Lydia, who’d only returned home to grab her notes for the lunchtime student council meeting, was standing by my stretcher, looking lost. So I grabbed her wrist and used my remaining oxygen supply to whisper, “It was Sage. Tell the cops she killed Kennedy and tried to kill me.”
I didn’t get the chance to see her reaction before the medics pushed me inside the ambulance. I wasn’t sure if she believed me and would follow through, or if she rolled her eyes and drove back to the farm.
Adam rode with me in the ambulance, holding my hand the whole way. I later learned that when we arrived at Central Springs Hospital, he insisted on making sure Dr. Russo wasn’t at the hospital that day. I was given oxygen, treated for hypothermia, and checked for myriad infections and ailments that can occur after near-drowning. Once they got my breathing under control, I was closely monitored in the hospital for three days.
Dad stayed there with me, and Henry came to see me every day, both when I was too sick for visitors and afterward. Even Lydia came to visit, right around the time I started staying awake for longer periods. She let me know that she’d gone to the police but wasn’t certain they’d taken her seriously.
I kept staring at the door to my hospital room, wishing for it to open, praying to see a familiar broody face.
Two of my earliest visitors were Detectives Chase and Wilson. I answered their questions, told them how I’d figured out Sage Wheeler killed Kennedy right before she pushed me into the creek. As I was relaying the events, I had the nauseating realization that my theory wasn’t rock solid. I had no evidence, only Sage’s slip of the tongue and my belief that she tried to kill me to keep me from telling. I recounted how Adam saved me and tried my best to convince the detectives that Kennedy—not Adam—had killed Mariana Sanchez.
The entire hospital stay, and even the first couple of nights after I returned home, my sleep was restless. I kept worrying there was a possibility Sage could get away with all of it. What if she told the detectives I’d fallen? That I was delusional? Would they take her word over mine and Adam’s? I hoped they might find the rock that had killed Kennedy, so they could test the DNA against Sage’s. But the detectives weren’t saying anything.
And then last night, Dad got the call from the lead investigator. On the day Kennedy was murdered, the detectives had discovered an acrylic nail at the crime scene in the woods—painted a brick orange shade, perfect for fall—which explained why the detectives had checked my hands during that first interview. It turns out they hadn’t suspected the Abbotts right from the start. Only they couldn’t ignore the camera footage or the eyewitnesses, so they eventually focused on the brothers, figuring the nail could have come from any of the dozens of students who took shortcuts through the woods and wasn’t forensic evidence.
But after I’d told them about Sage, they tested the DNA on the acrylic nail and compared it to hers. Last night, they got the results back. It was a match.
Ever since Dad relayed this information, I’ve been picturing Sage’s manicured fingers wrapped around the rock. The orange nail bending and ripping with the force of the rock coming down on Kennedy’s skull. The nail popping off, layers of Sage’s real nail along with it.
The mystery of Bram’s missing hoodie was solved too. NeilChen came forward with it. Apparently, Neil spotted it on the benches during the fire alarm and, unhappy after the way Bram embarrassed him in the cafeteria, snatched it. He’d planned to deface it and hang it on Bram’s locker, but when Bram was thrust into the spotlight for the murder, Neil thought it was best to lay low and hide the sweatshirt in his own closet.
The little twerp’s guilt must’ve finally caught up with him as Bram sat in jail for the murder, since Bram couldn’t possibly be the hooded figure caught on camera with Kennedy.
Now, Henry stops the truck and gets down to open the gate. When he climbs back into the cab, he squints at me. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” I say. “Just nervous, you know…”
Henry faces forward and starts the truck. “About Bram.”
“Aren’t you?” I shift my weight, then fiddle with my seat belt.
“Bram can handle himself,” Henry says almost flippantly, like his brother isn’t locked away in a cell. “And with Sage’s arrest last night, it’s only a matter of time.”
That is true. The Abbotts’ lawyer is working around the clock to get Bram out. But the cops have Sage now, so what are they waiting for? What if she already managed to worm her way out of this?
After parking in the circular driveway, Henry helps me down.
“I’m not an invalid, you know,” I say when he keeps my arm on the walk up the stone steps.
“Oh, I know. I’m doing this for my own safety, since your dad will murder me if I don’t bring you home in one piece.”
“Fair enough. So where exactly are we headed?”
“The theater,” he says, and I get a sinking sensation in my chest.
“We’re going to watch a movie?” I ask, barely able to keep the disappointment out of my voice. I thought maybe we’d spend the day in the gardens, talking and breathing in the fresh air that I’ve missed for the past week.
“Not exactly,” he says, motioning me along.
When we reach the foyer, Adam is there, wearing workout clothes, a gym bag in hand. “Hey,” he says, a brighter smile on his face than I’ve seen in a long time. “You’re up.”
“I am.” I can see he’s getting shy, probably afraid I’ll cry over the fact that he saved my life, like I did when I finally woke up in the hospital. But I won’t scare him off this time. “How was physical therapy?”
“Really good, actually.”
Henry feigns shock, throwing a hand over his mouth and exchanging a wide-eyed look with me. “Did he just use the wordgood?”
I punch him in the arm and turn back to Adam. “Making progress, then?”
