He’d kissed her that night. He’d been a class A jerk afterward. As tough as he was, she had been the one girl who’d scared him to death.
She took a step closer to him. He barely resisted the impulse to back away. Wariness joined the curiosity and rising tension. He didn’t know what was on her mind, but he was sure it wouldn’t be good for him. Nothing ever ended well for him that involved her no matter how badly he wanted it to.
“You knew where my room was, so you went there.”
This had gone far enough. “You know what happened next.”
“She was ... bleeding,” Emily prompted. “You said you tried to help.”
He jerked his head in confirmation. “I tried to help. She was ...” He swallowed again, but that tight feeling in his throat wasn’t going away. “... she was trying to speak. I needed to stop the bleeding, but I couldn’t.”
“The window was open when you came into the room?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know if it was open, but it was damn sure unlocked, because you came in that way. Did you open it or was it already open?”
Emily didn’t have to think about her answer. She hadn’t opened the window. It had already been wide open.
On some level she’d known that was wrong. Dear God, she’d made a terrible mistake. She fought back the emotions rising inside her so swiftly she could scarcely think.
Keep going. Get the whole story.“Why did you pick the lock on the front door?” she asked, that point suddenly poking at her. If he’d kicked the door in, his story would have been much more believable.
He looked at her funny. Even with so little light here in the barn, his every expression was stark and vivid. “Have you ever tried to kick in a door? It’s not as easy as it looks on TV. I was good at picking locks. I could do that way faster. Like,” he shrugged, “in seconds.”
She drew in a breath and moved to the next question. “Did you close and lock the door when you came in?” He must have; otherwise Principal Call wouldn’t have been beating on it when the police arrived.
“I don’t think so. I picked the lock and rushed in. I guess it could have closed behind me. I don’t know. I just figured the police lied about having to kick it in to discredit my story.”
The police had arrived and kicked in the door because it was locked—at least that was the testimony of the officers involved. Ten years ago that one point along with Fairgate’s testimony had completely discredited Clint’s story. Butif the police were telling the truth, and knowing what Emily knew now, that meant there had to be something both she and Clint had missed.
“You didn’t see anyone or hear anything?” she pressed.
Whoever had done this couldn’t have gotten out of the room more than a few seconds before Clint came in. Wouldn’t he or Emily have seen that person rushing away from the house? Maybe the killer had actually still been in the house when Clint came in and then slipped out the door. He may have been the one to close it ... but why would he have taken the time to lock it? A quick twist of the thumb turn was all it would have required. It was more than possible, she realized, it was probable.
Blood had been trampled all through the house by the cops and the half a dozen other people who had come into her house that night. The crime scene had been a mess. Mishandled, just like Cathy suggested. The whole case had been mishandled.
Renewed fury suddenly streaked across Clint’s face ... the face that only moments before was twisted with agony. “You know damn well I didn’t see anyone else. You sat in that damn courtroom every day. You’ve heard all this!”
She struggled for a breath, the guilt and regret crowding into her chest. He was right. “That was before,” she admitted, “before I knew you were telling the truth.”
She didn’t know how she managed to maintain eye contact when her whole body screamed with its own agony just looking at the desolation and fury smoldering behind this sharp-edged, battle-hardened man. “My father,” she went on haltingly, “he heard Sylvester Fairgate give you that order. Fairgate threatened that if he ever told anyone he would—”
Clint held up his hand for her to stop. “I know the kind of tactics he utilized.” His tone was menacing, bitter, his eyes glacial.
She managed another ragged breath. “My father said he would talk to Ray today. He wants to do the right thing.”
“And this suddenly changes how you feel.”
That Clint snarled the words at her shouldn’t have surprised her, but it did. She hadn’t expected his appreciation or even his understanding. Her father’s refusal to risk his own family to back up Clint’s alibi had cost him ten years. He wasn’t going to just say,Thanks and let’s forget the whole thing ever happened.
“I ... yes, it does,” she said. “Like I said, I understand that if you told the truth about that, you were probably telling the truth about the rest.” Facing him this way with the rage building in his eyes was nearly more than she could handle, but she owed him that much. “Maybe you were right when you said I needed someone to blame besides myself.” That she had been that selfish, that much of a coward, deeply pained her. More so than she could adequately articulate.
He took a step closer, putting his body directly in her personal space ... mere inches from her. “Do you have any idea what they did to me in there?” The words were low, guttural ... animalistic.
She should have been afraid. She should have run for her life, but she couldn’t move.
“I’m sorry.” She was. God, she was.
“The only way to survive was to learn not to feel.”
