The parking lot was silent.
Raphael was sitting on the motorcycle, his duffel bag strapped to the back, both helmets resting on the handlebars. He saw her arrive—the suitcase in one hand, the envelope in the other, the oversized cardigan buttoned crookedly. She wasn't smiling. Neither was he. Not this time.
“You've got everything?” he asked.
“I have a letter to drop off.”
“Go ahead. I'll wait.”
She went up to the second floor. The hallway was dark—the timer light was off, the carpet muffling her footsteps. She knew this hallway by heart. Three months of going up and down it, three months of coffee at Tatum's place, three months of lies wrapped in gift paper.
She stopped in front of Tatum and Jimmy's door. She looked at the envelope. “Tatum”—her round, slightly shaky handwriting. Inside, the truth. The whole truth. Vanessa. Williams. The mission. The messages. The reports. The pool incident. Plan B. Geneva.
She slid the envelope under the door.
She stayed there for one second. One single second, her palm flat against the wood, as if she could touch one last time the life she might have had if she'd been someone else. If she'd really been the girl in the cardigan, the sweet student, the neighbor who borrowed screwdrivers and stayed for coffee. If she'd been the friend Tatum deserved.
Then she pulled her hand away. And she went back downstairs.
Raphael held out the helmet without a word. She put it on. She climbed on behind him. The motorcycle started—the engine's roar in the silence of the night, gravel crunching beneath the wheels. The dead rosebushes streamed past in the rearview mirror. The pool, covered for the winter. The dark windows on the second floor.
8 Branly Street disappeared into the night.
Nora wrapped her arms around Raphael's waist. The November wind was freezing. The streets of Besançon streamed past—the streetlights, the closed storefronts, the empty sidewalks. Then the city faded away, and there was nothing but the road. The highway. The south.
She wasn't crying. She'd already cried—over the letter, over the whiskey, on the bathroom tile. There were no tears left. There was only the wind, the engine, and the terrible, liberating certainty that she'd done the only right thing in her life.
Tatum found the letter at seven in the morning.
She was barefoot in the kitchen, the coffee barely finished brewing, her hair tied back any which way. Jimmy was still asleep—he'd been sleeping badly ever since the Geneva photo, but when he slept, he slept deeply, like someone fleeing his dreams by sinking farther into sleep.
She saw the white envelope beneath the door. “Tatum”—Nora's round handwriting. She smiled as she picked it up. Nora sometimes left her little notes—a recipe, a drawing, a “have a good day” scribbled on a sticky note. It was their thing. Their friendship.
She opened the envelope. She unfolded the letter. She read.
The first lines—her name, the introduction. Normal. Then the second sentence. “But I'm also Vanessa's daughter. Williams's half-sister.”
Tatum stopped breathing.
She read it again. And again. Every word. Every line. The mission. The messages. The reports. The pool incident—“Williams came because my mother knew Tatum would be alone that night. And she knew because I'd told her.” Plan B. Geneva. And the apologies—“I'm sorry. I'm so sorry that words aren't enough.”
Tears stained the blue ink. The handwriting grew shakier toward the end. The signature—“Nora.” Just Nora. No last name. As if she no longer knew who she was.
Tatum didn't scream. She didn't cry. She sat down on the hallway floor, the letter on her lap, staring blankly ahead. The coffee was going cold in the kitchen. November sunlight came in through the window—pale, cold, indifferent.
Jimmy found her like that. Sitting on the floor, motionless, the letter in her hand.
“Tatum? What's going on?”
She handed him the letter without a word. He read it. His expression changed—not all at once, but in stages. Surprise. Anger. Pain. And something else, something deeper—understanding. Everything fell into place. Williams's visits. The perfect timing. The Geneva photo. Vanessa knew everything because someone was telling her everything.
“Nora,” he murmured.
“She left,” Tatum said. “Look—her apartment is empty. I checked through the window.”
“And Raphael?”
“Gone too. The motorcycle isn't there anymore.”
Jimmy read the letter again. The line about Geneva. The line about Diane. Plan B.
“We need to talk to Diane,” he said.