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As a result, I woke up later than usual this morning, and I didn’t have a moment to spare if I was going to get to Banks’s house on time for him to be able to leave for work.
So, this was not the time to freeze.
And yet, looking at the display on my phone, I couldn’t bring myself to do much beyond inhaling and exhaling. Well, that and feeling my heart pound wildly against my chest.
Because while I didn’t know the specifics of what this call was about just yet, I knew what the general gist of the conversation was going to be, and I wasn’t sure I was prepared for it this morning.
Avoiding it wasn’t an option, though.
I closed my eyes and let out a breath before I slid my finger across the screen. “Hello?”
“Hi, Ms. Kelly?”
“Yes, this is Lamise,” I replied.
“Right. My apologies. This is Detective Shaw with the Steel Ridge PD.”
“Hi, Detective. I assume you’re calling because you have some news for me,” I surmised.
There was a moment of hesitation before he revealed, “I can’t confirm if this will feel like much news, or even good news, to you, but I wanted to give you something.”
My fiancé was dead. I wasn’t sure there was anything he’d ever be able to tell me that would feel like good news. Because if he told me Graham had been murdered, there was no question that was awful. But if he told me Graham’s death had been precisely what I’d believed it was for months—that he’d died from a snake bite—then I’d be left wondering what the hell his video message was all about. I’d spend days and weeks and probably months trying to decipher it, attempting to figure out why he looked so utterly terrified.
“I understand, Detective, but I’m prepared for whatever news it is that you do have for me,” I assured him, doing my best to sound firm and not like I was trembling on the inside.
Detective Shaw no longer hesitated. “I managed to speak with the coroner, and we’ve gone back over things. As it turns out, your suspicion is entirely possible. It is conceivable that your fiancé was murdered. I hate to say this, but there’re no conclusive answers at this point.”
“Do you have any information? What did the coroner say?” I questioned him.
“Well, I’m not sure what you recall about the specifics of Graham’s death?—”
“I remember it all,” I declared, cutting him off.
There was a pause before he continued, “Okay, so then you’ll remember that Graham had all of the symptoms that pointed to the snake bite as being what killed him. As you may recall, he also experienced head trauma. The initial thought had been that Graham was bit by the snake, panicked, and tried to keep moving in hopes of gettinghelp. Before that could happen, we believed he became disoriented from the venom and wound up stumbling around until he fell backward and hit his head on the rock found right beside his head.”
I already knew all of this.
They’d shared it all with me last summer. And when I learned about it, all I could remember thinking was how terrified he must have been knowing he’d been bit and that he wasn’t going to make it if he didn’t get help.
The whole story added up, so I never questioned it, even if it made me sad to think about how horrible the final minutes of his life were.
Of course, believing what I did after I’d watched that video he recorded made me feel even worse about what the end of his life was like.
“Yes, I’m aware of everything you’ve just shared,” I told him.
“Ms. Kelly?—”
“Lamise,” I reminded him.
“Lamise. Sorry. I hate to tell you this, but based on the new evidence you provided us and after my discussion with the coroner, I do believe your fiancé was murdered.”
I swallowed hard.
I didn’t know why it bothered me so much to hear him say it, since I already believed that was the case. Worse, I tried to convince myself we all had it wrong. “How sure are you of that?” I asked him.
“Based on the coroner’s findings, the window in which Graham suffered the snake bite and the head trauma is so close that it’s not easy to pinpoint what happened first,” Detective Shaw started. “The explanation you got months ago was the most plausible. Snake bite, disorientation, then head trauma. But now, given that video he recorded noteven two hours before someone found him on that trail and called 911, we’re thinking the head trauma came first.”
My throat was getting tighter and tighter by the second. “So, what happens now?”
