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“Okay,” she says when she gets back, puffing as though she’s run a marathon. “I’m ready.”
“Did you go down to the lobby to get it?”
“No,” she says with a chuckle. “But I ran to the elevator and impatiently jogged on the spot as I waited for them to arrive. Now. Tell. Me.”
“Alex wasn’t there,” I blurt, putting her out of her misery.
“Oh, thank God.” She relaxes, throwing the bags of takeout onto the coffee table before sitting back down with her arms folded over her legs, food forgotten.
“But he suggested he could find out who it was.”
“Oh-kay.” Pippa’s brow furrows before she tilts her head in question, clearly confused. “And you don’t think he’s as bad as Jesse says he is? Sounds like a manipulative little asshole to me.”
“Maybe, or maybe he saw how messed up I was and thought it was time I knew the truth?”For both our sakes.
“Nope.” She shakes her head. “I don’t believe that. Why wasn’t he with you? Why didn’t he help?”
“Because I told him I wasn’t interested in knowing. I told him I was moving on. I lied. And then I decided I was going to find out for myself.”
“So, you went back up the mountain.”
“I went back up the mountain,” I repeat, now knowing how bad an idea it was.
“And you didn’t think to tell anyone?”
“Honestly, no. Because I knew I’d either be talked out of it, or you’d want to come with me. And I needed to do it alone.”
Pippa nods but stays silent.
“And…you know the rest. I rolled my ankle and got stuck there with no cell service.”
“Until Jesse and Tate found you.”
“Actually, it was just Jesse at first.”
“Okay.”
“But they both knewexactlywhere I was.”
I swallow a lump in my throat because that’s the part that always gets me emotional, whenever I think about it. They both knew. When Tate walked into that clearing, Jesse was shocked to see him. They hadn’t been searching together. Yet they both knew.
Pippa blinks a few times, trying to piece together what I’ve just said. It may be a small town, but it’s a huge mountain. I could have been anywhere.They knew.
She gasps suddenly, and I know she’s figured it out. “Nooo,” she says, shaking her head almost violently. “No. Nooo. And JesseknowsTate. I was with him when they ran into each other before Dad’s dinner. I questioned him but he said he knew him from when they both lived in Seattle. What the actual fuck?”
Jesus. I wish I’d known that piece of information, although, it probably wouldn’t have meant anything to me at the time.
“Yep, they were both there.”
“Then why the hell are you here? And why the hell didn’t you tell any of us that you knew what happened?”
“Because I don’t know what happened!” I half yell before covering my mouth.
“What?”
“I’m here to find out the truth. All I know is that Jesse and Tate found me, and Jesse admitted that he was there the day Jade died.”And that he had either killed someone, committed an unforgivable crime, or worse.
“And you didn’t think to ask him for more details?”
