She points at an article. “‘Wallace Quill Sells His Soul to the Devil’ is a funny headline, but not helpful. Nothing here connects him to the cottage. He never talked about his childhood.”
James scrolls through an interview. Another. All surface-level questions with surface-level answers. Nothing about Quill’s past, where he grew up, his family, his love life. Nothing. Half an hour passes, then a full hour. James huffs and brushes back a wayward hair.
“It’s getting late.” Nelle squeezes his shoulder. “Maybe we should find a hotel.”
James’s blue eyes snag on the screen, confusion and intrigue crossing his face. Nelle has begun to understand his expressions like a secret language.
“What is it?”
“I’m on a message board aboutRaveland this guy says he knew Quill when he was a kid.” James poises his fingers over the keyboard, then starts typing rapid-fire.
“What are you doing?” She marvels at the speed of James’s fingers as they fly across the keys. His nails are clean and short, and she can’t help imagining where else they might be put to good use.
“I’m replying to him. Asking if he’s local so we can meet up and ask about Quill.”
“We can’t randomly invite him to meet us, right? We’re two strangers. We need a reason.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be the one without any social training?”
“I’m a fast learner.”
He pounces on the keyboard. “We’re writing his obituary, and we need as much personal information as we can get. I’ll add that, uh, he’s an A-list celebrity in our town.”
“But Quill’s alive,” Nelle says.
“This guy doesn’t have to know that,” James says. “We can ask him more specific questions about Quill’s childhood, his upbringing,wherehe grew up.”
“Seems risky. And wrong.”
“I never claimed to be right.”
He finishes crafting their lie and hits “Send.”
“What if he doesn’t respond?”
“We’ll come back tomorrow,” James says. “Or use the hotel computer. However long it takes.”
“Thank you. There’s still one little problem.”We don’t have a hotel.
His hand falls to her waist, finger through her belt loop. “What is it? Oh, shit. Is it your period? We can stop at a pharmacy—”
“James, James, stop.” Nelle puts her hands on his arms. “I don’t have a menstrual cycle. I don’t ... I can’t ... reproduce.”
He blinks, processing.
She scratches her arm, trying to decipher his reaction.I donotneed to stress about this right now, she tells herself as her stomach goes ice cold. She only wanted to ease his cute, momentary concern, give them something to laugh about. She considers saying,It’s okay; we can adopt, but she settles on pushing the subject aside entirely.
“The problem is that we don’t have a hotel yet.”
James recovers fast. “I think we can solve that.”
Nelle studies the boring, smooth hotel ceiling. Twilight bleeds through the curtains. Scotland doesn’t get dark until midnight during the summer. She tries to sleep on top of the comforter, annoyed by the suffocating blankets. James’s soft snores are the only sound in the room, aside from the clock above the door. Outside is an occasional voice or burst of bird caws.
When her life was confined to a bedroom with rose-printed wallpaper, she never felt this, but since she left, storm clouds brew over her heart every time she settles in one spot. They have barely been in Edinburgh for a day, and she is already anxious to move on. Maybe scared that her past will catch up to her.
ThatQuillwill catch up to her.
She wants to see Japan and Morocco and Fiji, every continent and island, only now a roadblock stands in her way. The cottage.
