Page 71 of Blade

The kettle whistles, and he pours the water into the cups, then brings them to the table.

“Do you want to sit down? You left so abruptly this morning—I was hoping to get an answer to my question.”

Yes—his question. The one about Jolene and what happened to her. The question Grace didn’t want me to answer.

I walk to the table and sit, leaving my coat and boots on. I watch the steam rise from the tea and think about the night before. The questions about Grace and that video. The rage I saw on her face.

“I think you may know more about Jolene’s history here than I do,” I say. “You’ve been working with Grace for two years. I’m sure she spoke about her childhood. If I recall, you were always quite interested in our lives back home.”

I take a beat, and then add—“Especially the things that made us vulnerable.”

Westin sits and blows on the hot water.

“You know how important the past is. How it shapes young minds.”

“Yes,” I say. “So what did you learn about Grace that I might not know—from Jolene and Artis? I think I have a rough draft.”

“Well,” he tells me before bringing the cup to his lips, then setting it back down to cool some more. “She and Jolene lived with her parents until she met her ex-husband. Eventually, she and Grace moved in with him. He was older. He had other kids who came around on weekends and such.”

I know all of this. “And then he left—for another woman. Moved to California.”

“Right,” Westin says. “Jolene had enough money from the settlement to get her own place and send Grace here. But I’m more interested in how it all came about—Grace, I mean.”

This place—I begin to smell it as the air settles. Something familiar. Just like Avery Hall. The odors living in the floorboards and the walls. I feel the hard wood of the chair against my back and my feet planted on the ground as my eyes move to the reading chair and table. The lamp. The corner where the bed used to be.

And I remember why I came here.

“Well,” I say, “I’m interested in something else. Something I learned when I was driving back from Pueblo. About Emile leaving to run a rink in California. And a story he was giving to a reporter—about The Palace. The training.”

This gets more of a reaction, though it appears to be genuine surprise.

“What kind of story?” he asks.

“My source said he was trying to ‘burn the place to the ground.’”

“Really?”

I nod. “Before, when we were talking about Emile and his conflicted relationship with Dawn—we never got to finish. But I think this new information answers that question.”

“It certainly gives you leverage for tomorrow’s meeting with the prosecutor. Ample suspects now, right?” he asks.

“Yes. And we’re both on that list,” I confess.

He dives into the hot tea, slurping it into his mouth. Swallowing as it burns his tongue.

“Ah,” he says when he’s done, and the tea is back on the table. “Because of the exposé—he was talking about the past, wasn’t he? When you were here?”

I feel this sink into my gut. The past that is now front and center in my mind. The smell seeping from the floor and walls. The ghost whispering in the room.

“What do you need?”

“Because you were in Aspen. At the conference.”

Yes—and I was gone the second day. Spooked by that text message, the emoji of the blade.

“You knew I was there before it even started,” I tell him. “Who else?”

Westin shrugs. “You were on the website—as the keynote speaker.”