Kanan Dume Road curled off the Pacific Coast Highway into the Santa Monica Mountains and ran all the way to the 101.
They rumbled up past Mulholland and turned onto a dirt road. It twisted with unlikely confidence into a serpentine canyon. The canyon light faded into a deeper shade of green as the walls tightened.
They turned into a driveway sliced with deep ruts. She aimed the tires between them and dropped into a lower gear.
Dust swirled up behind them like a furious ghost.
The house was as she left it. The doormat deliberately askew, the screen door not quite closed and the outline of a large triangle scratched into the dirt driveway unbroken.
Nobody had been by.
