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She no longer trusted her instincts or him. This felt likefishing, maybe for the police to clear his name by throwing her under a bus the size of Texas, or for a more selfish motive.
She spun her phone around in her hand as she mentally searched for the right thing to type. The bar stool at the kitchen counter squeaked under her as she shifted around. Seeing Ryan’s name pop up on her phone used to make her smile. The day could be shit, but he’d ask some innocuous question about how she was and a light would flick on inside her.
Seeing his name now made her wary. Careful. Nothing sounded genuine, and that tiny light had extinguished.
Lila: Is this for the book?
Ryan: I care about u
Lila: I don’t know.
Ryan: It’s possible he knew Karen.
That’s not what she meant. After months of being on the same wavelength, they were talking past each other.
Lila: Gotta go
Ryan: Call me. CID still doesn’t believe someone planted the phone at my house.
Lila: Did you ever meet him?
Ryan: NO
Even this little bit of conversation was about him. She’d heard the university wanted to suspend him, but he’d brought in a lawyer and fought it. He was taking the rest of the semester off from teaching but would be there, on campus, strutting around as he finished his book. She guessed he’d also be willing to answer questions about her life. His fungible boundaries would likely allow for that.
After Ryan’s texts, Cassie came over with a cake and words of encouragement. Still nothing from Jared, but Brent stopped by. She debated whether to let him in.
The first thing he did was hand her a stack of mail. “I thought you would want it before the press looked through it.”
She didn’t care anymore. The press dug through her life. She’d seen photos of her father plastered on the front page of the news. She’d dropped her birth name to keep people from connecting her to him, but now, thanks to Aaron, everyone would know about her past. Every last detail would get dredged up again.
She walked back to the kitchen, listening to Brent’s footsteps as he followed her. “What are you doing here?”
“I owe you an apology.”
Guilt and shame didn’t matter to her unless he was confessing to letting Aaron get away with his hideous behavior. She walked around, battered and half out of it from lack of sleep. Her mind refused to turn off as it churned through anxiety that had her up and staring out the window, trying to puzzle through what the cabin and the stabbing meant.
She dropped the stack on the counter. “It’s fine, Brent.”
“I didn’t know about the girls at school. I mean, I knew their names when Ginny asked. That’s how it works as principal. I know students, but, with most, I didn’t have a personal relationship. They weren’t close enough for me to know about their private lives, and no one ever contacted me to point out a problem with Aaron.” He shifted his weight as he talked to her. Failed to give her eye contact.
She tried not to read anything into his nervousness, but that didn’t mean she intended to go easy on him. “You should have known.”
He lifted his head and looked at her. “How? None of them complained.”
“Okay.” But people were yelling now. She knew from the news that parents wanted him fired. An emergency school board meeting had been scheduled to hear complaints and arguments. There was talk of a suspension and an outside investigation. All things she secretly craved, but she couldn’t take comfort in a minute of it. Not when everything else—every other piece of Aaron’s disappearance and death—was a question mark.
“Do you really think Aaron had something to do with Karen Blue?” he asked.
“He had enough of a connection to have been killed in close proximity to her.” Ginny still hadn’t filled in those blanks or talked about forensic evidence that connected the two of them. The only thing that was clear was that Karen likely hadn’t killed Aaron, dumped him in the back of the SUV, and then gone back into the cabin to die.
Tobias told her that meant the spotlight remained on her. Ginny, the press, and most people in town thought she’d killed Aaron. The Karen Blue piece was still a mystery.
He cleared his throat. “I know I accused you—”
She refused to make it easy on him. “Yes?”
“People are saying...” He swallowed hard. “Some think if you did kill him, that was okay.”
