Chapter 5

Dante tried the handle of my guest-room door before dawn, then asked why I had locked it. I blamed a migraine from the anniversary party, and he told me to rest in a voice that made the locked door feel less protective.

I left through the service entrance and rode to a cemetery outside the city. Arthur Vale waited in its stone office, a silver cane beside his chair and a newspaper clipping about my mother's death beneath his hand.

"The police called it a hit-and-run," I said, staring at the photograph I had not seen in years. Arthur replied…