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The images were grainy, as though they were stills from a video. Maybe they were. It meant there was a recording out there somewhere. Was that the next “gift” I’d receive?

I didn’t recognize the handwriting on either the envelope or the photo of the note in the stack. Was it Corrine? Had she set this whole thing up to torture me all along? She seemed in genuine fear during all of her interviews. And yet, she handed my own underwear to Roy Dennison, right under my nose.

Had she been inside my home? Or had Lock given them to her as part of some twisted mind game? Only… she knew TRACE would send them off for DNA analysis. What had she hoped to accomplish? Was it Lock she was trying to frame? Or me?

My fear and confusion gave way to pure rage. Lock was lying to me. There was no denying that now. The word written on my windshield in blood simmered in my memory.

COMPLICIT.

In my guilt, I thought the word was meant for me, because I’d kept the truth from Dennison and TRACE. Now, I wondered if it meant Lock.

As I sat there in the storm, one thing finally became clear. This was bigger than me. If I’d been complicit before, that ended tonight.

I put the car in reverse and tore away from the pier. It was almost ten by the time I pulled into Roy Dennison’s driveway. Full dark.

The rain came down in sheets. I tucked the envelope containing the photographs under my jacket and ran to Roy’s front door.

I pounded on the door. By the time Roy opened it, I was drenched.

“Mina?”

Now that I was here, standing in front of him, I didn’t know what to say.

“Is Tonya home?” I asked absurdly. Where else would Roy’s wife be?

Roy looked over his shoulder. “She’s helping Skylar with her homework. Mina, you’re soaked. Would you like to come in?”

“No,” I said. I couldn’t imagine trying to explain any of this in front of Roy’s wife, let alone his three young children.

Roy looked behind him, then stepped out onto the porch. There was an overhang that kept us out of the rain. He gestured to the stone bench in the corner.

“What’s going on?” he asked. “Mina, it’s been a really long day. You know I’ve been searching muddy woods for eight hours at Palicki’s. Is this an emergency?”

“I should have told you a long time ago. I didn’t know how. It seemed like a coincidence. Even now. You might think I’m crazy. Roy, I swear to you, I just didn’t know what to do.”

“Start from the beginning. Has there been another incident? Did you get another message?”

I don’t know what happened at that moment. Nerves, maybe. Or some sort of trauma response. But I burst out laughing. I knew what I sounded like. Unhinged. Maybe I was. I took a breath and pulled the envelope out from under my coat.

“I think Lock is having an affair. I think Corrine Egan knows about it. I think it’s been going on for a long time. I think he knows something about Matt Woodson.”

“What?”

I couldn’t put the thing on a linear timeline. All the events of the last couple of months, all my fears and suspicions—it all came tumbling out in a string of disconnected thoughts and words. I don’t even know what I said. Finally, I slipped off my smartwatch.

“Lock gave me this,” I said, breathless. “When we were dating. I’ve never taken it off.”

Roy took my wrist and held it up so the porch light hit it.

“Like the one Corrine said Woodson gave her,” I said. “She described it right, Roy. It’s a commitment. A promise.”

“Mina… I think⁠—”

“No,” I said. “I know you’ll have a thousand questions. Most of them, I can’t answer for you. I got these today.”

I handed Roy the envelope and then buried my face in my hands. The floodgates opened and I started to cry.

Roy opened the envelope and leafed through the photos. He only got through about four of them before he slid them back and resealed the envelope.