She took a drink. “The shot was patient. The letter was patient. Everything about this is controlled. Pike doesn't have a controlled bone in his body."
They ate the sandwiches and watched the light change on the lake. The sun dropped behind the western ridge and the water turned from blue to copper to gray. A few clouds moved in from the north, thin and high, catching the last color.
“By the way, my lease is up in October," Callie said, not looking at him.
"Is it?”
"Mm-hm."
Noah knew where this was going. He’d noticed a jacket on the hook inside the front door that wasn't his. A coffee mug on the kitchen counter with a lipstick mark on the rim. A pair of running shoes by the mat that were too small to be Mia's. Callie's things had been appearing in his house for weeks, arriving one at a time like a tide coming in. Neither of them had talked about it. Neither of them needed to.
He took a drink. "There's a spare room. If you want it."
She looked at him sideways. "A spare room."
"That's what I said."
"Right." The corner of her mouth twitched with a smile. "The spare room."
They sat with that for a while. The loon called from the lake. Ed Baxter's porch light came on next door.
Callie stood and collected the empty bottles and the paper bag. “Well, I should go. Early start in the morning."
"Yeah."
She touched his shoulder as she passed behind him. Her hand stayed there for a moment. "She's going to be fine, Noah. Mia."
"I know."
"And Ethan will come around."
"Maybe."
"He will. He just needs a reason to."
She walked to her Jeep and Noah watched her go the way he had watched Mia that morning, following the car until it turned and disappeared. But the feeling was different. With Mia, the distance was loss. With Callie, the distance was the space that was slowly, carefully closing.
He wasn’t sure how he felt about that.
He sat on the porch until the last light was gone. The house was dark behind him. Somewhere inside, Ethan was awake in his room, doing whatever it was he did behind that closed door. The lake was black and still.
Noah thought about the letter. About the quiet man who wrote it. About the case that was pulling him in one direction while his instincts pulled in another.
He went inside, locked the door, and turned off the porch light.
Tomorrow, the investigation would resume. Tonight, the house was quiet. And there was nothing left to do but sit in it.
6
Hugh Sutherland answered the door like he'd been expecting someone else.
His eyes went to Noah's face, then past him to the Bronco in the driveway, then back. A quick recalibration. Whatever he had prepared himself for, it wasn't this.
"Noah."
"Hey, Dad."
Hugh stood in the doorway for a moment longer than was natural. He was wearing pressed khakis and a blue button-down, the collar open. His hair was thinner than the last time Noah had seen him up close, silver now where it had once been steel gray. His posture was still straight but the effort behind it was visible in a way it hadn't been five years ago. The house behind him was immaculate. It was always immaculate.
