Page 52 (2/2)

“It’s going to be okay,” she said

I did not reply I just stared back, recognizing the seriousness in her voice and the conviction on her face, and feeling grateful that there was someone there to look after me, even if I would never have admitted it Grateful there was someone with me who cared about me Someone who had such faith in my innocence that the words themselves didn’t need to be spoken out loud

So to protect me

After what felt like an age, she nodded to herself, and began driving We followed the car out of the town and left the parked police vans, the staring officers, and the bloodstained playground behind us Andin my head as we reached the main road

It’s going to be okay

Twenty-five years have passed, but I still think about that a lot It’s what all good parents tell their children And yet what does it really ae to fortune It’s a promise you have to make, and one you must do your best to believe in, because what else is there?

It’s going to be okay

Yes, I think about that a lot

How every good parent says it, and how often they’re wrong

PART ONE

ONE

NOW

On the day it began, Detective A been woken in the early hours by the fa to the thin threads of sleep for as long as possible, and it was approaching noon by the ti killed right then, but nobody knew it yet

In the middle of the afternoon, Amanda started out on the short drive to visit her father When she arrived at Rosewood Gardens, there were a few other cars parked in the lot, but she saw nobody A profound silence settled over the world as she walked up the winding path between the flower beds that led to the gated entrance, and then took the turns she had co gravestones that had become familiar markers

Was it strange to think of the dead as friends?

Perhaps, but a part of her did She visited the cemetery at least once a week, whichhere than the handful of living friends she had She ticked therave that was alell attended by fresh flowers There, the one with the old, eainst the stone And then the plot covered with stuffed toys: a child’s grave, that one, A parents who couldn’t quite allow their child to leave them yet

And then, around a final corner, her father’s grave

She stopped and pushed her hands into the pockets of her coat The plot was , the way she re pleasingly implacable in the simplicity of it—the way there was just his name and a pair of dates that bookmarked his life No fuss, exactly the way he would have wanted Her father had been loving and caring at home, but his life had been spent on the force, where he had done his duty and left his work in the office at the end of the day It had felt right to reflect that aspect of his character in her choice of headstone She had found so that did the job required of it—and did it well—but kept emotion separate

No bloody flowers on rave, Amanda

When I’one

One of the many orders she had followed

But, God, it still felt odd and jarring to her that he was no longer in the world As a child, she had been scared of the dark, and it had always been her father who caht shift, she reh a safety net had been taken away and if she fell there would be nothing there to catch her That was the way life seemed these days too There was a constant sensation in the back of her , but that it wouldn’t last Then she would remember her father was dead, and the stark realization would come If she called out now, there was nobody to find her in the night