“Did she say why she wanted to look at them?”
“She said it was for history class. A final assignment about the school and its students through the years. She wasn’t one to lie, so I didn’t think to question it. Should I have?”
“Hard to say. How many yearbooks did she look at?”
“Seven. Dustin was three years ahead of me in school, so our Freshman and Senior yearbooks are the same.”
“I’d like to see them, if you don’t mind.”
She nodded. “They’re on a shelf in the coat closet. I’ll get them.”
Rosemary walked to the closet and opened it, pulling out a cardboard box. The lid came off with a faint scrape. Inside sat several yearbooks, their covers worn at the corners. She carried the box to the kitchen, and we spread the yearbooks across the table. Rosemary’s name appeared in glitter pen on the inside cover of the first one, surrounded by dozens of faded signatures, some faded, others still holding up to the test of time.
I opened the first yearbook and began flipping through it. Rosemary leaned in beside me, pointing to faces, names, and the occasional scribbled note written in the margins.
“That was my friend Tara,” she said, tapping on one of the photos. “She moved to Paso Robles after we graduated. Always thought we’d keep in touch, but for some reason we didn’t.”
I nodded but said nothing.
I didn’t care about Tara or about strolling down memory lane.
I cared about patterns and clues, anything Audrey might have left behind that might be of use to me.
We worked through Rosemary’s first yearbook and then the second. Nothing stood out. The third was more of the same. It was disappointing, but I wasn’t ready to give up just yet. Audrey must have asked for the yearbooks for a reason, and I didn’t believe it had anything to do with a school assignment.
Rosemary raised a finger. “Oh, I just thought of something I should have mentioned at the start. Audrey spent the most time going through Dustin’s yearbooks, his senior year in particular.”
The comment gave me hope.
“Which one is it?” I asked.
Rosemary slid one of the books to the side, grabbing the one beneath it and handing it to me. “This is the year we met.”
I opened the book and began turning pages. When I came to the senior portraits, I noticed something strange—a black circle had been drawn around one of the portraits.
Not a neat pen mark.
A hard, deliberate ring drawn in thick marker.
I flipped through a few more pages and found another classmate had been circled.
Then another.
Then another.
I pointed out a few of the classmates that had been circled. “Before I make any assumptions, I just want to be sure you or your husband didn’t draw these circles.”
She leaned closer. “I did not. And as for Dustin, it doesn’t seem like something he would do. It wasn’t done in any of his other yearbooks.”
Turning to the next page, my eyes landed on yet another circled photo, and Rosemary’s hand flew to her mouth.
“That’s … that’s Dustin.” Her eyes darted to me, then back to the book. “Why would Audrey circle his photo?”
I wondered the same thing.
I also wondered if there was a connection, something linking everyone who had been circled.
My attention shifted to the next circled portrait, noting it was Talia’s father, Gabriel Kinkaid. Not too far from it was another circle of Brianne, Gabriel’s wife.
