The Becoming of Noah Shaw (The Shaw Confessions Book 1)

THE SOUND OF MY MOBILE vibrating on the metal desk gives me a start. When I look up from the letter, the sky beyond the window is dark.

I stand to pick up my phone—hours have passed. Worse, there’s another text from Daniel. I turn the phone off without reading it and nudge the lid of the trunk shut with my foot, leaving the letters, the keys, everything on the floor.

I desperately want it to be a coincidence that a nineteenth-century letter, written by one Sarah Shaw to one (apparently deceased?) Simon mentions “the professor.” Surely there were many professors in Victorian or Georgian England or whenever the fuck they were written, the ink on the dates is smudged.

But it’s him. All roads lead to him.

Enough. I’ve had enough.

I cross the room to leave, but as soon as my palm touches the knob, it twists and—

Mara’s on the other side of it.

“Did you hear?”

“Hear . . . ?”

She seems a bit jittery. “Daniel said he texted you.”

“He did,” I say. “Asking for an update.”

Her eyebrows draw together for a moment before she shakes her head. “Check again.”

“I’ve turned it off,” I say, rather bitchily. “Just tell me.”

“Stella’s missing,” she says. “Apparently.”

“What do you mean, missing?”

“Daniel said Leo texted him, and he thinks we should go over there. And that we should bring Goose.” She rushes out, her footsteps echoing in my skull. I shake my head, rub my temples. My body feels heavy, as if I’ve been sleeping for days, and Mara’s voice sets my teeth on edge.

“Come downstairs!”Content property of NôvelDra/ma.Org.

I follow her slowly, not sure how to process this news, trying to will myself to stop ruminating and drag my mind back to the present. Jamie’s voice carries from the first floor.

“What do you think?” I hear him ask Mara, but her reply is muffled. Walking downstairs feels as though I’m wading through mud, as if it’s sucking at my trainers, making every step aggravatingly slow.

She and Jamie are standing together in the living room when I get there, while Goose is in the kitchen, slicing at something.

Not ready for Mara just yet, I turn to Goose instead. “What’s all this?”

He separates two translucent slices of meat. “Prosciutto.” He holds a paper-thin slice up in offer.

“Pass.” The smell of it turns my stomach for some reason. I twist to look at Jamie and Mara. “Have you heard anything new?” I ask him.

Jamie glances at Mara before answering me. “What?” I press.

“She’s not missing,” Mara cuts in. She’s standing on the balls of her feet, her body taut, brimming with energy.

“You seem quite confident,” I say.

“I am.”

Because she doesn’t trust Stella, for obvious reasons?

Or because she knows where she is?

I don’t even think I want to know, at this point.

“But we’re going anyway,” Mara says with a sigh. “Daniel’s on his way there.”

Daniel’s waiting alone, standing at the cross streets by the house. The neighbourhood balances on the knife-edge of gentrification, and he looks rather relieved to see the four of us, assembled as instructed. We walk to the house together, no one saying much of anything because, I imagine, none of us is quite sure what’s to be said. Daniel’s the one Leo texted, so he’s the one who knocks.

Rolly’s head pokes out from the gate below the stairs, as out of place as a hard-boiled egg. His eyes sweep over us before he pops back inside just as Leo opens the door.

“Thanks for coming,” he says. “We really appreciate it.”

It’s a damn sight harder to get a read on him today, as I’m not at all up to scratch.

“What’s with that guy?” Mara mutters.

“Rolly?” Leo asks, waving us inside. “It’s his house.”

“You rent it?” Jamie asks.

“Not . . . quite.”

Jamie and I exchange a look. “He doesn’t let you live here rent free . . . ?”

“Like I said when we met, you’re not the only one with a gift for persuasion,” he says to Jamie.

“I’d like to meet the others,” Jamie says.

“Help me find them before they kill themselves and maybe you will.”

Off to a rather rough start. “So what happened?” I ask him, forcing myself to scrape this afternoon from my mind.

Leo sits down on the leather chaise, and the rest of us crouch/drape/lean on whatever other surfaces are available. I take the ottoman opposite him.

Leo bends forward, elbows on knees, and rubs his forehead. “Stella didn’t come home the night before last.”

Bloody hell. “That’s all?” I ask, feeling annoyed and superior until I realise that the night Stella went missing is the night we last spoke.

“It’s not like her,” Leo says, eyebrows knitted, talking to himself. “She always comes home.”

Home. I take in the brownstone again, the shabby, abandoned look of it.

“Thanks for coming,” he’d said. “We really appreciate it.”

Home to whom? Stella’s missing, Felix is dead—who’s we?

Mara almost seems as though she knows what I’m thinking. “Was this house always like this?”

Leo shakes his head. “A lot of people come and go.” He pauses before saying, “Came and went, more accurately, I guess.” His expression darkens, and if I hadn’t been watching him so closely I’d have missed the way his eyes flit to Mara.

Fuck this guy. “Let’s skip the bullshit, shall we?” I say. “Why did you want us to come?”

He raises his chin, turns to Mara. “Because I think you know where she is.”

“You’re mistaken,” I say for her.

“Am I?” He’s still talking to her. She doesn’t respond. Doesn’t defend herself. So of course, I do.

“I don’t know what Stella might’ve told you—” I start.

“Everything,” Leo says. “She told me everything.” He looks at Jamie then. “Which makes me pretty wary. And she’s not here to read your minds to tell us whether you’re lying or not.”

“Why would we lie?” Mara asks, but her voice sounds strange.

“Why would Stella leave you and be willing to go back home to a stepfather who abused her?”

My conversation with her bobs up in my memory like a dead fish.

“Leo found me, told me I had a choice—he’d help me get home if I wanted to go, but also said I had a place with them if I ever wanted it.”

“So you went home with a perfect stranger?”

“Safer than staying with my so-called friends.”

“And your family?”

“Not everyone has a perfect home life.”

Fuck. Fuck.

But Mara’s voice is even, not the least bit thrown. “Because she disagreed with a decision I made.”

“To kill people.” The words slither out of Leo’s mouth.

Mara simply shrugs. All the jittery chattery energy she’d had in our flat is gone. She’s completely calm.

“Right,” Leo says derisively. “Forgive me if I’m kind of concerned that you might not have her best interests at heart.”

Mara’s face is stone smooth, expressionless. “I wouldn’t kill Stella, if that’s what you’re asking.”

I try and listen to Mara’s heartbeat—it seems loud, clear, steady. She’s not lying. I’m surprised—and disturbed—by my relief.

“We want to find out why this is happening as badly as you do,” I say.

“Really?” He rounds on me. “How’s that?”

Forget this afternoon. Forget the professor. Forget my father. “Because every time one of us commits suicide, I fucking feel it,” I say, aiming my mind on that. “Their suffering and regret and fear. You think that’s fun, do you?”

Leo pauses before asking, “Have you seen Felicity since—did you see her . . . ?”

I supply the word for him. “Die?” I say, and he nods. “No. Nor Stella. As I said, I can’t find anyone for you.”

“He’s not a precog,” Jamie cuts in, to my surprise. He’s been playing at casual, hanging back, leaning against one of the French doors, but now I notice that he’s hyperfocused on Leo, tense and attentive. “But you know one, don’t you?” Jamie asks him.

Leo’s face pinches a bit. “Yes and no. There was someone here who could do that, but they’re gone now.”

“Gone where?” I ask.

“Went looking for a cure, I think. Mentioned Europe.”

“Then let’s hear about the rest of your friends,” I say, leaning back and stretching my legs as far as I can without kicking him. “And figure out which one of them might actually be able to help.” If Leo wants to work, then let’s get the fuck to work.

“My friends can’t help us,” he says, those watery blue eyes on mine. “But your father can.”