“Wait—there’s one last thing,” Kurt said. “Edith never saw your mother. But the thing she knew about your mother’s purse—Reyes told her to say that. How did he know?”

Nic realized then what must have happened. The only explanation. “Reyes knew because he saw my mother that night.”

She pulled away from Kurt Kent, and raced back to her mother’s car, down Hastings Pass to the inn. And the fence. And the hole that someone had started to make.

Chapter Forty-seven

Day eighteen

Alice does not get the key. Instead, she sits in the kitchen with Mick for hours, it seems. I hear him moan and choke. I hear her sob. I think I have miscalculated. I think that now I am surely going to die.

But then another sound. A car.

I race from where I stand by the grate and look out the small hole in the wood. I see another police car. Another police officer. This one wears short sleeves and patches. He walks to the front porch and I think, call out! Call for help! But then I wonder—Mick is a cop. What if they’re in this together?

I return to the grate when I hear the shuffling. Mick is on his feet, and he drags Alice toward me. He is pale, his shirt covered in sweat and vomit. But he has survived the poison. This will not end well.

He says nothing because the doorbell has rung and now the new cop is knocking. He calls out a name.

“Reyes? You in there?”

Mick has a name. Reyes.

He is worried. I can see it on his face. Worried and weakened by the cyanide.

The cop again—

“Reyes—come on. I see your car out here. . . .” A pause as he listens outside the door. And then—

“I spoke to the owners. I know you take care of this place. Listen—it doesn’t matter, okay? You’ve been working on the side for them. Right? Moonlighting? Doing security here and at the gas station? I’ve seen the utility bills—buddy? Are you in there? You been living in there when you’re not supposed to be? It’s okay, we can work it out. We can work everything out.”

When the cop falls silent again, Mick, Reyes, the man—he opens the grate with the key that he wears on his belt. He shoves Alice inside the room with me, and locks it shut.

I pull Alice close. We are one now, in our fate. And we move as one back to the grate where we can see what’s about to happen.

Chapter Forty-eight

Day eighteen

Nic ran through the lobby of the inn to the back door. Then across the patio to the shed where she took a rock to the padlock, beating it until it opened.