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“I do love you,” I said quickly, my voice raspy because of the dryness in my throat. “I’ve loved you for a long time, I just wasn’t sure if you felt the same way, and when you got a girlfriend, I assumed you didn’t.”
“I don’t believe you.” His tone was flat. “I looked for any hint you might have feelings for me a thousand times. I analyzed every word and action. But I never saw anything. Besides.” He dropped his trump card. “If you supposedly love me so much, why would you fly ten thousand miles to reunite with an asshole who doesn’t deserve you?”
I thought quickly. “Because I hoped if I said I was moving away, you’d step up and make a play for me. But you didn’t.” I stuck my lower lip out in an exaggerated pout. I felt ridiculous, but he seemed to be considering my lie, so I’d take that as a small win. I glanced around the room, hoping to see something I could use against him, but nothing stood out as an obvious choice. “Do you not care about me enough to take a chance?”
He glowered. I might have pushed too far with that comment, but my thinking was sluggish, and I was having a difficult time gaging his mood.
“What do you call this, then?” he demanded.
“Good point,” I said, cringing a little. Despite the screwup, he didn’t come any closer and seemed to have lost some of the tension he’d been carrying a few minutes ago. I needed to keep him talking.
“This whole thing has been so clever of you.” I rubbed my lips together, trying to moisten them.
“How so?” He sounded skeptical but interested.
“I never had any idea who you were.” A complete truth. “How did you make that phone call after the accident without Blair knowing?”
He rolled his eyes. “It was hardly a challenge. All I had to do was prerecord a message and pay someone I found on online to send it through when I gave them the signal.”
Now that he mentioned it, I recalled that the voice on the phone had made a simple statement and then the call had ended. They hadn’t engaged in conversation, nor had they even seemed to react to Liam’s outburst.
“And keying my car?” I asked. “You weren’t even in the country when that happened.”
He shrugged. “I knew that greedy paparazzo was nearby because of the photographs he posted online, so I paid him to do it. He was only too happy to help out. It would have been great publicity for him if your people hadn’t squashed the story. Delivering the Christmas gift was easy too. Everyone wants to make a quick buck these days, especially at that time of year. I hired some clueless idiot and promised a bonus if he made sure no one saw him. I told him it was a surprise for my girlfriend.” He shook his head. “Moron.”
I felt a chill. I’d never guessed that Blair’s sweet friend was so calculating. I bit my lip—hard—and tasted blood. “I had no idea.”
“I know.” His grin froze my insides. “And that brings us to where we are. Unfortunately, I have to decide what to do with you next.”
ChapterForty-Eight
LIAM
I knowyou probably won’t see this, but I need you to be okay. – text message from Liam to Kennedy, sent Monday 16 January
Time seemedto crawl while Nate and his fellow officers came up with a plan. I knew they had people out looking for Kennedy, and that thanks to Mum’s communication skills, most of Destiny Falls had closed shop for the day to help with the search, but it didn’t feel like enough. I’d briefly joined in but had returned to the police station when I couldn’t still my frantic mind. I needed to be in the center of the action and up-to-date with any developments, which meant I was better off here. Based on the looks some of the cops had given me, I was lucky they’d allowed me to stay, so I tried to make myself unobtrusive, hovering in a corner and using an online group chat to help coordinate the community search.
We’d heard from the hospital that Blair had been drugged with ketamine. I’d instantly gone down a rabbit hole on the internet to find out what that meant. Apparently ketamine was an animal tranquilizer, often used as an anesthetic, but some people took it recreationally, which must have been how the stalker got his hands on it.
The phone company had confirmed that Kennedy’s phone was within the vicinity of Destiny Falls, but due to the patchy coverage up here, they couldn’t pin down a precise location. According to Nate, they thought she was most likely in the area between the township and the ski resort.
“Sergeant Braddock,” Officer Mehrtens called as she strode into the room with a phone in her hand. “I think I’ve got something.”
Nate cocked a brow. “What is it?”
“I’ve called all adventure activity providers within fifty kilometers, and none of them have any record of Tyler Johnson participating in a tour today. He isn’t answering his phone and, if you’ll recall, Miss Carter mentioned she thought Johnson previously had a romantic interest in her. What if he’s the stalker?”
“You might be onto something,” Nate replied.
I strained to make sure I didn’t miss any of their conversation, my coordination role temporarily forgotten.
“That would explain how the perp knew the alarm code,” he continued. “Johnson would have had plenty of opportunity to find it out. But he and Blair were together when the stalker called Kennedy while she was in our interview room.”
“Calls can be faked,” Mehrtens said.
“It’s possible.” Nate clapped loudly, drawing the attention of the other officers in the room. “We have a potential suspect. Tyler Johnson. Male, blond, midtwenties. Constable Mehrtens will circulate his personal details to you shortly.” He nodded at Mehrtens, who leapt into action. “I want you to dig up any information you can about him and any connections he might have to sites within the area indicated by Kennedy Carter’s mobile service provider.” Nate pointed at the man with the wispy mustache. “You. Contact Blair Carter and get Johnson’s phone number. There’s a chance we’ll be able to determine whether he and Kennedy are in the same location.” He turned to another uniformed officer. “Patton, find out Johnson’s movements from the moment he arrived in the country. I want to know exactly when he landed, everywhere he’s been, and what he’s spent money on.”
“Yes, sir.”
