LOGINAnastasia's POV The letter arrived at the hospital on Thursday morning.I was there when Margaret brought it in. I had been sitting with Eleanor since eight o'clock. She was out of bed, sitting in the chair by the window with a blanket over her knees, drinking tea with lemon in it because the nurses had finally agreed to make it with lemon. She looked better. Not better the way a person looks when they are getting over a cold. Better the way a person looks when the room around them has started to let them sit in it again.Margaret came in with a small stack of post. Two cards. A magazine. An envelope.The envelope had Eleanor's name on it in handwriting Eleanor recognised at once. I watched her see it. I watched her put her tea down."Thank you, Margaret.""Mrs Hart.""Go and have a cup of coffee, dear."Margaret went.Eleanor turned the envelope between her hands for a long moment."Alan.""How can you tell.""The way he writes a capital E." She lifted her eyes and smiled at me, sma
Leon's POV I met Alan Veil at a cafe on Carlisle Street at nine in the morning the next day.The cafe was his choice. It was the one he had been going to since he was seventeen, when my grandmother had given him the first job he had ever had, as an assistant to her secretary. The cafe had six tables and a long counter and a camera above the till that we both knew was working.He was already at a table at the back when I came in.He stood up to greet me. He put out his hand. He smiled the smile I had seen a hundred times across my grandmother's kitchen table. It was the smile he used on waiters.I did not shake his hand. I pulled out the chair across from his and I sat down.He sat down too. His smile did not move."Leon.""Alan.""Thank you for coming.""I came because you did not leave me a choice.""That is a strong word.""It is the correct word."He laughed, small and comfortable. He gestured at the waitress. She came over and took my order. I ordered a black coffee. I did not wa
Leon's POV She slept for ten hours.I know because I sat in the main room from midnight until ten in the morning and I did not sleep much myself, and I did not hear her door open once. At six o'clock I made coffee. At seven I called the hospital and spoke to Margaret and was told my grandmother was stable, that she had been told about the bakery first thing, and that she had asked three questions, the first of which was whether Anastasia was hurt and the second of which was whether anyone had told me and the third of which was whether I was going to behave sensibly in the next twenty-four hours.I had told Margaret to tell Eleanor the answer to all three questions was yes.At eight o'clock James rang."The printer finished the fifty copies.""Keep them.""At the office?""At the office. Do not bring them to the apartment. Do not do anything with them until I tell you.""Leon.""Yes.""The news is reporting the Sweet Seasons fire as suspicious. Not electrical. Suspicious. Someone talk
Anastasia's POV They told me it was electrical at a quarter past nine.The investigator from the fire service was a short man with glasses and a notebook. He had come out of my shop twice, each time with a different question, and the third time he came out he came all the way across the street to where I was sitting on the florist's wall. Leon was still beside me. He had not moved."Miss Crawley.""Williams," I said. "I use my mother's name now.""My apologies. Miss Williams. Could I ask you a few questions."Leon stood up. "I will give you some space.""No," I said. "Stay."He sat back down.The investigator looked between the two of us and then flipped his notebook open. "The fire originated in the kitchen. From what we can see tonight, it started at the main electrical panel on the back wall. There is a lot of damage to the panel itself. We will not know anything for certain until the forensics team comes in tomorrow morning. But my first look is electrical.""Electrical.""Faulty
Anastasia's POV I had not been asleep.I had been lying on my sofa with my shoes off and the small lamp on and the framed photograph of my mother propped against my chest, and I had been staring at the ceiling trying to decide what I was going to say to Leon tomorrow. The clock on the wall said quarter past seven. I had not eaten dinner. I had not thought about dinner. The thought of dinner felt like something that belonged to someone else.The smell came first.It was not loud. It was not the way smoke smells on television. It was the small, dry, particular smell of something that was burning two rooms away but had not yet decided to be a serious problem.I sat up.My brain did two things at once. It said that is from downstairs. It said that is not supposed to be happening.I crossed to my front door. I pressed my hand flat against it. The door was not warm. The handle was not warm. But when I opened it two inches, grey smoke moved slowly past the gap at ceiling height, and the sme
Leon's POV The second episode was shorter than the first.The doctor told me this twice in the corridor outside my grandmother's room, as if saying it a second time would make me hold onto it. Shorter. Less severe. She had been sitting up in bed looking at a magazine Margaret had brought her and she had gone very still and had put the magazine down and had said, in her ordinary voice, Margaret, dear, I think we are going to need the button.Margaret had pressed the button.The nurses had been in the room in under thirty seconds. By the time the doctor had come in, Eleanor had been pale and sweating and her breathing had been too fast but she had been conscious. They had got her stabilised inside ten minutes. The monitor had steadied. Her colour had come back. She had asked, when she could speak clearly again, whether anyone was going to call her grandson.Margaret had already called me by then.I stood in the corridor and I listened to the doctor explain and I nodded in the right pla
Leon's POV Other students stopped to watch. Some of them laughed too. Some looked uncomfortable but no one helped me up.Lucas leaned over the fountain edge and looked down at me. "Careful, Hart. You should watch where you are going."He dropped my books into the water beside me. The pages immedia
Leon's POVMy real estate attorney called at nine in the morning with the confirmation I had been waiting for."The purchase is complete," he said. "You now own the building at 2847 Riverside Avenue. All paperwork has been filed and the deed transfer is official."I stood at the window of my office
Leon's POVThe sound of Alan's car pulling away from the mansion was the most satisfying thing I had heard all day. I stood at the window of the sitting room watching the taillights disappear down the long driveway, my jaw still tight with anger."Leon, dear, come sit down," Grandma Eleanor said fr
Alan's POVThe restaurant was the kind of place that did not put prices on the menu. I had chosen it deliberately for that reason, and also because the corner table gave me a clear view of every entrance without putting my back to the room. Old habits.I spread the contents of my private investigat







