Who taught me all of that?
“Let me look after you. I didn’t do what they say. I wouldn’t hurt anyone. You know me, Neve.”
He did. He taught me.
“Don’t you dare unlock that fucking door.” Cynthia’s voice makes me startle away from the lock.
I turn to face her, my heart pounding, a knife still in my fist. “He didn’t do it.” I don’t meet Cyn’s gaze as I whisper the words.
Cynthia’s got her phone clenched in her one hand, her other balled up tight, ready to pounce.
Not on me.
For me.
“Karter hasn’t heard from Tasia in the past few hours considering the time, but she knows she lost her phone.”
Lost.
My brother didn’t hurt her. But of course he didn’t. He wouldn’t hurt anyone.
“Let me hear him out.” I try to reason with her. I lift a hand when she opens her mouth to protest. “Please.” My voice is hoarse.
“You’re not thinking clearly. Imagine me asking you the same thing.” Cynthia speaks softly, but there’s panic edging her tone.
The tapping has stopped.
Worry squeezes my chest.
“He didn’t do it. He’s scared. I can talk to him and convince him to speak to the detective and?—”
“How did he get into Blackwell’s?” Cynthia interrupts me gently, taking a small step forward. “If he doesn’t know how to handle alarms or cameras or tread in places he shouldn’t…”
I think of Jackson’s body in the dark shadows of Sky Arena. They didn’t see anyone on film, did they? Or they’d know for certain.
“Then how did he get in, when Mr. Bennet explicitly told us he installed a top of the line alarm system?”
“Maybe Mr. Bennet lied.” The objection sounds weak to my own ears.
Cynthia drops her hand and shakes her head. “Casper isn’t the one who’s lying, Neve.”
SIXTY
NEVE
The cold is sealed off and only the dark of the shelves and the scent of old books exists now. Midnight Blackwell’s lock is flipped, no alarm went off, there’s no camera footage—it conveniently glitched—and Detective Lincoln and his armed men found no one inside the bookstore, or in Darkmouth.
Cyn left for Tye’s, already texted me she made it in.
Now that it’s silent and I’m retracing footsteps like I can find my brother among the shelves, I’m trapped inside a Gothic fantasy with my hockey nightmares.
“Carl Jung, anyone?” I ask to break the silence, a smile on my lips as I turn my back on them. “Probably shouldn’t start withThe Red Book,butMemories, Dreams, and Reflectionsmight be a more accessible choice.” I duck down the psychology shelves, then squat low, running my finger over the spines of Jung’s work. I’m in my red robe, a white cami, black sleep shorts, and slip-on black Uggs.
It’s not like I had time to change in all the chaos.
All the chaos which confirmed Tasia is fine, minus her phone. She lost it in a club.
So who took it? Who texted me? And if it’s Nolan, since when did he get in the habit of theft?
