“Jem and I might be…helping someone.”
“Again?”
“Yes, again.I mean, it’s kind of something we were already involved in, actually.”And then he had to explain all of it, how Amy had approached them, and their investigation so far.“Not that we’re making any progress,” he said when he finished.“We’re not any closer to finding them than we were before.”
“It sounds like you’ve madesomeprogress,” Hannah said thoughtfully.“God, Tean, I’m sorry you got caught up in this.Can I help?”
“I don’t know.I don’t think so.Not right now, anyway, but thank you for offering.”He surprised himself a moment later by saying, “Do you know what I can’t stop thinking about?”
Hannah shook her head.
“I can’t stop thinking about what someone wrote on the back of that poster.‘You’re still my favorite cowboy.’And then they wrote ‘love you’ three times.”
“He’s a serial killer,” Hannah said, “so nobody should love him?”
“Well, it’s not that simple, but…yeah, I guess.”
“What if his mom gave him that?Or his grandma?”
Tean shook his head.“It didn’t feel like that.Someone his grandmother’s age would have had a different type of handwriting, I suspect.Written in cursive, at least.His mom—I don’t know, it just didn’t feel like that kind of love.”
“It felt romantic.”
Tean’s face was heating.“I know it’s silly.”
“It’s not silly.You’re trusting your instincts; that’s a good thing.This is why Jem is good for you.”
“Jem isn’t good for me, actually.Jem is bad for me.Jem made me buy a swimming suit that’s so small it’s basically underwear.”
Hannah burst out laughing, and for a moment, the years washed away.But when the laughter faded, all she said was “Is it hard to believe this person, Kai, might have been different when he was younger?”
“But that’s not what his teacher said.His teacher told us he was strange and isolated.”
“Yes, but you should know better than anyone that people act differently in different situations.Alone, with someone he was attracted to, someone he felt safe with, he might have been a completely different person.Think about how people change when they go away to college and get away from family and friends.”
For a moment, Tean wondered if that had happened for Kai—if there’d ever been a time and a place for him to get away from the Uinta Basin and be someone else.But he said, “People don’t change that much.”
“You know what I mean.”
Tean wasn’t sure that he did.What he wanted to say—what he almost said—wasBut he’s a monster.
Instead, though, he only said, “Something about it doesn’t feel right.”
“Whoever gave him that poster,” Hannah said, “maybe they know something that could help you.Maybe they could help you find him.”
“Well, all I have is the initial S, so I’m not sure how much that helps.”
Hannah opened her mouth to respond, but Tean’s phone buzzed, and he saw a message from Amos.
Where are you?
Dad’s been waiting for half an hour
Tean placed a call to his brother, but of course, it went to voicemail.
Instead, another text came through:We’re cleaning out Grandpa’s place this morning.
Tean responded,Why are we cleaning it out today?Can’t that wait?
