Clare uses her phone to take a picture of the photograph. She returns the frame to the drawer and enters the master bathroom. It is cavernous, tiled from ceiling to floor with marble. At its center is a large stand-alone tub, a floating vanity under the window and a shower open to the space. No glass enclosure. Clare returns to the bedroom and stands at the window as the last light fades. So far, this house has offered her very little. It feels nearly devoid of any history, any context, any sense of its owners. Perhaps not so inharmonious with Malcolm after all.
Wait. Clare holds still. What is that sound?
The room washes with light.
“Turn around,” a woman’s voice says behind her. “Slowly. Now. Turn around.”
Clare obeys, her hands lifting instinctively. She must squint to adjust to the brightness of the track lighting. In the doorway stands a woman about Clare’s height and age. Her hair is the same curly brown. This woman wears a black T-shirt and black pants, an outfit that would have rendered her nearly invisible in the dark. And she has a gun. She holds it up, aimed right at Clare’s head. This woman’s hand is steady, her stance firm as she steps closer.
If I reach for my gun, Clare thinks, I’m dead.
“Please,” Clare says. “Don’t shoot me.”
Now the woman is within a few feet of Clare, her expression blank. At closer range, Clare recognizes her. Charlotte Westman, Zoe’s sister, vastly changed from the photograph Clare examined only moments ago. Too thin, much aged.
“You’re trespassing,” Charlotte says.
“I know,” Clare says. “I know I am. But I know Malcolm. He’s… a friend. Malcolm Hayes. I know him.”
A flicker crosses Charlotte’s face, a small register of surprise. She lowers the gun by an inch. But just as quickly her stance rights itself, and she steps to within point-blank range.
“You’re on private property. I should shoot you.”
Clare inhales deeply and holds her eyes closed. Why does she feel so calm? Charlotte edges the gun closer to Clare’s skull. When Clare pushes back against the wall, the numbness she feels is broken by the pressure of her own gun against her spine.
“You could shoot me,” Clare says, popping her eyes open. “But you shouldn’t, Charlotte. You really shouldn’t.”
“Shut up,” Charlotte says. “Shut the fuck up.”
Charlotte’s finger is not on the trigger. This gives Clare a split second.
“Charlotte,” Clare says again. “You’re Zoe’s sister. I know who you are.”
And then Clare reacts. She grabs the barrel of the gun and spins her hip into Charlotte until she’s able to yank the weapon free. A scramble ends with Clare holding the gun, their positions reversed, so that Charlotte is against the wall, her hands in the air. Clare clicks the safety open and threads her finger through the trigger loop.
“I get the feeling you’ve never actually fired a gun,” Clare says. “I promise you that I have.”
“Go ahead,” Charlotte says, her voice low. “Go ahead. I don’t fucking care.”
At this Clare takes several steps back until she is on the opposite side of the master bedroom. She thinks of Somers, her calmness, her professionalism. What would Somers do if she were here? She would not let her anger get the best of her, Clare thinks. She would assess, de-escalate. She would do her job. Clare keeps the gun pointed with one hand, then fishes a card from her back pocket and flicks it across the room. Charlotte watches stone-faced as it flutters to the floor.
“The back door was open,” Clare says. “I let myself in. My name is Clare O’Kearney.”
This name. Before she’d embarked on this case, Clare had allowed Somers to select her alias from a list of O’ names they’d found online. It means warrior, Somers had said. Let’s give you a name that means warrior.
“Like I said, I know Malcolm. Personally. I can explain.” Clare points to the card on the floor. “I’m an investigator. And I’m looking for him. I’m looking for Malcolm.”
“Stop saying his name,” Charlotte hisses.
“Malcolm’s name?”
“Fuck you.”
The venom in her voice, the wildness in her eyes takes Clare aback. What is it about her brother-in-law’s name that stirs such anger in Charlotte Westman? In the week between cases, Clare had sometimes enacted scenes like this one, trying on reactions, personas. The cold, detached investigator. And then a warmer version, like Somers, professional but disarming and friendly. Neither felt right. I have no persona, Clare remembers thinking. And now Clare must tamp down the urge to say sorry for not doing as she’s told, for taunting Charlotte. This is her missing sister’s house. She may well know more than anyone else. Clare needs Charlotte Westman on her side.
“Can we make a deal?” Clare says. “I put down the gun, and we talk? It’s possible that we want the same thing.”
The words hang in the air, Charlotte breathing hard, eyes diverted to the window. Is she waiting for something? Someone? Clare clicks the safety back on and lowers the gun, tucking it into her pants next to her own.
“You’ve probably been through a lot,” Clare continues. “I might be able to help you.”
Charlotte slides down the wall until she is slumped on the floor, her face buried in her hands. She begins to weep. Clare keeps her distance, silent. Whatever she knows of this woman’s story has come only from news articles, a family destroyed by her father’s murder, a sister missing. Who knows what else she’s lost? Enough to bring her to this house with a gun, enough for one gesture of goodwill to make her crumble. Clare can’t begin to understand these tears. She can only wait them out.
Clare sits on the floor across from a crying Charlotte Westman. The dark and tattered clothes Charlotte wears do not align with the photograph filled with well-dressed Westmans; a photograph where she’d been smiling so brightly, her daughter on her hip, her brother-in-law Malcolm at her side. Now her hair is unbrushed and wild around her pale face. But most telling to Clare are the small lines and dots of pink scar tissue in the bend of Charlotte’s elbow. Scars that have not yet faded to silver. What drugs are your weakness? Clare thinks to ask her. Takes one to know one. Instead she clears her throat, her thumb running the bumps of her own scars hidden under her shirt. From her low vantage on the floor Clare can see the dust bunnies under the master bed. It’s been a while since anyone lived here.
Finally Charlotte wipes her eyes with her sleeve and looks up, her expression returned to one of hardened rage, her eyes rimmed red. When Clare points to the card again, Charlotte crawls to collect it from the floor between them.
“Why don’t I start at the beginning,” Clare suggests. “Tell you why I’m here.”
“Why don’t you give me back my gun,” Charlotte says, not a question.
“You mean the gun you just pointed at my brain? I’d rather not.”
“Fine,” Charlotte says. “If you’re going to hold me hostage. Fuck. Just start.”
Hostage. The word troubles Clare. She’d pictured this going so differently. She’d pictured entering this home and finding some clue, big or small. Some place to begin. Her head aches. She is tired. She swallows to gather herself.