Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 114419 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 572(@200wpm)___ 458(@250wpm)___ 381(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 114419 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 572(@200wpm)___ 458(@250wpm)___ 381(@300wpm)
Her eyes moved downward, to the bottom of the page, where Mirabelle had written three names. Reva (Lilly) Keeling, Bee Murray, and Harry Lockheed. The three strangled murder victims who’d been elaborately posed.
Below that was a rough sketch of a crown, done in red ink, almost as if Mirabelle had been doodling while going over the notes. What the hell is going on?
Something occurred to her, and she brought her phone out to call in to the station. Kat was long gone, home to get a good night’s rest, but maybe Xavier was still there, despite the late hour. She used the automated system to type in the extension of the phone at the desk where he was working, and he answered right away.
“Hey, Xavier. You sure are burning the midnight oil. But I’m glad you’re still there.”
“I was actually just packing up. What’s going on?”
“Ingrid said that you’re pulling information about Roger Hastings and his son’s abduction?”
“Yeah. I’m still working on it, though. There’s a lot.”
“That’s okay. I just need to know his wife’s name, if you have that. The one who reported their son’s abduction in the first place.”
“Ah, hold on.” She heard rustling as though he was going through notes or printouts. “Violet. I thought so but wanted to confirm. Violet Hastings, former cocktail waitress turned homemaker, reported that Roger left with their son, Daniel, aged seven, in the back seat of his car and never returned. According to police, she claimed it was a spousal disagreement and he’d taken the boy to punish her.”
Punish her?
Sienna’s heart was beating rapidly, her stomach suddenly queasy.
“Does it say where she waitressed?”
“Um.” She heard papers rustling again. “Yeah. Casino Royale? That’s the one that closed last year, right?”
Casino Royale. She couldn’t picture any casino with that name. She stretched her brain, trying to picture it, but came up short. It’d been so many years since she’d lived there and known every building in every corner of the city. “I don’t know,” she said distractedly.
“It was a classic casino close to downtown but more off the beaten path,” Xavier went on. “I mostly remember it because of that giant red crown on top of the building.”
Her rib cage squeezed. Red crown. Yes, yes, now she remembered it too. She’d never gone inside, but she’d driven by. Her gaze locked on Mirabelle’s rough sketch. She felt breathless. “Thank you so much, Xavier. You’ve helped a lot. In fact, when this is all over, I’m nominating you for employee of the year.”
She could hear the pride in his voice when he said, “Wow, thanks. It’s no problem. I love this stuff. See you tomorrow.”
She hung up, her eyes going to the notes again, her brain attempting to merge and arrange all the information she had.
“Oh, Mirabelle,” she whispered. Was she Violet? Had she worked at Casino Royale with the murder victims? Violet . . . Danny Boy’s mother?
The inspiration for the infamous “Mother”?
She didn’t understand. How could this be? Had Mirabelle had another son?
A son who was now strangling people to death? The writer of the notes? Oliver. Ollie. Daniel.
He’d been a child when his father had taken him.
She suddenly remembered something and headed to Mirabelle’s bedroom, where she opened the top drawer of her bureau. The box where she’d once kept that long-ago bracelet was near the back, and with trembling fingers, she pulled it forward.
Sienna set it on the bureau and opened the top, the tiny hinges giving the quietest of squeaks. The pictures she’d glimpsed so many years before were still there, and she pulled them out, moving the one on top to the back, looking at each in turn. They were photographs of a baby, then of a toddler, a little boy, all with the same dark hair and wide dark eyes and a timid smile. She turned the one that had been on the bottom over and read the back: Daniel, 7.
A tiny moan escaped her lips. She saw Gavin in him, but mostly, she saw Mirabelle. A little dark-haired version of Mirabelle. Oh God. She clenched her eyes shut, reeling. When she opened her eyes, she saw that underneath the place where the photos had been was a purple fabric drawstring bag, and she set the photos down, already knowing what was inside by the feel of the bag in her hands. She pulled the string and tipped the purse, the silver dollars she’d once given to Mirabelle for safekeeping spilling out onto the wood of the bureau. All of them still there, every last one. Mirabelle had kept them safe for her all these years, because she’d told her she would. Even before she’d moved to this house with the palm trees and the double oven and the en suite bathroom and the pool. Even when Sienna was gone, and surely, she’d needed one a time or two to make final ends meet.