“You’re here because of the reporter,” Lacey finally said, her fingers holding tight to her own arm, protective once more. No small talk, no catching up between long-lost friends. Mia didn’t mind. What else was there to say, really?

“I heard he was bothering you up here,” Mia said, framing the question, tilting it, so that maybe Lacey would relax her arm, lower her guard.

The woman pulled again at her cigarette, the thin line of smoke quivering from her trembling hand, coiling, obscuring her face so that for a half second she was held apart from them, a veil slipping into place to let her keep her distance. Then Lacey dropped the cigarette back to her side, and the smoke was gone.

“He was asking about Monroe.” Lacey paused. “Though from the look on your face, I’m guessing you already knew that,” she continued, even though Lacey had barely glanced at Mia since she’d arrived. “A real prick, that one.”

“I’m sorry you had to deal with that,” Mia said, and meant it. No matter what she felt about Lacey—and what that was, she was still deciding—her ulcer pulsed as she tried to imagine being cornered and surprised by the reporter, being asked about a sister who had killed herself, a friend who had followed suit.

Lacey’s shoulder jerked as if to shrug it off, but the violence of the movement belied the carelessness she tried to wear on her face. “Told him what he could do with his story.”

“Did he ask you anything in specific?” Mia pressed.

Lacey crushed the lit end of her cigarette into the ashtray and slammed the window shut. Then she looked at Mia. “Mostly about how they didn’t leave notes. Asher and Monroe.” A pause. “You.”

It wasn’t suicide.

Lacey shrugged, and the arms of her sweater slid down to her knuckles, hiding her hands. “Was kind of odd, wasn’t it?”

Mia tipped her head. She’d looked for her own when she hadn’t been able to sleep after being dropped off from the lighthouse, torn her room apart, trying to guess where she would have left it had she written one. Had been consumed with needing to know what it had said.

There hadn’t been a letter, though. Not one that she could find.

“Did Monroe ever seem . . . ?”

“Like she was going to off herself?” Lacey cut in even before Mia could ask the question. If Lacey was trying to offend or shock her, it wouldn’t work. The brashness, the audacity, the pretending not to care was not unusual to see in the victims’ families. Everyone handled grief differently.

Mia nodded.