The room was as he remembered it – obscenely large, with ironwood-paneled walls, an enormous four-poster bed with mahogany curtains, flanked on either side by a nightstand. There was a wing-back chair by the window, a lantern burning low beside it, and Styke could see the ember tip of a lit cigarillo. A shadow moved within the wings of the chair, and a delicate hand reached out to turn up the lamp. “Hello, Ben.” Styke was immediately struck by how Lindet had lost the soft edges of her youth. She had grown gaunt over the years, and at thirty-three all the softness had been hammered out of her
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