Page 22 of The Final Cut

“I’m honored,” he murmurs.

Homer sneezes on him.

“Less honored, but God bless you.”

I climb out by myself before anyone can lift me, guide me, manage me, or do any of the thousand tiny careful things that will make me start screaming. The dock shifts under my borrowed sneakers. Shiloh found those too. Gray canvas, half a size too big, probably from a twenty-four-hour store that sells emergency sweatshirts, overpriced phone chargers, and shoes designed for tourists who made bad decisions in heels and sandals.

The marsh is quiet around us. That quiet is the worst part.

New Orleans is never quiet. Blackwood House creaks and breathes. Noir hums. Hospitals beep. Ambulances scream. Even the murder house had its own stale, waiting silence.

This place has a different kind of hush. Wide. Wet. Watching. Frogs click somewhere in the grass. Water laps softly against wood. A bird calls once, then decides against participating in the night.

The quiet gives thoughts room.

Cal’s mouth around the tube. The nurse’s kind eyes. Blood under my nails, hiding where water and wipes couldn’t reach. Delia dragged through the ballroom doors with a man’s arm at her throat.

I shove each image down as it rises. One by one. Harder each time.

The cabin door opens, and warm light spills onto the porch, revealing a space that has no right to be called a mere cabin. The main room is all clean lines and shadow. Polished concrete floors with plush throw rugs anchoring the living spaces. A massive stone fireplace rising up one wall. A low black sectional big enough for all of us, maybe more. Beyond it, those floor-to-ceiling windows show the marsh in dark layers of glass and a sleepy sun, just barely rising at the edges of the water.

The kitchen gleams at the far end. Stainless steel. Black cabinets. A long island with a stone surface smooth enough to reflect the recessed lights. No clutter. No old dishes in the sink. No stack of mail, no half-empty mug, no sign that anyone lives here unless they live like a catalog for men with too much money and too many enemies.

A hallway cuts off from the main room, doors spaced with precision. Bedrooms, likely. Bathrooms. Storage. Whatever else Nash keeps in a house designed to look harmless from the water.

Under different circumstances, I would love this place.

The thought irritates me enough that I step inside with my jaw locked and decide I will love nothing.

Shiloh follows with Homer, who perks up the moment his paws hit the floor. He sniffs once, crouches low, then starts a sideways slink toward the sectional as if the couch has insulted his bloodline. His leash trails behind him. Shiloh lets it drag.

Nash brings in the bags. Ever closes the door, locks it, then locks something else I can’t see. A soft tone pulses through the house. Screens wake near the kitchen wall, each showing a different view of the property. Dock. Water. Rear approach. Roofline. A narrow road I did not see from the boat.

“How many cameras?” I ask.

Ever taps a screen. “Enough.”

“That means too many.”

“It means fewer than I want.”

His answer annoys me a little in its gruffness, but it also makes me feel safer, and that annoys me more.

Nash sets a duffel near the hall. “Shiloh, take Reva’s things to the first bedroom. Ever, run the perimeter from inside before you go back out. I’ll make calls.”

They all begin to move.

Something in me snaps tight.

“No.”

Three sets of eyes turn toward me.

Homer freezes halfway to the fireplace, one paw raised.

I stand in the middle of this beautiful, locked-down marsh palace with Cal’s blood still buried under my nails and rubber bands biting my wrist beneath the sweatshirt cuff. My heart is beating too fast. My skin feels too small. The whole room presses in, glass and stone and expensive silence.

“No,” I say again. “Nobody gets to wander off and do useful man-things until I get answers.”