Chapter 24: One Warm Window

"Home," I said, and then I stopped.

"Which one?" Elliot asked.

I looked at the lawn between the two houses.

Trenton had left a long envelope on the lectern, with the deed inside and the front-door key taped to it.

"The one I paid for."

He drove me the thirty yards, because I asked him to.

The front door of Trenton's house stood unlocked.

The rooms were empty of anyone, and they smelled of vanilla.

Brynn's shoes were lined up in the hall, and her robe hung on the kitchen chair.

A half-drunk cup of tea sat on the counter with a lipstick mark on the rim.

"Bag it," I said.

"All of it?"

"All of it. I want the vanilla gone before I sleep here."

Elliot found a roll of trash bags in a cupboard and began to work.

He didn't ask.

He put her shoes in one bag, her robe in another, and her toothbrush and her scarves in a third.

He carried them out to the curb one by one.

I climbed the stairs to the bedroom alone.

The door was bare.

There was no white dress on it, and no hanger.

I put my hand flat on the wood where a text message had once told me to be home by eight.

Then I opened the door and walked in.

The spare room was at the end of the hall.

The skylight was still there, over the bare floor, a square of late gold sky in the ceiling.

I had once thought of it as a gift, and then as a way out.

I dragged a chair underneath it and climbed up.

"Corina?"

Elliot stood in the doorway with the last trash bag in his hand.

He had gone very still.

"I'm not going anywhere," I said. "Hold the chair."

He dropped the bag and crossed the room in two strides and braced both hands on the back of it.

I reached up and undid the latch with my good hand, and I pushed the glass open.

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