As soon as I’m in the house, I fish my phone from my purse, desperate to talk to someone. I know I should call Megan or Ava or my mother, but I tap Sam’s number instead. Yes, I need to get him out of my mind, but he deserves to know the truth before anyone else.
Surprisingly he answers on the first ring, and with halting words, I share the outlines of the story.
“Oh god, Kiki,” he says. I hear clanging behind him and also strands of conversation, as if he might be in a restaurant. I expect him to tell me that he can’t talk long, but instead he says, “Give me twenty minutes and I’ll be there.”
After we disconnect, I pour a glass of water and wander over to the small mirror hanging on the kitchen wall. The entire left side of my face is puffy, and crisscrossed with abrasions from having my head ground into dirt and roots. I take a long sip of water and then tap my cheek gently with my fingertips. It’s really painful to the touch.
Without warning, I start to cry quietly. Before long I’m racked with sobs, and tears stream down my cheeks, making the abrasions sting. It’s not simply about me and what happened tonight. I’m thinking about Jamie and the horrible reason for his death. And Jess Nolan, too.
By the time I hear Sam’s car pull into the driveway, the sobs have subsided. I grab a couple of tissues from a box on the counter and dab at my eyes before opening the front door to him.
“Hey,” Sam says, pulling me into a hug as soon as he enters. I wish it wasn’t so ridiculously comforting to feel those arms around me.
We separate and he leads me to the couch. He’s in a long-sleevedcollared shirt and dress pants, like he’s been out to dinner. As we sit down and he gets a better look at my face, he reels back in surprise.
“Whoa,” he says. “Shouldn’t they have sent you to an ER?”
I shake my head. “It looks much worse than it is.”
“Can I do anything, Kiki?”
“Just bear with me if I start on another crying jag.”
“Of course.” To my surprise, he takes one of my hands in his and strokes it gently. “Tonight must have been so terrifying.”
“It’s not just that. It’s knowing that Jamie died for no other reason than mentioning his summer plans at a fucking dinner party.”
“When did you piece everything together?”
“Only when I was sitting in the back of the police car after I was attacked. But ever since you and I talked about how uneventful the party seemed, without any drama that could explain Jamie’s murder, I’d been wondering if the truth was apparent in of one those ordinary moments, hiding in plain sight.”
“So, Jamie’s murder reallywasa spur-of-the-moment thing,” Sam says. “Liam was probably worried from the start that his DNA had gotten on Jess, but he might have relaxed a little as time went on. And then, boom, he finds out that Jamie ordered the genealogy kit.”
“And he knew he had to act before Jamie had a chance to send in a sample.”
“Could Liam really have been implicated from Jamie’s own DNA sample?”
“Yes, from what I’ve read, many police departments rely on genealogy sites to get matches or near matches. It would have taken time, but once Jamie’s DNA was in the system, there would have been some kind of an alert. His DNA wouldn’t have been a direct match, of course, but the police would be able to identify him as a relative of the killer, and they’d soon find their way to Liam. Their next stepwould be to try to gethisDNA—from something like a cardboard cup he tossed in a garbage can.”
Sam shakes his head in disgust. “I remember Liam driving off from the field just as I was getting into my car. He clearly went home, got an illegal gun he kept, stashed his car someplace, and approached Jamie in the field, saying he wanted to discuss something with him privately. And then they both got into Jamie’s car.”
As an image of that moment flashes before my eyes, I taste bile rising in my throat.
“But how did he fake the gun residue on Jamie’s hand?” I ask.
“I don’t know, but the cops will surely take another look at it. Here’s something else I want to know: Was Tori aware all this time that her husband killed Jess Nolan?”
“Unless she’s totally screwed up herself, and I don’t think she is, it’s hard to believe she knew the full picture. Maybe he told her at some point that he had a reason to avoid a DNA test without ever explaining why.”
“Whatever it was, she was willing to let Jamie die because of it.”
I shrug, not convinced that’s the case. “It could be that after she overheard Jamie, she simply wanted toalertLiam, without imagining what extremes he would go to. I remember how she held her hands over her ears when the car horn wouldn’t stop. Like she couldn’t stand it.”
I pause for a couple of beats, still trying to understand how everything played out.
“Once Liam acted, though, she must have thought she had no choice but to protect him,” I add. “She’s been checking in with me ever since I arrived, asking what I’ve been up to. She also tried to make me think Jamie was devastated by my presence at the party, implying that’s why he killed himself. And I’m sure that was conveyed to the police by her as well.”
“But in the end,” Sam says, “it seems she was only willing to go so far for Liam. She wouldn’t let him kill you.”
