As Hilary races out of the room, I kneel to the floor, tear open Riley’s pale-blue blouse, and start chest compressions, aiming for a hundred per minute. With my arms aching, I reach one hundred, then two hundred.
“They’re on their way,” Hilary yells from the doorway. I hear her come up behind me. “Please tell me she’s alive.”
“There’s no sign she’s breathing,” I say, still working desperately. “Can you take her pulse?”
She drops to the floor, shoves up the sleeve of Riley’s blouse, and shifts her fingers around until they’re finally resting in one place.
“I can’t feel anything,” she says, her voice breaking.
I glance closely at Riley’s face for the first time. Her mouth is slack, and every inch of her skin looks burned. Instinctively, I reach up with one hand and touch her forehead. Despite the fiery color, it’s cool to the touch.
“I think it’s too late,” I say hoarsely, letting my hands drop to my sides.
Hilary moans, and we both sink back onto our heels.
My own hands are shaking now, partly from doing the compressions, and the rest from despair. Riley is dead, has died within hours of speaking to me. She will never return to her job or her fiancé, never have children like she wanted, never slip her feet into those black-and-tan ballet flats again.
I swallow hard and fight off the urge to dry heave.
“Why would shedothis?” Hilary exclaims, pressing her temples hard with her hand. “She said she was ready to put the past behind her.”
But I’d pushed her, hadn’t I? Was she terrified about people learning of her failure to come forward and then judging her harshly? Shaken, I realize she might have put off the conversation with me today just to buy herself enough time to end her life.
“Did she sound distraught when you spoke to her?” I ask.
“No, just a little nervous about admitting the truth,” Hilary says. “Besides, Riley was asurvivor. I can’t believe she’d give up and do this.”
I gasp.
“Hold on,” I say and stagger to a standing position. “Maybe shewouldn’tdo it ... Does the cord belong to you?”
“Uh, it must have been in the garage with stuff that got left by the previous owners.”
“But you’re not sure?”
“No ... Are you saying she wasmurdered?”
Instinctively, I glance down at Riley. Someone could have surprised her from behind, strangled her with the electrical cord, and strung her up over the door.
“Yes, maybe. Even if she wanted to take her own life, would she have chosen to die like this—in the same horrible way she was attacked years ago?”
“Oh dear ... then we need to get out of this room,” Hilary says, rising now, too. “I’m not a criminal lawyer, but I know we shouldn’t be tramping around in here any more than we already have.”
We back out of the den, then hurry to the living room. As I stand nearly shell-shocked in the center of the space, Hilary drifts to the back door and stares hard at it.
“The bolt’s not on,” she says. “And it was when I left this morning.”
“So, someone broke in from the back?”
Hilary shakes her head. “No, there’s almost zero way to pick the lock ... And I can’t picture Riley opening the door to a stranger.”
I shake my own head, bewildered. “What ... what if it wasn’t a stranger?” I say finally, chilled as I utter those words. “We know Riley lied about the timing of the assault, and maybe somehow that caught up with her in a way we don’t understand.”
“For God’s sake, how?”
“When Riley and I spoke on the phone, I asked her if anyone knew the real date besides her, and she admitted that she’d told someone right afterward. Did she say anything to you about that?”
“No, we never got that far.”
