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“Ofcourseshe’s going to text you that!” Patrick roars. “That’s what I was just trying to explain! She hates me! She wants to break us up!”
I frown. So Kitiswith him, then. I don’t know where to direct my whirling thoughts, what to concentrate on first. Then Patrick adds, “And I do have an alibi for that night, okay?”
“Oh yeah?” Paul calls, the gun still raised. “And what would that be?”
Patrick shakes his head as if to sayI can’t believe I’ve gotten myself into this.A long few seconds elapse. There’s no sound out tonight, not even any bugs.
“I was at this after-hours club,” Patrick finally mutters. “I stopped at home first, and then I went there.”
“What kind of after-hours club?” I demand.
His shoulders heave. “It’s just this... place. I’m part of this online community that gets together every once in a while. I knew they were getting together that night, and I made an excuse to my wife, and...”
He lowers his head. A sour feeling rushes through me. I once did an investigative report on certain after-hours clubs; a woman who frequented one was murdered. By the shame on Patrick’s face, I’m pretty sure he wasn’t going to one to play poker and drink. He was going to have orgies, maybe some sex play. Bondage, extreme violence, rape fantasies, and worse. The interviews nauseated me, plunging me back into memories I didn’t want to consider. I’d almost had to give up the story.
But this is someone Kit wassleeping with? I glance at her, registering the shock on her face. It’s clear she didn’t know, either. She takes a small step back, and her lips pucker into disgust. I can see it all over her face:Whoareyou?But she doesn’t say it out loud.
“I didn’t touch Strasser,” Patrick goes on. “If you need a witness to corroborate that, I have someone you can call.”
His eyes lower. I exchange a glance with Paul. I presume he means the woman he was with that night. I check Kit’s expression about all of this once more. She looks shattered.
“I just didn’t want to admit where I really was,” Patrick grumbles.“I have a wife. Kids. A business reputation.” He glances uneasily at Paul. “Can you stop pointing that gun at me?”
Paul goes to lower the rifle, but I catch his arm, telling him to wait. “You were still hurting my sister,” I growl. “Care to explainwhy?”
I watch as Patrick’s eyes widen and he holds his arms in front of his chest like a shield. But then Kit sighs. “Forget it, Willa,” Kit mumbles. “Let’s just get out of here.”
Patrick makes a small, beleaguered noise, but Kit doesn’t look at him. I nod for Paul to stand down. Patrick hurries into the SUV I’d mistaken for Ollie’s; within seconds, he’s out of the lot. Darkness swarms over us. Paul and I had parked our vehicles down the road, and without any lights, I can barely see a few inches in front of my face.
But I can still sense Kit’s presence beside me. She’s oddly still, like she’s thinking—or trying not to cry. I try to process what I’ve just witnessed—and how Kit must be taking it. I have so many questions. How long has Patrick meant something to her? A while? Before Greg? And who steals into the woods at two in the morning?
But I can’t ask any of that, because Kit’s shaking so badly. I touch her shoulder. “Are you okay?”
“No,” Kit says. Her voice is thick, maybe on the verge of collapse. Had shelovedthis guy? I feel hurt that she felt she couldn’t tell me about him. I feel heartbroken, too, that he’s turned out to be such a dick.
I reach over and hug her hard. Kit’s body is stiff, but I can feel her heart beating quickly through her thin chest. “Thank you for coming,” she whispers. “I don’t know how you figured it out, but... thank you. That guy... he was a big mistake, I guess.” She starts to walk into the woods. “He threw my phone in here. Can you help me look for it?”
I hesitate a moment—does her phonereallymatter right now? But it also seems easier just to look for it, so I switch on my phone’sflashlight and shine it over the forest floor. “You know, we followed you because we thought you’d gotten into someone else’s car. The man I’m pretty suredidkill Greg,” I say softly.
Kit’s eyes widen. “W-Who?”
Somewhere in the distance, a large truck rumbles down the road; because of the stillness, it seems so much louder than usual. “Ollie Apatrea.”
Kit is bent over, peering into the fallen leaves, but when I say this, she rises and stands very still. It takes Kit a minute to wrap her head around it. “The cop?”
I nod. My heart is beating fast. There’s so much that I haven’t told her yet. So much I wasn’t evensureof, though when I floated my theory to Paul just now—going through the dates of Laura’s tryst with Greg, outlining the exact conception date of her baby, telling him about Ollie’s hostility on the phone when I tried to call his wife—he said my hunch seemed right. But once again, this will be another blow for Kit. Maybe theworstblow. It means her husband has a child out there. It means another secret she has to absorb.
But I take a breath, and I tell her anyway. After I’m finished, Kit slumps to the cold ground and is hugging her knees. “Jesus. Are you sure?”
“We aren’t, unfortunately.” I glance at Paul, who has followed us into the woods. “And it’s sticky because Ollie’s a respected officer—if we go to the detectives, they might be less likely to look into him, I’m not sure. So we’ll need some kind of proof.”
“What kind of proof?” Kit asks.
“I don’t know,” I say. “But I’ll figure it out.”
Kit nods, but then adds, “Just make sure it doesn’t impact the baby.” She makes a strange noise at the back of her throat. “I’vemetthat baby. Those blue eyes. I mean, I neverthought... but it was right in front of me. All along.”
We nod quietly. Then, Paul breathes in. “There.” He shines his phone’s flashlight on something wedged in the leaves. It’s the edgeof Kit’s glittery iPhone case. She pounces on it and presses it to her chest. I feel grateful we were able to solvesomething.
