Page 47 of See How They Hide

She knew her grandmother’s story and her mother’s story. The truth was somewhere between them.

Her grandmother told her after the death of her first husband, when she was struggling to provide for her daughter, she met William Riley, a kind and gentle man who was also disillusioned with society. His family owned property in the mountains, and he invited her to join him and his brother’s family to move there and live off the land. They created Havenwood and designed it to be a utopia. Every year more people joined them and the community grew and prospered.

They almost lost the land because of back taxes, and that’s when her grandmother and William decided to grow marijuana. Robert, a new arrival to Havenwood along with his dying mother who wanted to live her last months in peace and quiet, was a math whiz. He set up their finances so they would never be at risk of losing the hundreds of acres deep in the Rocky Mountains. They had created their utopia, a community of people who worked together, played together, worshipped together. They weren’t religious in the traditional sense, but they were spiritual. There were no rules, other than to be kind and contribute to the good of all.

Her grandmother rarely talked about the Day of Mourning, only that it changed the hearts of everyone. Riley only remembered snippets of the fateful day that resulted in the murder of one of her fathers and her unborn sibling.

Her mother had a different story.

Havenwood was perfect, a utopia for those who wanted a safe haven. But not everyone wanted to stay. Some people didn’t like the rules. Some people didn’t like the isolation. Some people didn’t want to work. People left. And two of those people came back with the purpose of destroying Havenwood. They murdered Glen and Bobby’s mom. Riley remembered her daddy Glen, though only vaguely. He was always happy and spent more time with her than her daddy Robert and her daddy Anton, who both had lots of jobs to do.

Eventually, Calliope convinced her mother that they couldn’t bring in outsiders. That new people would destroy the fabric of their home. She would point to Todd and Sheila.

What she didn’t tell Athena, and what no one knew for a long, long time, was that Calliope wasn’t letting anyone leave. Oh, they made a big show of a goodbye party, but Riley learned much later that Calliope had those people killed.

There was a song Riley never heard until she escaped Havenwood. An Eagles song, about a place you could check in anytime but you could never leave. It haunted her because that was her life, and she hadn’t realized how dark, how evil her mother was until that fateful day when she was eleven and she learned the truth.

The day the proverbial doors shut on Havenwood for good when Thalia and Robert left, and Calliope convinced everyone that Thalia had killed Robert and run away to avoid punishment.

It took Riley several minutes to compose herself. When she left the restroom, Andrew was standing in the small waiting area, frowning. “I can’t reach Donovan. I called to talk, just to hear his voice, make sure everything is okay, and it goes to voice mail.”

“When you talked to him earlier, did you tell him about Jesse?”

“No—I didn’t want to do it over text. He said he’d call when he was free, but he hasn’t called, and he’s not answering his phone. I texted him that I was worried and to call me, but he hasn’t called and now he’s not even texting me back.” Andrew sounded panicked.

“Do you have anyone to check on him?”

“His work. Yeah. I should have thought of that.”

He ran a hand through his hair as he stepped outside. She followed. He hit a number and waited. “Maddie, it’s Andrew. Is Donovan there? He’s not answering his phone and it’s kind of an emergency.”

As Andrew spoke, Riley looked around the parking lot, getting the odd feeling that she was being watched.

A woman got out of the back seat of a black SUV with multiple antennas. A sheriff’s vehicle pulled into the lot.

Riley recognized the woman. It was the cop from Oregon. Short, blonde, focused. She looked straight at Riley.

How did she find me?

“Andrew,” Riley said, her voice a squeak.

“What do you mean he left this morning? Where is he?” Andrew was saying into the phone.

“Andrew, we have to go.”

Riley tried to pretend she didn’t see the woman, or the big black guy in a suit who got out of the passenger seat and stood behind her.

“Andrew!”

He turned to her. “Donovan left work this morning—no one knows where he is.”

She started to pull him toward his truck. Why she thought she could get away from the police she didn’t know, but panic drove her. Years of believing that the police were cruel. Years of brainwashing and indoctrination and Riley would rather die than talk to them.

She knew everything Calliope had told her were lies and half-truths, but the fear and panic she felt was real.

“What?” Andrew asked, going with her while looking and sounding confused. “Riley, what—”

“Riley Pierce,” the woman called. “Stop.”

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