Hank, understandably, fell hard. She became a project. To win a smile, that’s all he wanted.

He’d always been the friendly sort.

It only took him a few days to make the connection. He told her of his life. His passion for acting. The disappointments he faced. The changes he was going to make.

When she shared her story, Hank was lost. And forever marked by the lonely waif.

When he got out of rehab, he waited for her.

When she got out, three months later, she was changed. There was a hardness in her, a coldness. Armor had been developed. Protections put in place. Gone was the lost girl. In her place was a woman.

A woman with ideas. A woman with a plan.

And Hank, lovesick Hank, bought in.

Five years later, when the police picked him up on the Jersey Turnpike, Trent Duggan’s passport in hand, he denied knowing anyone named Ivy Brookes. Denied being in Paris. Denied killing Rick and Lily. Denied ever having met or slept with a woman named Sutton Montclair.

He stuck to the script, like he’d been told.

It didn’t matter. There was DNA evidence at Sacré-Coeur, his hair on young Lily’s body. The FBI had him dead to rights for a double murder, and this time, he was going away for good. His only chance, they told him, was to make a deal.

They pressed him hard. And in the end, he caved. The story he told them was beyond anything they could have imagined.

The Trinity

THE TRINITY

Now

Ethan came awake with a groan. His head was splitting. The situation rushed his memory. Ivy. One second he’d been standing, in horror, realizing the woman he’d called friend was betraying him, and the next, it was night, he was on the floor, and he knew for a fact if someone were to observe him at this moment, they’d see small bluebirds circling his head, tweeting and chirping.

Ivy had gotten him good.

Ivy, you betrayed us.

His nose was broken; he could feel the blood running down his chin, thick and warm. He shuffled himself to his elbows, sat up. Ran a hand below his nose, tried to swallow, coughed up blood onto his shirt.

Realized someone was banging on the door, calling his name. It sounded like Officer Graham.

Good. He needed to report the bitch.

He rose to his feet unsteadily, used the edge of the couch for support. Somehow made it to the door. Threw the dead bolt, and pulled it open.

Holly Graham stood on his porch. She was on the phone, and held up a finger so as not to be interrupted.

Ethan started to laugh. All hail modern technology.

“Yes, yes, it’s fine. I’ve got him, he’s alive.” And to Ethan, “Who did that to you?”

“Ivy,” he said, and Graham nodded curtly.