It was tiny, like the rest of the house. Outdated, like the rest of the island.

Mama stood in front of an old, baby blue gas-top stove that had been the main feature of the room before Mia’s birth. A radio on the counter by the porcelain sink played some country song, and Mama sang along softly, pretending not to hear them come in.

Mia exhaled. “Mama. We’re here.”

It took another few tries before Edie Hart spun, her hand clutching at her apron, manufactured surprise on her face.

“You actually came,” Mama said, her voice flat, before she switched off the stove and slid the cast-iron pan to the back burner.

“I told you I was,” Mia said, and before they could devolve into bickering, she gestured toward Izzy. “Mama, this is Detective Izzy Santiago. Izzy, this is Edie Hart.”

Mama’s gaze slipped over Izzy’s lean and lanky frame, taking in the pink undercut, the nose stud, the row of earrings, her light brown skin, and the ink that disappeared up along her forearm underneath the pushed-up arms of her flannel shirt. “Are you a lesbian?”

“Mama.” Mia sighed.

But Izzy just laughed. “Why, yes I am.”

Edie nodded once and then turned back to the stove. “You’ll be in the den. There’s blankets and pillows out there already. Mia, same goes for your room.”

For a second, Mia wished she and her mother were the type to reach out, hug, kiss cheeks. It had been at least seven months since Mama had been to the mainland for one of her rare visits. But that kind of affection had never been a part of their lives.

So instead of pressing the issue, Mia turned and led the way toward the room across from the study, where Izzy would sleep.

“Will we still be able to talk to the pilot today?” Izzy asked.

“Probably not.” The light in the room had lost any golden hue. The days were no shorter here than they were on the mainland, but somehow it seemed like they were. The island had a funny way of distorting time like that.

“Well,” Izzy drawled. “Then you have plenty of time to tell me about that little bomb you dropped back at the doc’s.”

Mia swallowed. The suicide note. The lighthouse.

She hadn’t been back since that night. But she wouldn’t be able to keep the story secret from Izzy for long. Shouldn’t.

Might as well rip the Band-Aid off. “All right. Grab your coat.”

The lighthouse came into view at the same time the sea did.

It was a simple building, a one-story house and then a phallic thrust of stone into air. Painted white, it stood as a reclusive lookout against the nothingness of the world that was beyond the slick black rocks below it.