Sylvie says, “Thomas needed closure and I was grateful for the opportunity to help. After the show, he came backstage, asked me out for a coffee. We’ve been together ever since. Joined at the hip, really. I barely go to the bathroom without him.” She leans in, kisses my cheek.

I ignore the prickles of heat where her lips touched my skin. Despite what Sylvie does for a living, she’s an attractive woman and it’s a natural reaction. Instead, I focus on the fact that she’s baiting me. I get it, but why taunt her mother?

Hana slides an enormous kitchen knife free from a wooden block. She slices through a yellow onion, expertly chops, uses her fingernails as a gauge. “So you believe in psychics, Thomas?”

Sylvie bats her eyes at me. She’s enjoying this. “I believe that your daughter believes,” I say. Hana slits the plastic wrapping on the package of chicken. “How about you,” I ask. “Do you believe?”

She sniffs. “Is that why you’re here, Thomas the journalist? To get testimonials from Sylvie’s parents?”

I switch directions. “Mostly, I want to know what Sylvie was like as a child.”

“What were you like?” Hana asks as she ruthlessly separates chicken fat from meat with the tip of her knife then rips the lumpy, yellow strands free.

“I’ve told him. Normal,” Sylvie says. “But I don’t think he believes me.”

I ask, “Do you have a favorite memory of your daughter?”

Hana’s knife hesitates then flicks the chicken fat into the sink. “Why don’t you answer that, Sylvie?”

“Mom is a photographer. She took most of the photos in our house. I liked going into the darkroom with her.”

Hana uses the knife to point at a shot of Mount Hood that’s hung to her right. The mountain’s white peaks are painted pink. “She took that one.”

“Careful, Mom. You sound proud,” Sylvie chides.

For a moment they’re not estranged, just a daughter teasing her mom, then Hana looks right at Sylvie and says, “There’s before and after. Your father and I live in the latter. We haven’t been proud of you for a long time.”

Sylvie’s hand darts to her chest, where Hana’s mortar-round smolders. Her words on the train come back . . .

Have you ever considered that you’re the vampire? You tear people’s lives apart for a story and you don’t care about who you hurt in that process.

Redirecting the conversation, I ask, “What do you know about Sylvie’s birth parents?”

Hana scowls. “Why would you ask that?”

One, your last comment was cruel. Two, your daughter lied about her early childhood, claimed she can’t recall it. Instinct tells me when I dig up the truth about that, added to whatever I glean from the time I spend with you and Sylvie’s dad, and after she bombs at her next show, I’ll have irrefutable evidence and Annie will publish my exposé, front page. The only negative is that you’ll dance on your daughter’s grave.