2. June
JUNE
The plane touched down hard.
June jolted awake as the wheels hit the runway, her neck stiff from the angle she’d been sleeping at against the window.
Outside, Miami was bright and flat under a full summer sun.
June pressed her fingers against the bridge of her nose and breathed through the familiar lurch of landing that she’d never managed with anything resembling grace.
She’d always hated landings. Takeoffs too. That left approximately the middle portion of any given flight as the only part she could tolerate, which made flying a particularly efficient form of misery.
The cabin filled with the sound of seatbelts unclicking. June sat still for a moment longer than everyone else, waiting for the adrenaline to settle, and thought about nothing useful.
She’d been doing that since midnight.
The Gainesville airport at midnight in the middle of summer was not a place that offered much comfort.
June had arrived with one bag, no reservation, and the wearing patience of someone who’d made a decision in the dark and was living with its consequences.
Every flight out had been full. It was peak summer season in Florida, and standby seats were not exactly abundant.
She’d waited for hours in a row of plastic chairs near gate seven, drinking bad coffee from a vending machine, watching the departure board with the focused attention of someone with nowhere better to direct her energy.
June hadn’t minded the wait as much as she might have expected. It had given her something to do that wasn’t thinking. As the people piled off the plane, she watched them go before standing and joining the line at the back to walk off.
June collected her bag from the overhead compartment and walked out into the Miami heat.
The taxi rank outside arrivals was busy.
June joined the line, pulled out her cellphone, and called ahead to her finest Chinese restaurant near her house.
June wasn’t hungry. She knew she wasn’t hungry.
But June hadn’t eaten since the previous evening, and the headache sitting behind her eyes was at least partly the result of that, so she ordered anyway.
“Mrs. Lee?” June answered. “It’s June Carter here.”
“Miss June!” The warmth in Mrs. Lee’s voice was genuine and immediate. “You’re back in Miami? We haven’t heard from you in so long!”
“I just flew back,” June replied. “I’m still at the airport and am exhausted. Could you have something ready in about forty minutes? Whatever’s fresh today.”
“Of course, of course. We’ll pack it up nice for you, Miss June. Don’t you worry,” Mrs. Lee answered cheerfully. “Is there anything else I can get for you?”
“Do you have some fresh milk?” June asked, knowing Mrs. Lee also owned the grocery store next to the Chinese take-out.”
June thanked her and got into the next available cab.
She settled into the back seat and looked out the window as the driver pulled into the airport traffic.
The drive from the airport into her neighborhood was long enough in the midday heat to give her more thinking time than she wanted.
June had taken this route more times than she could count over the years, coming and going from court appearances in other cities, from conferences, from the trips she took twice a year to see colleagues in New York.
The city looked exactly as it always did.
The familiar sprawl of it, the particular flatness of Miami’s skyline against the wide blue sky, the way the light hit the buildings differently here than it did anywhere else she’d lived.
It didn’t feel like coming home. She felt like a stranger, and tears stung the back of her eyes as memories of Sandpiper Shores flashed through her mind. June turned that observation over once and then put it away.
The cab stopped outside the Chinese. June went inside and collected her order.
The containers were warm through the paper bags, and the smell of it was genuinely good, even if her appetite remained somewhere in the middle distance.
Mrs. Lee, who was behind the counter, pressed a half-gallon of milk into her hands alongside the bags and waved away June’s attempt to pay for it.
“For your coffee. You are my number one customer,” Mrs. Lee insisted.
“Thank you,” June smiled at the woman, who was a familiar face in this big city that suddenly felt cold and empty to her.
“You look tired, Miss June. You’ve been traveling too much.” Mrs. Lee noticed. “You need to rest now you’re home.”
“I’ll try to get some,” June replied with a warm smile, heartened by the woman’s kindness. “Take care, Mrs. Lee.”
“You too, see you soon,” Mrs. Lee said, waving her goodbye.
She got back into the cab. The aroma of the Chinese food made her stomach do a little grumble as the cab took off and drove to her neighborhood.
Her house looked exactly as she’d left it. She blew out a breath and stepped out of the cab as the driver lifted her bag from the trunk.
June paid the driver, collected her bags and the takeout, and stood on the front path for a moment, looking at the house that suddenly looked way too big.
Her garden service had kept the front neat.
The windows were clean. And June knew the house cleaning service still came once a week.
She walked to the front door and stared at it.
It looked completely like her house and felt, standing in front of it now with her bag and warm food in her hands, as if it belonged to someone she used to be.
June pushed that thought firmly aside, unlocked the door, and went inside.
The air inside was cool and still from the air conditioning, which her neighbor had switched on for her earlier when she’d phoned him to let him know she was on her way home.
He kept an eye on her house when she and Carmen were away, ensuring that the cleaning and garden services were doing what they were paid to do.
June set everything down in the hallway and stood in the quiet for a moment.
The house held the neutral stillness of a space that had been waiting without urgency.
Everything was in its place. Nothing had changed.
Suddenly, the image of her daughter’s and Holt’s faces from the previous night flashed through her mind.
June drew in a breath and closed her eyes.
She was not going to think about Willa’s face.
She was not going to think about Holt turning and walking out the door without a word.
June picked up her bags and carried them through to the main bedroom.
She unpacked what needed unpacking. She hung what needed hanging and put items in the washing hamper.
June moved through the familiar routine of returning home with the methodical focus of someone who understood that ordinary tasks were useful precisely because they required just enough attention to crowd out the things she wasn’t ready to sit with yet.
Willa and Holt would call when they were ready.
She wasn’t going to push either of them.
They’d both been hit with something enormous, in the worst possible setting, at the worst possible moment, and the fact that June hadn’t chosen the moment didn’t change what the moment had cost them.
They deserved whatever time they needed.
She took out some clean clothes and went to the bathroom.
The shower helped. June stood under the water for longer than was strictly necessary, because it was the first moment since she’d walked out of Willa’s house in the middle of the night that asked absolutely nothing of her, and she intended to make full use of it.
She got out, dried off, and rubbed her hair with the towel until it was damp, not wet. June shoved her cellphone into her pocket and walked to the kitchen.
The Chinese food sat on the counter in its neat containers.
June looked at it. She tried to locate her appetite and found it still somewhere far off, uninterested in cooperating.
She put the kettle on instead, made coffee with a generous splash of the milk Mrs. Lee had pressed into her hands, and stood at the kitchen window looking out at the backyard.
The garden service had done a good job with the roses.
June drank her coffee slowly and looked at the roses and did not think about Sandpiper Shores. Looking at her wristwatch, she found it was close to three now. June sighed. She was tired, but knew she wasn’t tired enough to sleep, so she decided to check her emails.
She was at her desk in the study twenty minutes later, with her laptop open, working through the emails that had accumulated while she’d been away.
There were more than she’d expected, which was useful because it kept her mind busy.
Client queries sat alongside court date confirmations, a letter from the firm’s accountant that needed a considered response, two messages from opposing counsel on separate matters, and a note from her assistant about a deposition that had been rescheduled.
June worked through them in order, steadily and without rushing.
Professional correspondence had always given her a kind of clarity.
It was specific, bounded, and had rules she understood completely.
She drafted responses, confirmed dates, and flagged two items that needed follow-up calls in the morning.
June was halfway through a reply to opposing counsel on a contract dispute, a genuinely tedious piece of work that she was finding uncommonly comforting in its tediousness, when the doorbell rang.
June frowned at the screen. She wasn’t expecting anyone. Her neighbor knew she’d been away and would have called ahead. She saved the draft, pushed back from the desk, and walked through the house to the front door.
Not thinking it would be anyone dangerous, she pulled it open, and when she saw who it was, June froze.
She stood in her own doorway in the Miami afternoon and felt the blood leave her face in a way that was entirely outside her control.
“June.” The person held both hands up, palms out, in a deliberate gesture to communicate that they meant no threat. They looked exhausted and unusually disheveled. “Please. Can we come in?”
June’s eyes moved to the taller person towering behind them. They, too, didn’t look like their usual polished selves.
“No.” June’s voice came out steadier than she felt. She reached into her pocket for her cellphone. Her hands were not entirely steady as she pulled it out and looked at the screen. The battery icon showed a flat red line.
June looked toward her neighbor’s house. His car was in the driveway. She could scream, and hopefully one of her neighbors would hear her.
“Please, June,” the second unexpected guest urged quietly. “We just need to talk to you.”
“I have nothing to say to either of you,” June told them, keeping her voice level despite everything her body was doing. “Other than the fact that there is a —”
“Look, June, there is no delicate way to put this, but we have reason to believe that your life is in danger.” The two of them said the end part in unison.
June gaped at them; her heart was racing.
“What did you say?” June asked stupidly, shaking her head, trying to figure out if this was just a nightmare.
“June, I don’t have time to go through this again.
We have reason to believe that you have evidence,” the one person repeated in a low and measured voice.
Their eyes moved briefly to the quiet street behind her before coming back to June’s face.
“Evidence about what really happened ten years ago. Evidence that someone else very much does not want found.” They held June’s gaze without wavering.
“Please. We’re not asking you to trust us. We’re just asking you to listen.”
June looked from one to the other, taking in the exhaustion reflected on their faces, with their hands still raised.
“Honestly, why on earth would I believe a single word either of you says?” June kept her voice steady.
“Victoria, there is a warrant out for your arrest.” The anger that had been building for weeks lay beneath the words, controlled but present.
“And as for you, Alfred…” Her eyes narrowed.
“I would never have expected this from you.” She shook her head, outraged now more than scared.
“Alfred, I genuinely thought better of you.”
“I understand why you feel the way you do,” Victoria replied quietly.
She didn’t defend herself. She didn’t deflect.
Her shoulders seemed to sag in defeat. “I know exactly what the evidence looks like. I know what it was designed to look like.” She lowered her hands slowly.
“But June.” Her voice was stripped of everything except the weight of what she was saying.
“I was framed, and you may be the only one who can clear Alfred and me.”