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“He found me,” I said. There were two empty booths in a dark corner over at the back of the bar. I nodded in their direction. “Can we talk?”
Julie said she’d get some food. I went and sat in one of the booths. She emerged from the kitchen a few minutes later with a couple of baskets of popcorn chicken and two Cokes.
“Do you mind? I haven’t eaten since lunch, and I’m working tonight.” She offered me the second basket, and I shook my head.
“I’m okay.”
Julie nodded. She picked up a piece of chicken and popped it in her mouth.
“Your mom around?”
“Not tonight. She was tired. She went home.”
“Thank you for your help,” I said. “For searching today, and for last night.” I was trying to move slowly. I didn’t want to scare her off. But Julie was smart and perceptive. She could tell that I had something to say, and she was waiting for me to start. I took a breath.
“Julie, I think Nina is dead, and I think Simon killed her. Not just because of what happened with the dog today.”
Julie’s elbows were on the table. She folded her arms across her chest and compressed her lips.
“I think Simon killed Nina,” I said. “I think he buried her body somewhere on the property and then cleaned up after himself. Maybe his parents know about it, maybe they don’t, but either way they’re going to protect him. If we don’t find Nina, I think it’s going to be very hard to prove what happened. And I don’t think I can live with that.”
“You shouldn’t give up hope,” she said, but her eyes filled with tears. I didn’t say anything. A minute passed. The bar was noisy with music and laughter, but all of it felt unreal, like it was a movie soundtrack that had been overlayed on the wrong scene.
“Can you tell me more about the dog? What happened, exactly?”
Julie wiped her eyes and nose. “Trudy picked up a scent and followed it down a deer track, and then she alerted. Sally Ann says she sits when she smells human remains.”
“Do you think she could have gotten confused? Someone might have shot a deer, or some other creature might have died there.”
“Isaac asked that question after you left, and Sally Ann says no. Cadaver dogs are trained only to react to human remains. And... well, the ground in the area had been dug up and then sort of covered over, Sally Ann says.”
“But they didn’t find Nina.”
“No.”
I thought about it. Neither of us was eating. The chicken was cooling in the basket.
“You said I should still hope, and I get why you’d say that. But I keep thinking about all the families who lost daughters or sons and who waited for years, waited their whole lives, and never learned the truth. I can’t live like that, Julie.”
“Yeah.” She wiped her nose again.
“Matthew Wright told me that you had a theory about Nina. He said that you asked Nina straight out if Simon hurt her and she denied it. What was he talking about?”
I think Julie had known that the question was coming, maybe as soon as she saw me enter the bar. She turned her glass slowly on the table. Her hand was tanned, and her fingernails were short. She had blue eyes, very different from Nina’s, which were dark brown. Nina had been the better student in school, but Julie had been a better athlete. In many ways they hadn’t been the most likely of friends.
“I never saw a couple as in love as they were,” Julie said. “Simon always acted like he couldn’t believe he’d gotten so lucky. Because Nina’s so beautiful.” Julie’s eyes met mine briefly, before sliding away. “And she’s nice too. Kind. Every guy in school was crazy about her. Whereas Simon wasn’t that popular.”
That surprised me. “I thought he had a lot of friends. He always seemed to have a crowd around him.”
Julie frowned. “People didn’t hate him, but he wasn’t top of the heap either. He made jokes that didn’t quite land. He was good at sports, good enough to make ski squad, but only just. He was never a star. He’s really smart, but he was never going to be valedictorian or anything because we had Brit and Anne in our year and they were super smart too and they worked way harder.” She paused. “Some people liked Simon, or looked up to him, but those kids were the ones who were, you know, easily impressed. Or they were sort of insecure themselves. A little on the outside. The cooler kids could take him or leave him. I think all that was a problem for Simon. It’s like he felt he should be number one, and he was pissed when he wasn’t.” She paused. “But then when he and Nina started going out, suddenly everyone noticed him. Together, they had a kind of glow.”
“You said they were in love.”
“Sure.”
“Nina too?”
“Oh, yeah. She was crazy about him. I mean, really. He made all these grand gestures, like he sent her a dozen roses at school when he asked her to prom. That kind of thing. Which wasn’t really her style, and she was embarrassed, but... I think it made her feel good too. He made her feel secure.”
