Page 162 of Black Reign

“Dance. Drink. Pretend you have a normal personality.”

“I don’t dance with you.”

“Not what I meant.”

He starts inside, then looks back.

“One thing.”

“What?”

“Don’t look so wrecked.”

“I don’t.”

He gives me a pitying expression.

“You really do.”

I follow him in.

And for the next two hours, I pretend Vesper isn’t somewhere in California with my name in her mouth.

At two fourteen the following morning, the wedding estate finally goes quiet.

Haverhill and Hannah are gone.

Most guests have left.

Drew and Isa disappeared an hour ago.

Vale and Stella took one of the guest cottages.

Leo and Jade retired after Leo informed me that I’d created my own problem and deserved to suffer through it.

Useful.

My temporary security command center occupies the estate library.

The evidence from my table waits beneath controlled lighting.

One Scotch glass.

One red rose.

One handwritten note.

One strand of blonde hair.

My jacket hangs nearby.

I run the tests myself.

The lipstick is commercially available.

Nothing interesting.

The rose was purchased somewhere within a hundred-mile radius, which narrows the suspect pool to approximately everyone with access to a florist.