“And why would she kill his brother?”
“The man said his brother deserved it. But that it didn’t matter because it was family. He clearly wants Cain dead.”
“And why were you looking for this Eloise Cain person?”
Pine knew this question would be coming.
“She’s a person of interest in a case I’m working.”
McAllister looked put out by this. “That’s what I tell my bosses when I don’t want to loop them in yet. Is that really the best you can do under the circumstances?”
Pine looked at the man and held his gaze. “I just need you to trust me on this one. It’s complicated, and we just don’t have the time. Please.”
He sat back and sighed. “I checked up on you before I came down here, of course. Nothing but superlatives. So for now, I’ll let this pass. But at some point, Agent Pine, I’m going to have to hear the whole story.”
“I hope by then I’m able to give it. And I mean the whole story.”
She left him there and went back up to her room. She left three more messages for Blum, both voice mail and text. Something was clearly wrong.
Idiot. She hadn’t even checked to see if the Porsche SUV was in the parking lot.
She rushed down to the lobby and headed to the exit door as a Lyft car dropped off a passenger in front. Pine pushed through the revolving door and stepped outside.
Then she stopped dead and turned to look at the person who had just gone into the hotel through the revolving door.
She was standing just inside the lobby and was now staring at Pine.
The woman slowly walked back outside.
And for the first time in thirty years the Pine sisters were staring at each other with only a few feet between them.
Pine felt herself start to shake. The emotions welling up inside were unlike anything she had ever felt before. No, she thought, she was wrong. They were the same set of feelings that she had had when she’d learned that her twin sister was gone.
“M-Mercy?”
As Mercy looked at her, long-ago memories, plastered under years of Desiree Atkins–imposed hate, vitriol, and cruelty, came rushing back to the surface of her brain. It was like the dam had finally burst and all that was important was rushing back to her.
“Lee? Is that really you?”
Pine stared up at a face that was very much like and also unlike hers. Thirty years of life, much of it bad, had impressed itself indelibly on her twin. There was no getting around that. Long gone was the adorably pretty girl with the wonderfully long hair and penchant for frilly dresses and a mischievous smile that could make Pine laugh as if on cue. Yet in every other way, Pine knew that she had just found her sister.
Tears were now streaming down Pine’s face and she made no move to wipe them away. “Yes, my God, yes, it really is me.”
The women both stepped forward as though connected by the strongest of rope, and finally embraced for the first time in three decades.
CHAPTER
57
WHEN PINE STEPPED AWAY from her sister, she simply stood there staring at Mercy.
“I really can’t believe this is happening. After all these years.”
Mercy looked her twin over, her happy features slowly fading. “It’s been a long time. I doubt I’m like what you remember.”
Pine’s smile slowly faded, too, as something strange and illdefined seemed to spring up between the pair, like a border wall built of myriad and substantial components. But she told herself absolutely nothing was going to taint this moment. She was too happy, and she meant to show this to her sister. The smile came back even more forcefully. “The only thing that matters to me is that you’re alive and that you’re here, right now. Oh my God, this is the day I’ve been waiting for, for so long.”