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Damn.
He had it bad and he knew it.
He pulled the huge archival box of witness statements closer to him. Better to focus on fixing the past. He liked the thought that he’d figure out what happened and fix it, enabling both Hunter and him to move on. Fixing things had long been something that mattered to him.
When he opened the box he was surprised to see how many statements were in there. He pulled a stack out and glanced into the box to see Gabi’s name on one.
He hadn’t known she’d made a statement. The DA hadn’t mentioned her at all.
Maybe she hadn’t mentioned him. So they wouldn’t have known she and he had been together the night Stacia was killed.
He pulled her statement out and read it.
Well, this made no sense. Not only had she talked about him, she’d also said he spent the night at her place and she’d woken up to find him gone. Which wasn’t what had happened.
He couldn’t think of a single reason why she would lie unless she was covering for him.
He realized right then how badly it must have hurt her when he rejected her at the jailhouse. She’d come there ready to support him and help him out of a tight spot. And he’d gone into full protective mode, not wanting anything to happen to her. Not wanting her to be colored with the same brush that he and Hunter were.
He’d known that things were going to get ugly. Even his attorney—his own brother, Ben—had thought he was guilty and talked to him about cutting a plea deal. Gabi might be one of only two people to believe he hadn’t been involved in Stacia’s killing. Hunter being the other one.
Wow.
This changed things.
It made him see her in a different light. He’d always known the attraction between them was powerful, but this went deeper. This was a kind of attachment he hadn’t let himself believe existed.
She had to have thought she was in love with him.
Kingsley divided the statements into two piles and was amazed at how big the file of statements he hadn’t known about was. He skimmed all the ones he’d already read a dozen times. The ones that the DA had presented in order to have Hunter and him arrested. No wonder Ben had said to leave this alone. As he flipped through the documents he saw statements from people he’d thought were his friends. They’d told how he was always with another girl—not entirely untrue—and that he seemed to date each one for less than a month.
Gabi fit that profile, he realized. But he’d been planning to stay with her. Not that any of that mattered now.
He started reading through the statements that were new to him, and Hunter arrived when he was a third of the way into that stack.
“Did you know that Chuck gave a statement that night?” Kingsley asked once Hunter was up to speed on what he’d found.
“No. What did he say?”
“That we never left the common room after Stacia left. And we were in a corner drinking and laughing.”
“Not sure that helps us, but at least he saw us there,” Hunter said. Hunter pulled out his tablet and stylus and started making notes on it. “Have you sorted them at all?”
“Yes. These are the ones who all corroborate the DA’s version of events, the ones we read at the archives. These are the ones that are different versions.”
“Anything helpful like Chuck’s?”
“Some. Some of them just mention that we were both at the parties where other girls had been given the date-rape drug. And Cassidy Freeman said you told her that you liked having sex with women who were passed out.”
“Bitch.”
“That’s not helpful,” Kingsley said. “Did you really say that?”
Hunter gave him a hard glare. “No. She was always after me but you know I was into Stacia in those days. And I used to be a one-woman man.”
Kingsley reached over and squeezed his friend’s shoulder. So much had changed. These statements about himself and Hunter were about men he no longer recognized. They weren’t the life of the party anymore... And he couldn’t remember the last time he and Hunter had laughed together unless it was over something silly Conner did.
“Let’s make a list of everyone who placed us at the frat house and those who thought we did it. Then we can contact them and see what they remember,” Hunter said.
“What makes you think they will talk to us now?” Kingsley asked. He wasn’t sure that they were going to get answers from people who thought they did it.
“I don’t know. I thought... I had hoped this would be easier. That we’d find something that pointed the finger at someone else.”
