Tilly shook her head. “We convinced ourselves whatever happened to Anne had nothing to do with us.”
I sat back, taking in their story.
It fit, but almost in a way I found too neat.
“Now we see how wrong we were,” Vaughn said. “If Audrey was digging into this, and if someone killed her to keep the past from coming out, I wish we would have spoken up back then.”
It was a comment I kept hearing over and over as I’d started speaking to all those at the bonfire that night.
“Do you believe one of your friends could be responsible for what happened to Anne and for Audrey’s murder?” I asked.
Tilly looked at the floor, and Vaughn hesitated.
“I can’t say it’s impossible,” Vaughn said. “But no. I don’t think anyone in our group had anything to do with what happened to either one of those women.”
It occurred to me that Vaughn or Tilly or both may have searched their son’s room before he took off or after. They could have stumbled upon the hidden notebook, seen the rendering of the locket. If so, Vaughn or Tilly might be the killer, or one could be covering for the other. They were two theories I wasn’t ready to lay to rest.
“What about you two?” I asked. “You say you’re innocent, but you have yet to convince me.”
“We’re cooperating, telling you everything we know,” Tilly said.
“You are now, and I’m willing to bet it’s because the truth is starting to come out.”
“We’re owning up to the mistakes of our past to protect our son.”
“And because it’s the right thing to do,” Vaughn added.
Was it because it was the right thing, though?
Or was it out of necessity and the need to appear innocent?
“Is there anything else I need to know, anything you haven’t told me already?” I asked.
Vaughn met my gaze, and they both said no.
“We want this solved,” Tilly said. “For Anne. For Audrey. For everyone who needs answers.”
“I do too,” I said. “And in that vein, I have a few more questions.”
33
I leaned back and asked the question that had been circling my mind since I arrived. “How did the two of you end up getting back together?”
Tilly glanced at Vaughn, and for the first time since I’d sat down with them, something unguarded passed between them.
Not tension.
Not strategy.
Appreciation for one another.
“We didn’t,” Vaughn said. “Not right away.”
Tilly nodded. “We were apart for six months.”
“Six months,” I repeated.
“I left town for a bit after the breakup,” Vaughn said. “Stayed with my older brother. I needed distance. Every time I thought about Tilly, I thought about everything that happened and everything I’d lost.”
