As we step inside, it’s like being plunged right into a memory: the smell of rose-scented laundry detergent and that old luggage trunk Nonna uses instead of a coffee table. I want to breathe it all in, to close my eyes and luxuriate in it, but there’s no time. Nonna’s landline phone sits on a table by her love seat. I turn toward it and—
Nonna stands in the doorway. She brandishes a heavy rolling pin. “Who are you?” she says tightly.
7
The good thing about being dead is that your family doesn’t recognize you.
Or at least, that’s what I tell myself.
Nonna looks surprisingly threatening for a lady in her eighties with rumpled hair and glasses askew on her nose. “How did you get in here?”
I stand there, frozen. Every unsaid word rises up my throat like floodwaters, and I fear I might drown.
The last time I saw Nonna, I had been barely fifteen. Baby-faced, with long brown hair, my body softer and voice lighter. Now, I’m stray-cat thin from constant travel and danger, scarred from the car crash, my voice roughened by intubation, and my hair burnt umber and pink.
Augusta Pine isn’t anything like the girl Nonna knew. But it still hurts when she doesn’t recognize me.
My fingers itch to tear off my visor, to try to fit myself into the smaller body that I had back then. I want to crawl into that life, to be her granddaughter again.
But I can’t.
The old lie comes easily to my lips. “My name is Augusta Pine. This is Eames Ahlberg and his sister, Piper. I’m sorry, but there’s an active shooter situation in the lobby. All theapartments are in lockdown mode, and I was trying to get out of mine. We came over the balcony.”
Nonna squints at me. “What do you mean, shooter?” she asks, lowering her rolling pin. “Is that what the alert was about?”
“I saw the security guard get shot,” says Piper, her voice shaking. “My brother and I were at the pool when—when it happened.”
“Matthew’s dead?” says Nonna sharply. A spasm of grief crosses her face.
I look from Piper to Nonna. “Who?”
“The security guard,” says Nonna. “Matthew.” She casts her gaze about, as if looking for something else to focus on. “I don’t know any of you. What apartments are you from?”
“Eleventh floor, ma’am,” says Eames. “We moved in with our Aunt Connie a few weeks ago.”
Perhaps it’s his politeness or the way Eames ducks his head to make himself smaller, but Nonna visibly relaxes. She’s always had a soft spot for strays.
“I don’t live here,” I say. “I’m just renting the apartment next door for the weekend.” I keep my tone calm and level. “We need to call the authorities. Do you have a landline?” I know she does, but I have to ask.
“Yes,” says Nonna. She walks to the cordless phone and hands it to me. Even the phone is familiar—the worn buttons and yellowed ivory. It’s got to be thirty years old.
I press theCALLbutton.
The sound of a dial tone floods my right ear and I exhale in relief. Finally, a bit of good luck. A landline won’tbe connected to the building mainframe, so anything I say will be private.
I have Prefect’s number memorized. I wait, phone pressed to my ear and heartbeat unsteady.Pick up, I urge him silently.Pick up, pick up—
Prefect picks up on the second ring. “Hello?”
“It’s me,” I say.
“Why are you calling on a weekend?” he asks. “If you’ve attacked another billionaire, I’m not helping you.”
I let out a shaky laugh. “I’ve got good news and bad news. The good news is, I haven’t reprogrammed another dog. The bad news is that a group of criminals invaded the apartment building I’m staying in. The ringleader killed the security guard and I’m pretty sure her crew just hacked the building. We’re under lockdown.”
There is a long pause, broken only by the sound of my breathing. I wait for his reply.
And wait.
