Chapter 2

I stared at Graham for a long time.

The blood had stopped spreading. It soaked into the cracks between the linoleum tiles like it belonged there. His mouth was open. One arm bent under him at an angle that would've hurt if he could still feel anything.

I was shaking so hard my teeth knocked together. But my mind was cold. Clear. Already running through options.

Call 911. Tell them what happened. Self-defense. Open and shut.

Except it wasn't. I was sixteen with no parents, no money, no lawyer. Graham had friends. Drinking buddies who'd swear he was a stand-up guy. My mother was gone—no witness to three years of abuse. The bruises on my ribs had faded weeks ago.

I'd be the troubled stepdaughter who killed a man on Christmas Eve. Foster care. Juvie. Maybe worse.

So I didn't call.

Instead, I went down to the basement and got my work kit.

Rafferty leaned forward. "Work kit?"

"Restoration tools," I said. "Chisels. Mallets. A bone saw for cutting plaster molds. Solvent. Everything I needed was already down there."

His face changed. The entertained curiosity curdling into something queasier.

"You know what bone powder looks like?" I asked him. "White. Almost chalky. It's been used in porcelain for centuries—they call it bone china. Mix it with calcium sulfate and it becomes indistinguishable from plaster."

I stopped myself. Too clinical. I was telling this like a lecture, not a confession.

The truth was, my hands wouldn't stop shaking the entire time. I threw up twice. I cried so hard I couldn't see what I was doing. But I kept going, because stopping meant thinking, and thinking meant falling apart.

It took me two days.

I won't go into details. Not to protect you, Rafferty. Because some things get more real when you say them out loud.

What I will tell you is this: by December 26th, Graham was gone. Every trace of him. And the next week, when I went back to the church workshop, I mixed what was left of him into a batch of restoration plaster.

"You're not serious," Rafferty said.

"There was an angel statue in the church garden. Damaged in a storm—missing a wing and half its face. I'd been working on it for months." I paused. "I finished the job."

Rafferty put his whiskey down. Didn't pick it up again.

"That angel is still there," I said. "People pray in front of it. Light candles. Leave flowers for their dead. And the whole time, they're kneeling before the bones of a man who deserved to rot."

"I think," Rafferty said carefully, "you're making this up."

"Maybe."

"No one could do that alone. You were sixteen. The physical effort, the smell—the neighbors would've noticed."

"I didn't do it alone."

He went still.

"There was a nun at the church. Sister Agatha. She was blind—cataracts, basically no vision left. But she could hear a mouse cross the room, and her sense of smell was unreal."

I told him how she found me. Christmas night, past midnight. I was in the church basement trying to clean the tools, and she came down the stairs in her nightgown, feeling her way along the wall.

She stopped at the bottom step. Sniffed the air.

"Child," she said. "What are you burning?"

My blood went cold. I opened my mouth to lie—a candle, incense, anything—but what came out was the truth.

"I'm getting rid of a monster."

She didn't scream. Didn't run. She just stood there, those clouded eyes pointed at me but seeing nothing, and said: "The one who hurt you?"

"Yes."

"Then do it properly. Don't leave traces."

Rafferty's knuckles were white around the armrest. "A nun helped you cover up a murder."

"Sister Agatha had her reasons. Graham stole from the church donation box twice. Shoved her down the stairs once when she caught him. She hated him." I shrugged. "And she was blind. Even if she wanted to report me, what would she say? She heard sounds. Smelled something. No jury would convict on that."

"She helped me carry the angel back to the garden. Told the parish it was my volunteer project—a Christmas gift to the congregation." I smiled. "Everyone loved it. The priest blessed it in January."

Rafferty didn't smile back.

He was watching me the way you'd watch a dog you weren't sure was friendly. Every muscle braced. Calculating distance.

"Why are you telling me this?" he asked.

"You wanted a secret. You got one."

"This isn't a secret. This is a confession."

"Same thing," I said. "Just depends on who's listening."

He stood up. Walked to the window. His reflection stared back at him from the black glass—pale, tight-jawed. Behind him, I could see myself on the sofa, legs curled up, calm as a cat.

He pulled out the satellite phone from the desk drawer.