10
GWEN
Ibolted to the bathroom.
Only once I’d dropped to my knees and hurled all that coffee and pepperoni roll into the toilet did I begin to process those texts.
For half a second, I thought it could have been Simone. She understood what I’d done, how dangerous it was. It wasn’t out of the realm of imagination that she could’ve gotten a burner to message me about it.
That half second was nice. Then reality set in.
If it were Simone on a burner, she would’ve called. She would’ve called on her regular phone, told me she’d gotten a burner, then instructedmeto get one. Otherwise, this one-sided anonymity would be useless.
It wasn’t Simone.
Someone had to have seen me.
No, they hadn’t just seen. They’d found the body. And the personal effects I had been too stupid to remove.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
What the hell had I been thinking? Why hadn’t I checked his pockets?
At that thought, my stomach tightened, and I retched again.
I sat up and wiped my mouth, breaths coming in ragged. They couldn’t have just found the body. There had been nothing to connect me to it. Sure, maybe a bit of my DNA. No matter how careful I’d been to conceal it, a hair follicle or two could have slipped out, but it wasn’t like I’d pinned a picture of myself to his chest.
Either they’d seen me wrapping him in the tarp and loading him into his car, or they’d seen me dumping him into the river. But I would’ve known if anyone had followed me to the bridge. That road had been so quiet, no one could’ve been close enough behind to identify me without me seeing them.
Not unless they’d been in the woods around the bridge. That was possible. Not only possible, but probable. Another thing I should’ve thought about this morning. Hunting season had just begun.
I shut my eyes and placed a hand on my forehead, running it through my hair to the back of my neck. My hands were like icepacks against my clammy skin.
Son of a bitch.
Holy shit, how had I screwed up this badly?
Not unless it was someone from the ranch. How would they have found the body and known to connect me? Unless I had been tailed. But I would’ve seen headlights behind me, right?
Dazed, lightheaded, and almost certain I wasn’t going to puke again, I dropped onto my ass. The cool linoleum caressed my spine through my sweat dampened T-shirt. Resting my head against the blue-tiled wall behind me, panting, I grasped my chest. My heart threatened to pound its way out of my body.
Breathe, Gwen. Just breathe.
They hadn’t turned me in. Did they even have proof I’d done it? I’d been bundled up like an infant on their first venture intothe winter world. Even if they had taken photos of me, there was no way toproveit was me. That, I was sure of.
But why had they sent me a message?
I wouldn’t know, couldn’t know, until I asked.
With shaking fingers, I typed back.
Gwen;Who is this?
Ding.
Instant reply.
Unknown; A friend.
