“She did. I found an old blog she used to keep. I can’t believe it still exists, although I guess someone would have had to delete it. Don’t they say the internet is forever? Anyway, one of her last entries was about taking Morris’s class.”
“So there’s a link between both women and Morris. That has to be enough for Garrett to treat him as a suspect.”
“It should be. And I bet they can get a warrant or whatever so they can search the class records. See if any other former students have been reported missing over the years.”
I held out my fist and she bumped it. “You’re a freaking genius.”
“I don’t know about that. I bet the sheriff ’s office already figured all this stuff out.”
“Maybe not, Detective Fallbrook.” I grinned at her. “Who knows, we might solve this mystery yet.”
“I’m not sure what will happen, considering the suspect is deceased. But at least the families will have answers.”
“And we know he can’t kill anyone else, so there’s that.”
“That is good news,” she said with a smile, but a second later, her expression changed. “You know what’s creepy?”
“What?”
“I took his class. Do you think he ever looked at me and…”
“Thought about killing you?”
“Yeah. Obviously he didn’t kill every one of his students. He must have had some criteria. I wonder what it was.”
Just the idea of Penelope in danger sent a ripple of tension through my back. I didn’t know how I could suddenly want to unalive a dude who was already dead, but if he’d even thought about hurting her—
My phone rang and I grabbed it off the coffee table. It was Kevin Wilkins, the athletic director from Carolina.
For some reason, I didn’t want to answer that call in front of Pen. I stared at my phone as it buzzed again.
“Do you need to take that?” she asked.
“Yeah. It’s the athletic director from Carolina.”
“Oh.” She stood, and the drop in her voice was unmistakable. “That’s important. Go ahead, I’ll give you privacy.”
I answered the call as I watched her disappear into her bedroom. “Hey, Kevin.”
“Hi, Theo. Is this a good time? Just wanted to touch base about a few things.”
“Yeah, go ahead.”
I wandered around the living room aimlessly as he talked. He wanted to know my thoughts on the latest game film he’d sent. I had ideas, but my brain was still fuzzy from the migraine. I did my best to share some feedback, all while trying not to fixate on Penelope’s forlorn expression when she’d left the room.
The back of my neck stiffened as the call went on, and a pulse of pain reverberated through the right side of my head. I probably should have stayed in bed longer. The strain of trying to keep up with Kevin’s conversation quickly got to me. Fortunately, he seemed satisfied and told me to have a good night.
Another throb of pain hit me as I ended the call. Shit. I needed to deal with it or I was in for a relapse.
I went to the kitchen and took another dose of my medication. While I was at it, I downed another glass of water in case I was dehydrated. Penelope came out, moving so quietly, I almost didn’t hear her.
“Is everything okay?” she asked.
Inadvertently, I winced. “Yeah. He just wanted to chat about some stuff.”
“Is your migraine coming back?”
“Little bit.”
