For the first time, Celia Caldwell looked less like a wealthy woman managing inconvenience and more like a mother who had discovered the cost of looking away.
“Vanessa’s father called,” she said. “He wants this contained.”
“Of course he does.”
“I told him containing something is not the same as resolving it.”
That surprised me.
Celia gave a faint, humorless smile. “Do not mistake me for brave. I am late to decency, Emma. But I am trying not to miss it entirely.”
I did not know what to do with that.
Anger was easier when people remained exactly as cruel as you expected.
“I need to finish packing,” I said.
She nodded.
At the door, she paused.
“Be careful with Damon Cross.”
My hands stilled over the suitcase.
“People say that like warning me is a kindness.”
“It is not his power I mean,” Celia said. “It is his grief.”
I looked up.
She seemed to regret the words as soon as they left her mouth.
“What grief?”
Celia hesitated.
Then she said, “Ask him about Elise.”
Before I could respond, she was gone.
Downstairs, Damon stood near the front door speaking with Caleb Caldwell.
Caleb was tall, fair-haired, and usually so easygoing that people mistook avoidance for kindness. He turned when I entered with my suitcase.
His face flushed with embarrassment.
“Emma,” he said. “I am so sorry.”
I did not answer immediately.
For months, Caleb had been polite to me in the way some people are polite to furniture they do not want scratched. He had never insulted me. He had also never truly seen me.
“Did you know Vanessa was going to the cemetery?” I asked.
“No.” He looked stricken. “I swear.”
“But you knew she suspected me.”
He lowered his gaze. “Yes.”
“And you said nothing to me.”
“I thought ignoring it would make it fade.”
I almost laughed.
So many people trusted silence to perform miracles.
“It didn’t,” I said.
“No.”
He glanced at Damon, then back at me. “If you need me to make a statement, I will.”
That was unexpected.
Damon’s expression remained unreadable.
I studied Caleb for a moment.
“Why?”