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27

Havenwood

Calliope paced the length of the Office, waiting for the call. Back and forth, back and forth. She was so tired of waiting, waiting, waiting for news.

The Office was the only building in Havenwood that consistently had cell phone reception. Their computers were here, charging phones that they took when they left the sanctuary, along with their business files. Few people were allowed inside.

Her mother, Athena, had had an open-door policy. Need to call your mother? Of course! Want to read the news? Go right ahead. Want to wish your sister a happy birthday? Not a problem. It had become Grand Central until Calliope put an end to it.

Havenwood was not a part of the world; they were separate, self-sufficient, complete. Robert had set up the financial structure before he betrayed her, but she was smart. She rebuilt Havenwood. Stronger. Better. More secure.

The phone rang and she practically jumped on it. She forced herself to wait until after the second ring before she answered.

“Hello,” she said calmly, though her heart was pounding.

“It’s Anton.”

“You’re late. You said you would take care of Donovan and Andrew this morning.”

“Donovan is dead. Andrew never showed.”

Rage began to boil. She squeezed her fist around the phone. Control. She needed to maintain control.

“Why?” she said in a calm, authoritative voice. She was the leader of Havenwood, she reminded herself.

“We waited for several hours, suspecting he couldn’t leave work immediately but would at lunch. But then Evan called. Andrew showed up at the hacker’s house.”

She breathed easier. “Evan dealt with him.”

“He wasn’t alone.”

“So?” Calliope was growing increasingly annoyed. Anton wasn’t usually so cryptic.

“Riley was with him.”

“Who?”

“Riley.”

“You are mistaken.” She couldn’t have misheard him. Therefore, he was wrong.

“Riley didn’t drown,” Anton said. “She tricked us. I was there, I saw her go under, she never came up. Garrett was there. I mourned her, we all did. But Evan took pictures. I just sent them to you.”

Her daughter was dead. She’d been dead for three and a half years. She didn’t leave Havenwood, she was dead . Riley didn’t leave her. Riley would never leave her on purpose.

“Calliope,” Anton said quietly. “Look at the email.”

She sat at the computer and launched her email. It was slow, but eventually a picture began to load.

It was a parking lot. There were a lot of people in the photo, but her eyes immediately went to the young woman with long dark auburn hair.

A second picture loaded. It was the same woman, zoomed in.

Riley.

“My baby,” she whispered.

“She was with Andrew at the hacker’s house. She’s now with the police.”

“They arrested her?”

“We don’t believe so. Evan followed them to a hotel. There are a lot of federal agents around.”

“It’s really her?” Calliope whispered.

“Yes, it’s Riley. Evan and I are positive.”

“How did this happen?” Calliope didn’t want to believe that her daughter, the most important person in the world to her, had...pretended to die? Why would she have let her own mother think she was gone? She’d cried . For days. Weeks.

“You want her home?”

“Of course I want her home!”

“It might be difficult,” Anton said. “But I will bring her to you.”

She trusted him. Anton had been with her longer than any of her partners and never let her down. “What about Andrew? Is he with the police, too?”

“He tried to kill himself. He’s in the hospital on suicide watch. They have a cop on him, but they won’t be on him forever.”

“Andrew knows far more that can damage us than Riley. He must die. If you can’t get to Riley—I don’t want to lose you, Anton. You or Evan or anyone else. So if she stays hiding behind the police, I may have another plan. I need to think about it, weigh our options. Call in twelve hours with a status report.”

“Yes, Calliope, love.”

“Thank you,” she said. “You are my rock, Anton.”

She hung up. Sitting on the couch, she leaned over to pet Banjo. She’d forgotten how much she’d missed having a pet until Anton brought the dog to her last month. He was a beautiful animal. Petting his thick, lush fur calmed her like nothing else, and the last thing she wanted to do was lose her temper. Her plan was still rough around the edges, but she would figure it out.

She always did.

“Banjo, come,” she said and left the Office. The dog walked at her side, loyal to her now. Reminded her how easy loyalties shifted, changed. Feed him, care for him, and he was hers.

People needed a bit more work.

She walked to the jail where Carl was on duty and asked, “Has my prisoner talked?”

“Not a word.”

“Take a break. Be back in ten.”

He left and Calliope unlocked the main door, then unlocked the door to the pit, and walked down the sturdy, narrow stairs to the cold basement where her traitorous sister—her half sister—was chained to the wall.

“Come,” she commanded Banjo when he hesitated at the top.

Thalia looked up at her with pain in her eyes, which pleased Calliope. But she still wasn’t broken.

Then Thalia saw the dog and a cry escaped.

“Your hacker deserved to die, but I am not cruel. I would never kill an innocent animal.” She glared at her half sister.

“You betrayed me, Thalia. You betrayed everyone in Havenwood.”

Thalia stared at her, eyes hollow but defiant. “Fuck. You.”

“Everyone who betrayed Havenwood, who betrayed me , will be dead . The people you took could ruin everything we have built here! Don’t you remember those who tried to destroy us? Killed Glen and my baby? Don’t you remember?”

Thalia didn’t say anything. She did remember, she just didn’t want to admit that Calliope was right. That Havenwood had to be protected by any means necessary.

She glanced around the room. The waste bucket in the corner, the tray of uneaten food, the photos of the dead Calliope had printed and pinned high up on the wall, where Thalia couldn’t even reach them if she was unchained.

The dog loped over to Thalia and licked her. Tears ran down Thalia’s face. She should be crying. She was living her last days.

“You never understood what needed to be done to save Havenwood.”

Calliope pulled a folding chair from the corner, opened it, sat down, her long dress flowing around her. Her bright red hair falling in shiny curls. She knew she was a vision. The most beautiful woman in Havenwood. But more than being beautiful, she was smart. She had seen the cracks, watched people leave, watched her mother let people leave. She called the dog back to her. He hesitated.

“Banjo, come,” she said again, firmly.

He came, sat next to her, and she gave him a treat. Rewards worked. With dogs and people.

She pet him as she watched Thalia cry.

Without people, Havenwood was nothing. Calliope had found a way to make people stay. Most wanted to, they just needed a bit of finesse to steer them in the right direction. Rewards. Enticements. Those who couldn’t be persuaded? Punishment.

They couldn’t be allowed to leave and risk the sanctuary that was their home.

“I love Havenwood,” Calliope explained to her sister as her fingers scratched Banjo gently behind the ears. She felt the hate and anger rolling off Thalia, and somehow, that pleased her more than her sister’s tears. “I love Havenwood more than you. If it weren’t for me, we would have ceased to exist long ago. If it weren’t for me, everyone here would be wandering the world in search of what they lost, depressed, wishing they hadn’t been so petty and selfish. I showed them a better way.”

She had saved Havenwood. And what had her sister done? Betrayed her and their mother’s legacy.

“People were stealing from us. Our own people, and Mother never did anything about it. They used us, used what we had, what we freely gave, and then stabbed us in the back. And still Mother turned the other cheek. What a naive woman. She had the vision but was too weak to maintain it.”

“You killed her,” Thalia said.

“Her fault, not mine. I wish it could have been different, Thalia,” Calliope said. She rose, towering over her chained sister. “But everything you did, stealing Havenwood’s money, taking Robert from me, kidnapping people in the dead of night, all of that is nothing compared to you turning my own daughter against me.”

Thalia sucked in her breath.

“I don’t know—”

Calliope backhanded her. “ You know. Anton sent me a picture. It’s Riley, my baby, and you turned her against me. That’s why she faked her d-d-death.” Thinking about it made Calliope’s heart race. “I’m getting her back. She’s mine .”

“Riley has seen the darkness of your soul,” Thalia whispered, her voice raw. “She knows who you are and what you’ve done. She will kill you before she submits to you.”

“You thought you could deceive me, make a fool out of me. Everyone here believes you killed Robert. They believed me eleven years ago when you left with him.” She stepped closer, her face close to her betrayer. “You may not have slit his throat, but his death is on you, dear sister. You have been tried and convicted. The sentence is death.”

Calliope walked out of the jail, Banjo right behind her.

The final pieces of Calliope’s plan began to form.

She smiled. It would work.

It had to work.