Chapter 35
After navigating the tail end of rush-hour traffic, it’s pitch black by the time Naomi makes it to the graveyard.
She decided to rent a car instead of taking the train and then a taxi, thinking she wanted to be alone while she did this, but as she stares out at the cemetery, shrouded in darkness on an eerie October night, she wishes she had the comfort of a cab driver nearby.
Well, you’re here now, she thinks, forcing herself out of the car.
A heavy mist greets Naomi as she steps outside, dim rays from the blood-orange moon bellowing down on her. Her stomach roils with dread, still disbelieving that a Harlow Hayes Easter egg led her here.
This was not how she intended to visit her sister’s grave for the first time.
She should’ve been walking in the sunshine, carrying a beautiful bouquet of wildflowers, not clinging to a can of pepper spray as crows squawk in the distance.
She was supposed to come here after she uncovered the truth about Harlow.
She never imagined that her search would lead her here before then.
That her sister would somehow be a part of this mess.
Whether her sister was a victim of Colton, real Harlow, or fake Harlow, she still doesn’t know.
But if she continues analyzing Harlow’s music and albums, will she find even more victims? Like a sick, depraved scavenger hunt?
This is fucking crazy, she thinks, continuing forward.
She stops, whirling around at the sound of rustling in the trees. Warning bells blare in her head, and the hairs on her arms stand on high alert, telling her to leave. But she can’t. She won’t. She needs to see this through. She needs to get justice for Faye.
She picks up her pace, dead leaves swirling around her as she rushes forward, before her feet cement to the ground, as if she too is made of stone.
Except, unlike the graves and statues, she has a heart that can’t stop beating.
It’s racing a mile a minute as the memories of burying her sister here flash across her mind.
Her kneeling at the closed wooden casket.
Her whispering goodbye. Her following the procession to the burial site.
The lowering of the casket six feet under. And throwing a rose over the grave.
A chill shoots through her as the lyrics to one of Harlow’s imposter’s songs come to mind. Until you’re laid under a rose-covered grave.
She shakes her head, trying to shift the memories that cut her like a thousand knives.
Fucking psychopath, Naomi thinks, growing ever more desperate to ruin this person.
But this isn’t the time to fantasize about her revenge.
That comes next. Now, it’s time to find out once and for all who did this to her sister.
Naomi’s breath is shallow and shaky as she scans the cemetery with her flashlight, creeping past tombstones until she finds her sister’s grave, marked by a statue of an angel, perched gracefully atop a square stone.
It’s smaller than she remembers, grass now covering the hole where her casket was lowered. “A ‘Garden of Bones,’” Naomi whispers under her breath, recalling the lyrics to the bridge.
A fortress is only as strong as what it’s made of. An angel frozen in time. Her haven a kingdom of delicate glass. Shattered and rebuilt into stone made of lime.
Naomi pauses, wondering then if the song is referencing her sister’s grave. The last hidden clue led her here, so nothing is out of the realm of possibility now.
She knows she should feel afraid, alone in a cemetery in the dead of night.
But now she feels invincible, like she’s on the brink of a discovery that will change everything.
She moves her flashlight around the site, looking for something, anything that will lead to another clue.
And then she spots it. A plaque, laid to the right of the gravestone.
Even though Naomi hasn’t visited the site since her sister’s funeral, she knows this wasn’t there before. She picked the gravestone herself. And this wasn’t part of it.
She steps closer, crouching down as she shines her light over it. She squints, trying to make out the writing. Is it Latin? Or another anagram? But something tells her it’s neither of those.
She reaches into her purse for her compact eyeshadow and holds up the mirror, her breath catching in her throat as her mind processes what the inverted text says.
“Here lies Harlow Hayes.”