through Google?”
“I called a few places in Grafton.”
“We have to go out there,” I said. “Tomorrow, if possible.”
Thierry had looked bored by our conversation, but he perked up at this. “You allowed to leave the city and all? With your new arrest record?”
“They let me go this morning. Said nobody was pressing charges.”
Thierry gave me a hard stare. “You know what that means, right? They’re planning to finish the job themselves.”
“What job?”
“H, you’ve been pissing these guys off for weeks. They’re going to kill you.”
“Shut up, Thierry.”
“I’m serious.” He stared at me with flat eyes. “Maybe it’s a good idea for you to leave town after all.”
Petra watched us without saying anything.
“What do you think?” I asked her. “Want to take a quick trip?”
“You go,” she said. “I’m looking into something else. I need to stay here.”
“Come on, you’re as much a part of this story as I am.”
She gave me a sly grin. “I’m chasing a different dead girl,” she said. “Two of them, actually. I’m going to find out the connection between Linus and all those girls who died in Beverly Hills.”
“How do you plan to do that?”
She shrugged. “I found out a little bit more about that performance artist. Deborah Mann. Once she realizes that Linus and Heather can afford the top criminal attorneys and she can’t, she’ll want to get her side of the story out there as quickly as possible.”
“All right, enough of this,” Thierry said. He leaned across the table and fixed me with a stare. “I want to know why your ass was in jail last night.”
“I went to Windhall to find something.”
“You broke into Windhall and stole something, then got arrested for it. Genius move. I’m guessing they didn’t let you keep it.”
“They didn’t know about it.”
He gave me a hard look. “You hide it somewhere on the grounds?”
“Nope.” I grinned at him. “I swallowed it. That’s why I took so long in the bathroom just now.”
I dropped the pair of Ziploc bags on the table. Thierry frowned, and then he realized what he was looking at. His eyes widened, and he leaped out of his seat.
“Jesus, get that away from me! That’s vile!”
Petra peered at the plastic bags with curiosity. “What am I looking at?”
“Proof,” I said proudly. “That’s a piece of bloody wall that I took from Windhall. I had to swallow it, because I knew that if they found it while they were searching me, it would disappear.”
“You’re telling me that bag just came out of you?” Petra stared at me.
“I have to get it tested,” I said. “If it’s Eleanor’s blood, we have enough evidence to reopen the trial. We can find out what really happened.”
“How are you going to get it tested?”
“I’m friends with a blood tech at Cedars-Sinai,” I said. “I spent a few years there when I was a kid.”
“Seriously, Hailey, there’s something wrong with you.” Thierry took a swig of his coffee and gave me a dirty look. “Let’s get out of here.”
* * *
My cell phone had died, but when we pulled into my driveway, I could hear the landline ringing. I stretched as I stepped out of Thierry’s car; the night in jail had kinked up my neck.
“You gonna answer your phone?” Thierry asked.
“Why bother? Only people who have the number are telemarketers.”
We went into the house as the answering machine kicked in.
“Hailey, pick up.” It was Madeleine’s voice. “Seriously, pick up.”
I crossed the room and grabbed the phone. “Mad. What’s going on?”
“Where are you?” she sounded anxious. “I’ve been calling you for an hour.”
“I was otherwise engaged,” I said. “You okay?”
“Hailey,” she said, and her voice sounded oddly electrified. “Oh my God, Hailey. It’s Windhall. The whole thing has gone up in flames. It’s all over the news.”
TWENTY-ONE
Thierry trie
d to stop me from leaving the house, but I wouldn’t take no for an answer. Since my car was still parked near Windhall, I finally managed to convince Thierry to drive me and Petra toward Beverly Hills.
There’s an odd quality about fire, that you can sense it several miles away. The air above Beverly Hills was white and ashy, and tendrils of smoke reached up toward the heavens. There was a sweet smell in the air, and as I passed Sunset, I could see a dark plume of smoke above the hills. The road was blocked at the bottom of Benedict Canyon Road, three streets below Theo’s house.
“Residents only past this point,” one of the officers told me.
“You don’t understand, I need to see Windhall. I know Theo personally.”
“You hear what I said? Move along.”
A collection of rubberneckers and photographers had gathered at the bottom of the blockade, and a few news crews were filming the occasion. Two helicopters circled overhead. I felt tension in my chest, and Petra put a hand on my shoulder.
“What do you want to do?” she asked.
“There’s another way,” I said. “Come on. We need to get closer.”
Ignoring Thierry’s protests, I got back in my car and reversed, then headed back toward Sunset. The fire trail where the dead art student’s body had been discovered was far enough away that I doubted they had blocked it off, and we would be able to see Windhall from above. We had to move quickly, though, or they might realize the vantage point had been missed.
“You know that you can’t get anywhere near Windhall, don’t you?” Thierry was saying. “You just got arrested for breaking in. You want to get yourself arrested again, fine, but this time there won’t be anyone to bail you out.”
I parked on an offshoot of San Ysidro Drive.
“Look, you don’t have to come with me,” I said. “But I’m going to get closer.”
I made my way down the path toward the outlook. I could feel Petra and Thierry behind me, but nobody spoke as we moved through the overgrown path toward the peak with the view of Windhall.
The branches above us cleared, and I made my way onto the rocky outlook. Several hundred feet down the embankment stood Windhall, engulfed in flames. A veil of smoke hung over everything in Theo’s yard, and the house stood in ruins. Even at that distance, I could feel the heat, and it felt like a caress. I could make out the frames of the windows and saw that the skeleton of the house had been exposed. It was beyond saving.
“Shit,” I whispered.
The upper turret had caved into itself, a collapsed skull. The smoke was so thick that it hung in tatters around the sooted windows, the broken glass, and the ragged woodwork. I could see firemen forming a brigade from the street, unwinding hoses to combat the flames, but I knew that it was futile.
Petra and Thierry stood on either side of me, and for once, they were completely silent.
“What do you think happened?” Thierry said.
“I’m guessing it was Heather,” I said, after a moment. “She said that Theo was going to pay for what he did. I didn’t know that she was going to burn his house down. Unless, of course, it was Caleb Walsh. He was determined to tear Windhall down.”
The sun dazzled above the eastern ridges, and the house stood defiant against the hills. The suggestions of what the house had once looked like were still there, but it only existed in pieces: the tallest tower was still there, only it had been carved out by flame, and the glass in the windows had shattered. The lower domes and cupolas had collapsed into themselves, and daylight shone through in places where there had once been roof and shingles.
“I did this,” I said. “I started digging, and this is what happened.”
“You can’t blame yourself,” Petra said. “Besides, if it was Caleb, then this had nothing to do with you.”
“Blame himself? He’s trying to take credit,” Thierry retorted. “Hailey, you’re not that influential.”
I felt hollow. “You don’t think Theo was inside, do you?”
“You were there last night,” Thierry said. “Did you see him? Hear him?”
“No, but I wasn’t there for very long.” I pinched my eyes shut. “Let’s see if we can find out what happened. Maybe the firefighters will talk to us.”
We picked our way down the fire trail. The crowd on Benedict Canyon had grown, and I could see an ambulance through the fray.
“Why is there an ambulance?” I turned to Thierry.
He didn’t respond. The crowd was surging forward around us, and I could hear snatches of conversation.
“Can’t believe he was still alive,” a woman behind me muttered. “I grew up here, there were always stories about him. I always thought my mom was lying.”
“Yeah, well, he’s not alive anymore,” a man replied. “They’re saying he was inside.”
I edged closer so I could listen in on their conversation.
“Creepy place,” the woman said. “Whoever set that fire did a favor to the whole neighborhood.”
“A dried-up corpse,” the man said. “He probably went up like a stack of matches.”
The ambulance siren started up, and the crowds parted slightly to make room for it. Firefighters came through the crowds, pushing people aside until there was enough room for the ambulance to reach the street, then take off down Benedict Canyon toward the hospital.
Once it was gone, the crowds began to disperse, and I pushed my way closer to the house. A pair of firefighters were talking next to the gate.
“Is it true?” I asked.
They turned to look at me.
“Was he inside?”
“You can’t be here,” one of them said. “We need you to stand back in case the fire spreads.”
“Was Theo inside?” I repeated. “I need to know if Theo was inside.”
“We retrieved a body,” one of the firemen finally replied. “Someone was inside when it happened.”
“It was a man,” the other said. “We’re not at liberty to say more than that. Really, you need to leave.”
* * *
Thierry dropped me off at my house. Before I got out, he put a hand on my shoulder. “You can drop this,” he said. “You can leave this story behind. It’s done, Hailey.”
I went into the kitchen and poured myself a shot of Heather’s whiskey, then sat down. I was shaking so hard that I could barely lift the shot to my lips, and when I swallowed the amber liquid, I didn’t really feel any better.
I called Leland’s phone, but he didn’t answer. Another thought occurred to me, then, and I ran over to my computer. I hadn’t used Theo’s email address since I’d contacted him, trying to get an interview. Now, I found the address among my notes and penned a quick email to Theo:
I know you don’t want to talk to me, but please give me some sign that you’re okay. I saw the fire.
After pressing “send,” I poured myself another shot of whiskey and tried to calm myself down.
With all the insanity of the day, I had almost forgotten about the blood sample that I had collected from Windhall. It was difficult to believe that twenty-four hours before, I was planning how to break into Theo’s house. Now, I had been arrested and seen Windhall burning down.
After a few more shots, I booted up my computer and checked various news sites, then watched as Windhall collapsed in on itself, taking all the years of layered history along with it. At one point, some photographers managed to sneak past all the fire barricades and climb the walls of Windhall. Their photographs turned up on the Huffington Post a few hours later.
The fire was the only thing on the news that evening. I couldn’t turn on my computer without seeing images of Windhall, a burned hull devoid of beauty. The hedges surrounding the yard were also badly damaged, and the whole property was exposed, once and for all. It was as though the fire had peeled away the protective sealant that had managed to keep out trespassers and curious bystanders for years.
I had drifted off to sleep when I heard a soft tapping on my door. The sound intersected with m
y dreams, at first, and then I gradually woke up and realized that someone was outside. I rose to my feet and padded across the room to open the door.
It was Madeleine.
“Hey,” she said softly. “Are you okay?”
“I honestly don’t know.”
“Did you find what you were looking for?”
It only took a few minutes for me to catch her up on everything from the last twenty-four hours, from the stolen piece of wall to the fire, to Theo’s body.
“I still have the sample,” I said. “I was going to have it tested against Eleanor’s DNA, but now I don’t know if I can.”
“How would you get Eleanor’s DNA?”
“I have some of her hair,” I said. “It’s part of some stuff I got from this crazy collector. I’m sure they’d have a record of it somewhere, since all of the original tests were done on Eleanor at Cedars-Sinai.”
She leaned against the doorframe. “You need to take it in,” she said. “It’s the only way you’ll ever get peace from this.”
“I know.”
“Let’s go,” she said. “I’ll drive.”
* * *
Petra answered right away when I called, and Madeleine swung past her apartment to pick her up.
“Where are we going?” Petra asked when she climbed into the car.
“You said you wanted to be part of the story,” I replied.
It was approaching six o’clock, and traffic was heavy. I knew from experience that Claudia spent most of her time at the lab, though, since she was a workaholic. If she wasn’t at work, there was a chance that she was at her home in Studio City. I’d been there a few times, and I knew that she wouldn’t be upset if I showed up at her house with an emergency request.
When we got to the hospital, one of the night-shift nurses told me that Claudia was on break.
“She’s probably in the courtyard,” she told me. “Go out there and see, if you like.”
Sure enough, we found Claudia leaning against the wall of the courtyard, eating her sandwich. I had always liked Claudia—back when I was in the hospital, she had had green streaks in her hair, but now it was cut short and shaved on the sides. She was a curvy black woman who wore horn-rimmed glasses, and it was widely acknowledged that she was the best blood technician at Cedars-Sinai. Even though we didn’t see each other too often, we made a point of getting in touch at least once a year. The last time we’d seen each other, we’d both gotten shit-faced at a bar in downtown Los Angeles.