‘Don’t you look pretty, honey,’ he told his daughter, before turning to Harper apologetically. ‘I can’t seem to get the hang of how to help her with things like that.’
‘You’ll figure it out,’ Harper assured him. ‘Camille will show you how.’
When she left, they’d both stood on the porch together. Jim waving. Camille standing straight, watching her go.
Those huge eyes stayed with her all the way down the highway.
Harper got stuck behind a tractor outside of Vidalia, and later a two-car accident slowed traffic to a crawl, so it was more than two hours before she reached the outskirts of Savannah.
Her cell phone rang as she sat at a red light, and she fumbled with it, answering without looking at it first.
‘Harper,’ she said. The light turned green.
‘Harper, it’s Billy.’ Her landlord’s normally jovial voice was unusually serious. ‘I need you to come home. There’s been a break-in.’
Harper was so stunned she nearly slammed into the back of the car ahead of her, which had braked abruptly.
When she screeched to a stop inches from its back bumper, her heart was in her throat. She saw the driver frown at her in his rearview mirror.
‘A break-in? At my apartment?’
‘I’m afraid so, honey.’ Stress made his Louisiana accent thicker than ever. ‘Them kids upstairs, they called and told me your door was hangin’ open when they got back. Already called the cops, but you need to get on home now.’
‘Thanks, Billy,’ Harper said grimly. ‘I’m on my way.’
When the light turned green, she floored it, but traffic slowed her down.
At every red light, she kept thinking, Get home. Get home. Get home …
It took twenty long minutes to make her way through the rush-hour traffic to the graceful oaks and tall, old buildings of Jones Street.
When she pulled up, Billy was standing on the porch with a worried frown. When she climbed out of the rental car, he stared at the Ford.
‘Y’all got a new car?’
‘It’s a rental,’ she explained. ‘Mine’s been acting up.’
She’d taken off her wig at a truck stop an hour ago, where she’d stopped for gas and a cup of nuclear-powered trucker coffee, so at least she didn’t have to explain her appearance.
‘How bad is it?’ she asked, hurrying up the front steps.
‘It’s bad.’ Billy patted her awkwardly on the shoulder. ‘But don’t you worry. We can fix it.’
Harper stepped numbly through the front door. A quick glance at the locks told her they were undamaged.
‘How’d they get in?’ She glanced back at her landlord.
‘Kitchen window’s broke.’ He pointed towards the back where afternoon light was flooding down the hallway. ‘Looks like they used a crowbar.’
The window. Why hadn’t she insisted on bulletproof glass?
The front hallway was exactly as she’d left it. Even the light was still on. It was only when she turned into the living room that she could see the damage.
The television was smashed – the screen a cobweb of broken glass – and the stereo had been ripped loose from the speakers, leaving wires trailing uselessly across the floor. Papers were flung everywhere – pages had been torn from her notebooks and scattered like confetti.
Harper saw the plastic pieces of her police scanner in a corner – the gash in the wall above indicating someone had hurled it there with great force.
Through the haze of shock, she had one very clear thought – this damage looked vindictive.
The sofa and chair had been knocked onto their backs, cushions sliced open so foam spilled out like intestines.
It was such a mess, the last thing she noticed was the worst thing they’d done.
The portrait Bonnie had painted of her seven summers ago – someone had taken a knife to it. Two deep, crisscrossing gouges had been carved across her face.
Next to it was a single word, painted on the wall in some dark substance.
RUN.
Harper made a small, involuntary sound. She pressed her fingers against her lips.
The warning had been scrawled with a brush, with fast, furious strokes. The paint dripped down the wall like blood.
This was no ordinary burglary.
Harper had moved beyond fear now, and into a kind of icy calm.
Careful not to touch anything, she picked her way through the chaos to the kitchen. Here there was more evidence of destructive fury – glasses broken on the floor, contents of the refrigerator had been hurled around until ketchup and salad dressing ran down the walls she’d so carefully painted last summer.
There was no sign of Zuzu anywhere.
She felt a cold distance between herself and the scene in front of her as she turned down the hallway.
The bedroom had received most of the invaders’ attention. Sheets had been ripped off, clothes emptied from drawers, the mattress had been sliced in several places and the filling torn out. The bedside drawers lay on the floor, with the contents hurled everywhere.
‘You said the police already came?’ Her voice was devoid of emotion.
‘About twenty minutes ago.’ Billy’s voice was tight with suppressed anger. ‘Policeman barely got out of the car. Walked up the front steps, said something like, “Boy they sure made a mess of this place. Guess she should’ve got better locks.” Then he got back in his car and drove away. Said he’d write up a report.’ He scratched his cheek, eyeing her dolefully. ‘Question I got is, how’d that policeman know it was a woman who lived here? I sure as hell didn’t tell him.’
Billy grew up with nothing. And if there’s one thing anyone who grew up poor knows, it’s what it looks like when the cops are messing with you.
‘The cops know me,’ Harper said numbly.
‘They know you so much they don’t come in to make sure you’re all right? What’s going on, Harper? Why’d they write that on your wall?’
She looked at him bleakly.
‘I don’t know.’
She was tired of feeling lost and confused. And she was so grateful she’d put her few remaining boxes of family belongings back in the attic a few days ago. At least they didn’t get that.
Billy crossed his arms, lips pursed like they held an invisible cigarette.
‘I’m worried about you, sweetheart,’ he said. ‘What’re you gonna do?’
It was a good question.
Already the apartment was fading into a twilight gloaming.
As Harper looked around at the ruins of everything she owned in the world, she thought of Camille Whitney and her father.
Maybe this was karma. Maybe she deserved this.
Billy was still waiting for a response, but she didn’t know what to tell him. He should be worried. Everyone should worry.
‘Would you stick around a few minutes while I gather some things?’ Her voice was thin but horribly steady. ‘I don’t want to be alone.’
Billy looked affronted.
‘I ain’t leavin’ you here alone for some criminal to come finish his job. I got a .45 caliber semi-automatic says nobody hurts you, Harper.’ He patted the gun in the waistband of his baggy jeans. ‘You take your time. I’m gonna go out back and secure that window. You need anything, you holler.’
Harper cast him a grateful look.
‘Thank you, Billy.’
He waved that away.
‘Don’t you be thanking me. They break into my house and get at my people, it’s on me.’
As he walked out, Harper called after him, ‘Keep an eye out for my cat, will you?’
His reply was faint as he disappeared out the back door: ‘Cat’ll run a mile from this craziness.’
Once he was gone, Harper moved quickly. She didn’t want to be here. Every instinct she had was screaming at her to get out.
Crossing the room, she pulled the damaged painting from above the fireplace and leaned it by the door, trying not to look at the gashes across her
younger face. Moving faster now, she gathered her mother’s paintings as well. She loaded them all carefully into the trunk of the rental car.
Running back up the steps, she dug through the chaos in the bedroom until she found her suitcase. She threw it on top of the damaged mattress and rifled hastily through the clothes on the floor, taking anything that looked remotely wearable.
As she placed a top in her bag she noticed, as if from a distance, that her hands were trembling.
When the bag was full, she zipped it shut and lugged it to the door.
By then, Billy was nearly done sealing the window – the plywood cover blocked the last of the day’s light from the kitchen, casting the apartment in shadow.
He came in through the back door, whistling a tune she didn’t recognize.
‘That’ll do it,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘Ain’t nobody else getting in here tonight.’
With his hammer dangling from one hand, he walked out the front door.
Harper lingered, taking in the destruction of her home. Committing to memory what had been done to her. She never wanted to forget this moment. She wanted it seared on her skin.
It would never happen again. She wouldn’t allow it.
Squaring her shoulders, she followed Billy out.
After he locked up, they stood together on the front stoop.
‘You got somewhere to go, darlin’?’ Billy asked. ‘You won’t be able to live here for a week or so.’
The concern in his voice made Harper’s heart twist.
‘I’ll be fine,’ she assured him.
He didn’t look convinced, but he knew her well enough not to push it.
‘Well, don’t you worry about a thing here,’ he said. ‘I’ll get my cleaning service to come clear up the mess. I’ll have that window replaced this week. It’ll all be back to normal in no time.’
But Harper knew it would never be normal. Someone had invaded the only safe place she had – a place she’d worked so hard to protect. And now it was ruined.
The things she hadn’t told Billy swirled in her mind. She’d been a police reporter long enough to know this was no ordinary burglary. Whoever did this hated her.
They wanted her to know they were coming for her.
She wasn’t safe anywhere now.
Chapter Thirty-eight
Bonnie lived in a small Victorian duplex on 26th Street, near the railroad tracks.
It was cute – with bay front windows and a porch with an old-fashioned swing – but the neighborhood was right at the edge of Harper’s tolerance. She’d covered a shooting five blocks away a few years ago.
Still, Bonnie loved it and refused to move.
‘You’re obsessed,’ she always said when Harper harassed her about safety. ‘I’m perfectly fine here.’
As it turned out, she was right – it wasn’t her place that got broken into.
Now as Harper lugged her suitcase through the gate and up the front steps, she was glad Bonnie had never moved.
She could hear music playing inside as she rang the doorbell.
When she opened the door, Bonnie’s wavy blonde hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail. She wore an oversized white button-down shirt and cut off shorts. She must have been working – pale blue paint was smeared on her fingers. There was a smudge of it on her cheek.
‘Harper!’
Bonnie’s surprised eyes took in her crumpled expression, the suitcase at her feet. Her welcoming smile faded.
‘I’m so sorry, Bonnie,’ Harper said helplessly. ‘I didn’t know where else to go.’
While she unpacked the car, dumping her suitcase in the crowded spare room, where filmy pink curtains were draped haphazardly over the window and a sequined throw gave the bed a disco sheen, Bonnie poured them both glasses of wine.
Later, sitting on the front porch swing with a glass of Chardonnay, slapping at mosquitoes as the sun set, Harper told her about the burglary.
She tried to make it sound like no big deal, but Bonnie wasn’t fooled.
‘First your job, now this.’ Her eyes searched Harper’s face. ‘Something’s going on.’ She swung her wine glass at the empty street on the other side of the low fence. ‘And, by the way, where’s your hot cop? Why isn’t he protecting you?’
‘Oh, yeah. I forgot to tell you that part.’ Harper took a long drink – the wine was cold and sharp on her tongue. ‘He broke up with me.’
Bonnie’s jaw dropped.
‘Well, shit,’ she said. ‘What happened?’
‘It’s no big deal,’ Harper said unconvincingly. ‘We haven’t been together long. Better to find out now.’
Bonnie fixed her with a steady look.
‘Harper, stop it.’ There was no anger in her voice; only gentle determination. ‘You’re lying about the burglary, and you’re lying about your guy. You’re scared and sad – I can see it on your face. You might as well tell me the rest.’
Clutching her wine glass to her chest, Harper slumped on the wooden seat.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, miserably. ‘I didn’t want to ruin your whole day with my messed-up life.’
‘Don’t be an idiot,’ Bonnie said. ‘Tell me everything. I can take it.’
The thing was, Harper couldn’t tell her everything.
So she told her some of it. She told her about Marie Whitney and the murder scene so like her mother’s. She told her about Luke, and how he thought she was obsessed. And she confessed that she was starting to believe he was right. She told her about Blazer’s cold fury that night in the archive room – how sure she’d been that he was the killer. And then she told her that she thought she’d been wrong about that.
‘All I can do is go back to the beginning,’ Harper said helplessly. ‘Look at all of Whitney’s boyfriends again. There’s a lawyer who freaked out when I called him, but I don’t know how to investigate him without being sued. And then there’s every other man she ever dated.’ She held up her hands, wine splashing from her glass onto her skirt. ‘That could take weeks, and by then I think I will have gone insane.’
Throughout it all, Bonnie listened, filling her wine glass and holding her hand as she talked and talked, until the sun went down and the air began to cool.
Finally, her tongue loosened by wine, Harper told her the thing she hadn’t really let herself think about until now.
‘Whoever broke into my place …’ she said brokenly. ‘I think it could have been cops. Getting revenge for what I did. It was personal. Things they did … that message … it wasn’t an ordinary theft. They were trying to intimidate me.’
Bonnie frowned. ‘You really think the police would go that far?’
‘It happens.’
It was hard to explain to someone not steeped in the culture that police are slow to love, and quick to take offense. That they react viscerally and viciously to suspected betrayal.
She’d seen it in action. She just never thought it would be directed at her.
She hadn’t been back to the police station since she broke into the archive, but Luke had made it clear she wasn’t welcome there.
‘What are you going to do?’ Bonnie poured the last of the wine into their glasses, setting the empty bottle on the porch beneath their feet. ‘If the cops broke into your apartment, that’s serious. You can’t let that go.’
‘I’ll call Smith,’ Harper told her reluctantly. ‘Tomorrow.’
‘Oh, the lieutenant.’ Bonnie brightened. ‘He’ll help.’
‘I’m not so sure,’ Harper said.
She told her what Smith said to Luke – about how she couldn’t be trusted.
‘I betrayed his trust,’ she said. ‘I let him down.’
‘Come on, Harper,’ Bonnie said, unconvinced. ‘He blusters, but he loves you. If you tell him you’re sorry, he’ll fix things. He always does.’
She made it sound so easy.
‘What about Luke?’ Bonnie nudged her shoulder. ‘You have to get in touch with him.’
Harper
shook her head.
‘I can’t.’ She sank down on the wooden swing. ‘He doesn’t want me any more. I can tell. Besides. He left town.’
‘He’ll come back,’ Bonnie assured her confidently.
With lithe ease, she hopped to her bare feet, sending the swing swaying.
‘Come on.’ She held open the front door. ‘Enough sadness. I’m drunk. Let’s eat some food while I finish fixing your life.’
The next day, Harper woke up to find herself in a bewildering sea of pink. It took her a second to realize what she was seeing was sunlight, streaming through Bonnie’s vivid pink curtains.
She closed her eyes again.
Her head ached, and her mouth was dry. She desperately needed to pee.
There was no point in trying to get back to sleep.
She rolled out of bed, sending the sequined throw to the floor with a metallic jangle, and headed downstairs.
Bonnie wasn’t up yet, so Harper put some coffee on and perused the limited food options. Aside from skim milk, yogurt and peanut butter, there wasn’t much to choose from.
She sniffed the milk suspiciously before pouring it into her coffee, and gave up on breakfast.
After the wine ran out, the two of them had found the vodka in the back of Bonnie’s freezer, ordered Chinese food, and talked late into the night. They’d finally gone to bed at around two.
Harper had been certain she’d never sleep, but the booze and exhaustion did their work, and she remembered no dreams.
This morning, though, she felt adrift. Cut free from all her moorings.
No job. No boyfriend. No home.
All she had was the Whitney murder. Did she still want to go on with that?
She’d promised Miles she’d stop if she learned nothing from Camille Whitney. But that was before someone destroyed her home. Before they slashed her face.
When she’d gone to Vidalia, she’d taken her notes and her laptop with her.
If she wanted to, she could dive in right where she left off.
But did she want to?
Flopping back on Bonnie’s sofa, she gave a low groan of misery.
‘Oh my God.’ Bonnie’s husky voice floated down the stairs. ‘You sound like I feel. Please tell me there’s coffee.’
After Bonnie left to teach a workshop at the art school (‘My students will all be more hungover than me,’ she assured her as she put on her darkest sunglasses), Harper tried to keep herself busy.
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