Home. The word is foreign in my mouth. The feeling strange. Numbness mixed with a kick of hope. After the night I’ve had, I’m happy to take the final step up onto the porch of Maura’s towering Victorian. And as I cross the threshold, I think, Maybe it’s my towering Victorian now, too.

The foyer is dark but for the distant glow of honey yellow cast from the kitchen. Maura left a light on for me. At first comforting, my grandmother’s consideration soon turns sour. How am I going to tell her about Ben? She’ll be devastated. Especially that he used her as his alibi!

At least he’ll rot in jail instead of at the bottom of a cliff. The Bergens, this town, will finally see some justice.

But will they? I think of Caroline and my afternoon with Joe.

I don’t believe that Joe Bedecki killed Caroline Quinn. He didn’t know about the insulin that Ben so lovingly imitated. Whose handiwork did he really copy?

I should have told Sheriff Morrow about Grace, but I was so exhausted, so hyperfocused on Ben. It’s nearly five a.m., and all I want to do is sleep. But I don’t know if I can.

I remove my heels from my aching feet, pad into the kitchen to make coffee, already dreaming of a lengthy scalding-hot shower. I need to wash Ben off me. The grime of that bedroom. The sweat at the nape of my neck, now sticky and cool, from the exertion of keeping that asshole from dying.

Maura’s sitting at the counter, already nursing a cup. She takes in my tangled hair, a grin creeping up her cheeks.

“Good morning, Celia. Or good night for you, I gather. I hope you’re strolling in hours past curfew because you got laid. Only excuse I’ll accept.”

But then she frowns. Takes in the state of my dress. Her dress. A dirt-smeared and ripped mess. “What the hell happened? I swear, if that boy laid a hand on you, I will murder him myself.”

“You’re right on both accounts. Sort of,” I say, grabbing a coffee mug from the cabinet and sliding with a grunt onto the barstool one over from her. “Ben and I hooked up, and then he tried to kill me. All in all, an eventful homecoming.”

Being cavalier keeps residual panic from rising in my throat. For good measure, I pour myself a cup of joe and don’t even bother with cream or sugar, swallowing down bitter black coffee to echo my mood.

“Excuse me?” Maura says low and slow.

I smack my lips together and elaborate. “Ben murdered Natalie. Once he knew that I knew, he tried to throw me off a cliff. Kind of. We were in his mom’s bedroom.”