Epilogue

Three weeks later she finished the tour in a town called Granton.

Small bookshop. Twelve people. The three questions in the slightly different order that the interviewer from the local paper asked them. She answered them the way she always answered them — accurately, without edges, without performing anything she didn't mean.

After the signing she stood outside the bookshop on the pavement in the particular quiet of a Wednesday evening in a small town and looked at the sky and breathed.

Her phone was full of things. Messages from Detective Marsh about the case — Jacob Cain was in a facility, properly contained, the legal process doing what it did. Messages from Detective Cole about the same. Messages from Claire about the tour numbers which were apparently significant and which she was going to have to have a conversation about eventually. Messages from Greta at Page and Spine saying the water damage to the roof of the building next door had been sorted and she was doing a new window display.

A message from the hospital — Daphne Forzone, discharged Tuesday. Recovering at home. Doing well.

A message from Hannah. A photograph. The signing table at Page and Spine with the copy of the book that Indigo had written in. The message said: she found it. she said it was the best thing she'd read all year. thought you should know.

She looked at the photograph for a long moment.

She put the phone in her pocket.

She looked at the sky.

She thought about Millhaven. About the Forzone kitchen and the dinner they'd had on Tuesday night — Daphne home from the hospital and sitting at the head of the table and saying exactly what Indigo had predicted she'd say about everyone not staying in the house. Tom making something with pasta. Hannah beside Indigo with the inventory-taking eyes doing their work on everything.

Family dinner. Actual family dinner.

She thought about how strange that was. How unexpected.

She thought about coming back. About what coming back meant and what it cost and what you found when you got there.

She took her phone out again.

She called Hannah.

Hannah picked up on the second ring.

"How was the last one," she said.

"Fine," Indigo said.

"That's your fine that means fine."

"It is actually," Indigo said. "It was fine."

A pause. She could hear the Forzone house in the background — the particular sounds of it, the radio, someone moving around in the kitchen.

"What are you going to do now," Hannah said. "Now that the tour's done."

Indigo looked at the sky. At the November evening coming in around the town of Granton. At the ordinary world doing what it did.

She thought about the question.

She thought about New York. About the apartment that was still technically hers for another couple of weeks. About Max in Brooklyn and the calls they still had every Thursday. About the office that she'd never really gone back to and the manager who had sent a very kind email that she had never responded to.

She thought about Millhaven. About Clement Street and the Forzone house and Tom's standing invitation that had been extended at every subsequent dinner with the simple flat certainty of a man who had decided.

She thought about what a life looked like now. On the other side of the tour, on the other side of Millhaven, on the other side of everything.

She thought about the last line of the book.

I don't know what comes next. But I'm the one who gets to find out.

"I don't know yet," she said. "I'm going to figure it out."

Hannah was quiet for a moment.

"Come for dinner," she said. "When you're back. Mum's been saying."

"Okay," Indigo said. "I will."

"I'll tell her."

"Tell her I said hi."

"She knows you said hi. She always knows."

Indigo smiled. The particular smile of someone who had been given something they hadn't expected and was still figuring out what to do with it.

"Good night Hannah," she said.

"Good night," Hannah said. "Come back."

"I will," Indigo said.

She hung up.

She stood on the pavement outside the bookshop in Granton at the end of the tour in the November evening and put her phone in her pocket and looked at the sky and breathed.

In. Out.

She thought about Jacob Cain in a facility forty minutes from Millhaven. She thought about the legal process and the timeline and what Detective Marsh had said about it which was thorough and which meant long.

She thought about what thorough and long meant.

She thought about he always comes back.

She looked at the sky.

Then she picked up her bag.

She started walking toward wherever she was going next.

She was the one who got to find out.