Chapter 14: The Kitchen

I took out my phone and texted Kinsley.

Gavin is in Joanna's kitchen. Sixth floor, back stairs. Come now. Go live.

Her answer came before I had put the phone away.

In a cab on Lake Street. Four minutes.

I pressed my back to the cold brick beside the window and listened.

"She'll come back tonight," Joanna said. "She has nowhere else. She'll sleep in my guest room and I'll have her phone by morning."

"And Corliss?"

"Corliss is a man with a coat. She'll get tired of him."

"You said that about the last one," Gavin said, and she laughed.

I had spent twenty-two years believing that laugh was on my side.

Footsteps came up the stairs, quick and light.

Kinsley appeared on the landing in her gray hoodie with her phone held out in front of her, and the little red light was already on.

"Hi, everyone," she said, very softly, to the screen. "I'm Kinsley Draper. I'm going to show you something."

I nodded.

Then I put Joanna's spare key in the lock.

The kitchen smelled of garlic and butter.

Joanna turned from the stove with the wooden spoon in her hand.

Gavin's hand was still at her waist, and it took him a full second to move it.

"Hello, Gavin," I said.

"Deanna." He recovered first. "You've let yourself into a private residence."

"Her key. She gave it to me in August."

"Sweet pea," Joanna said, and her face changed to something warm and worried. "You're upset. Sit, let me make you tea."

"Don't call me that."

Behind me, two doors had opened on the landing.

A man in slippers stood in one with a cat in his arms, and a young couple in robes stood in the other.

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