“Oh shit,” Jasmine hisses. “Abort.”
“What is it?” I whisper in alarm.
“It’s the families. Of his victims.”
Oh shitis right. I shouldn’t be here.
Ireallyshouldn’t be here.
But it’s too late for us to flee. The crowd hushes as a man in a police uniform approaches the podium. If we tried to make our escape now, it would be too noticeable.
“Thank y’all for being here,” the officer begins, his voice steady but grim. “As y’all know, it has been nearly a decade since Gabriel Thorn was arrested for his unspeakable crimes, but the town of Starling, and the families of his victims, have not given up hope of finding answers. Today they have an important announcement to make.”
My stomach drops. This can’t be happening. I glance at Jasmine, whose face has paled.
“I’d like to introduce Benjamin White,” the officer says. “His mother, Anabel, was Gabriel Thorn’s fifth victim.”
A guy in his mid-twenties walks up to the podium. I immediately recognize him from the articles and news clips about the case. He’s been interviewed a lot. If I’m remembering correctly, after Benjamin graduated from college he made a ton of money from a tech start-up that he sold. Now the Whites are worth hundreds of millions.
Benjamin steps up to the microphone, his shoulders tense. He stares out at the crowd for a moment before he finally speaks.
“I want to start off by thanking everyone for being here this afternoon. It’s been twelve years since my mom was taken from us, and not a day goes by where I don’t think about her. About what happened to her. About how we still don’t know where she is.”
His voice shakes, and I can tell he’s struggling to hold it together. The crowd is silent, hanging on every word.
“My family,” he continues, “and the other families who have suffered—we’ve been waiting. Waiting for answers, waiting for some kind of closure. But it hasn’t come. The Starling police and the FBI did a great job putting the culprit behind bars where he belongs, but the investigation into the location of the remains has stalled…”
He trails off, shaking his head. I feel sick.
“A death sentence is not enough for us,” he says, and the small group standing behind him nods in agreement.
Their faces are hard, expressionless. Especially the young woman at the end. She has deep brown skin and thick black hair, and she keeps wringing her hands together, her lips set in a tight line.
“We need to know where our mothers are.” Benjamin pauses, his eyes sweeping over the crowd. He looks so tired. “And that’s why,” he says, his voice gaining strength, “we’re offering a new reward for anyone who can give us the information we need to find the remains of our loved ones. The current reward of one hundred thousand dollars was already one of the largest in the country—today we are upping that amount to one million dollars.”
The crowd murmurs, and I feel dizzy. When my hands start to shake, I shove them into my pockets to hide it.
Beside me, Jasmine gasps before covering her mouth with her palm.
Benjamin leans in, lowering his voice, but it’s somehow more intense, like every word carries the weight of all the years he’s spent without his mother. “To whoever is out there…if you know something, anything…please. Please come forward. Help us end this. They deserve to be found. My mom, all of them—they deserve peace.Wedeserve peace.”
At that, he steps back from the podium, his face a mask of barely concealed pain. The officer returns to the microphone, but I can’t hear him anymore. Everything feels too close, too loud, like my heart is pounding in my ears.
Jasmine grabs my hand, but it isn’t until the three of us are far enough away that she turns to us, buzzing with excitement.
“One million dollars! Did you hear that?”
“It’s a lot of dough.” Connor shrugs.
“Yes, Con, it’s a lot of dough,” she echoes, staring at him pointedly.
“What?” he says.
“They’re offering amillionbucks for information about the bodies.” She gives him another are-you-stupid look. “We need to find the bodies.”
That gets her a loud bark of laughter from her twin. Me, I’m too stunned to laugh. She wants to find thebodies? As in, the remains of the six women my father slaughtered?
Hard pass.
