Chapter 5: Sophie

Every woman in that shop was looking at me.

Iris sniffled on her pedestal.

My mother had both hands pressed to her mouth.

"Then come clear me off yourself," I said to Damien.

"I'd rather not have to."

"You'd rather have someone else do it. You always do."

His jaw tightened.

I walked past him and out the door, and the little bell rang behind me.

I made it to my truck before my knees went.

I was still gripping the door handle when someone yelled my name from across the street.

"Faye Dacre, you absolute ghost!"

Sophie Winslow came out of the diner at a jog, still in her yellow fire shirt, a coffee in each hand.

She was a head taller than me, with short red hair and a sunburned nose, and her voice could stop traffic.

It did. A pickup braked to let her cross.

"Your mom has texted the entire street," she said. "My mom woke me up at five to tell me you'd been eaten by a bear."

"I'm not eaten."

"I can see that. You look worse than eaten."

She shoved a coffee into my hand.

"Talk. I've got a day off and a lot of rage that needs a target."

So I told her.

Right there, leaning on my tailgate on Main Street.

The camera, the ring, the bed, the ridge, the deed.

I showed her the photos one by one.

She went quiet at the one of Iris and Damien.

Then very quiet at the one of the fire.

When I was done, she drank her whole coffee in one long swallow.

"Okay," she said. "So we're killing her."

"We are not killing her."

"Maiming. Light maiming."

"Soph."

"You know I believed you before you got to the bed part, right? You've been a terrible liar since kindergarten."

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