a pit forming in her stomach as she went on to Facebook.
Signing in as Isobel, she accessed her sister’s page with the password they had created together: Isolania101.
Her eyes watered as she stared at the banner’s image. It was a close-up of her sister, that smile so bright and happy, that telltale spiky red hair something that Helania felt as though she hadn’t seen in a decade.
She had taken the picture. Isobel had been sitting over there on the sofa, imminently on her way out, of course, her coat in her lap. The shirt she had on was one Helania remembered putting in those cardboard boxes: Blue-and-white-checked with a short little collar that stood up off the neck. Casual but classy—and that had been Isobel.
Even though they’d never had a lot of money, she had always looked put together because she was an expert shopper. During the darker months of the fall and the winter, she had always gone to the human mall and scoured sales before closing time. They had joked that with twenty dollars and the right stack of rebates and coupons, she could put together something worthy of Fifth Avenue down in NYC.
Taking a deep breath, Helania scrolled down the page. Everything hurt to look at, especially the part in the bio where Isobel had chosen “in a relationship.”
It made sense that Boone was suspicious of the male that had been in Isobel’s life, but Helania knew her sister. The kind of happiness Isobel had shown was legitimate.
Wasn’t it?
Going further down, Helania read through the things that people had put on the wall after Isobel had been killed. Seeing the dates end so abruptly eight months ago was hard, the car-crash nature of the death—one night there, the next gone—represented baldly. And there were a lot of people who missed her.
So many tribute posts, although it was hard to determine who the folks really were. As usual, members of the species fudged their actual identities on social media, the extra precaution taken as a security measure both from a Lessening Society point of view, but also from a human one—
Helania stopped. Leaned closer to the screen.
One of the posts had only five words: I love you, Issie. Forever. No images were included, but Helania wasn’t focused on that. She was looking at the avatar, the little circle with part of a face in it.
She double-clicked on the name and was taken to another page. “It’s you,” she whispered.
Sitting back in her chair, she stared at the partially obscured photograph of a female’s jawline and cheekbone and lips. It wasn’t the complete profile, but a telltale mole beneath the ear was what secured the identification: This was the female who had knocked on Helania’s door that horrible night. The one who had helped prepare Isobel’s body for the Fade Ceremony. The one who had had the other shovel out in those woods.
Some people you just did not forget.
Rubbing her face, she felt her body break out in a cold sweat. But then she forced herself to gather her racing thoughts.
The name was an odd one: Rocky B. Winkle.
Helania thought about things for a while. And then she went into direct messaging and constructed what she hoped did not sound like a crazy, desperate request to the female.
As she typed, she couldn’t avoid the shift that was occurring in her mind.
That boyfriend. Who was he?
And where was he?
As Boone was shown into the dining room of Wrath’s Audience House by Rhage and Tohr, it was impossible not to remember coming to see the King just nights before to talk about that gathering his sire had been invited to.
Stopping on the Oriental rug under the great chandelier, Boone realized he had been terrified his father would be killed because of the intel he himself was sharing with the King. And his fear had come true, just not for the reason he’d assumed . . . not because his father had been a traitor. Although perhaps, if the evening had continued on uninterrupted, treason would have come to pass. Altamere had certainly had no love for the King.
“How you doing, Boone?”
Shaking himself to attention, he focused on Wrath. The great male was sitting in one of the armchairs by the fireplace, that huge body eased back to accommodate all the blond dog in his lap. George offered Boone a wag, but there would be no in-person greeting. Not tonight.