Page 126 of Don't Say a Word

I asked:How do you know it was suicide?

I was already parked in the student lot when Josie finally responded.

Left a note. Parsons, Clark’s boyfriend. He confessed.

No way. No fucking way, I thought.

I was about to tell her that Parsons left a message for me yesterday, but I didn’t. She might be compelled to put that information into the report, and I needed time to think.

Instead, I texted:Let me know if there is anything weird, as in not a suicide.

She responded with several question marks, but I texted Angie instead of Josie.

Where are you? I’m in the far corner of the student parking lot.

A second later, Angie wrote:coming, and I waited. She slipped into my passenger seat and said, “Everyone is saying it’s Mr. Parsons and that he killed himself. I don’t believe it.”

“It is Mr. Parsons,” I said.

Tears welled in her eyes, but she didn’t cry. “Fuck. I talked to him yesterday. He wanted to talk to you. He was sad, but... he killed himself? No way. Why?”

“Guilt, maybe?”

“For what?”

“Killing his girlfriend.”

“No. Absolutely not.”

I was having a hard time wrapping my head around it. I had listened to his message twice while waiting for Angie.

Have you made any progress in your investigation? I thought maybe we could trade notes.

He also said he was struggling and that he could have saved her. Why would he want to talk to me and then kill himself before he did so? Why would he tell me he could have saved her, yet confess to her murder?

“Is there someplace safe I can take you?”

She shrugged. “I just want to know what’s going on. Mr. Parsons was a great teacher. Do you think he really killed her?”

“No,” I said before I caught myself. “Angie, this is important. What exactly did you and he talk about yesterday when you gave him my number?”

Angie thought. “He was upset. He said he should have stayed with her, but he left papers in his classroom to grade and ended up talking to Mrs. Porter. She’s across the hall from him. He said the detective made it sound like they thought he was guilty, but said it was just the detective’s style, like how she made it sound like she thought I killed her.” She paused. “I asked him if he was okay, and he said he would be. He was sad, but he... he really wanted to talk to you again.”

“He left me a message. I have to talk to Detective King. Dammit.”

I didn’t want to, but she needed to look at his death as a homicide investigation, not a suicide inquiry. “Can you hang with your friends today?” I asked Angie. “Don’t be alone. Okay?”

“Yeah. Gina’s over there with Andy and a couple of her friends. School’s canceled, but I’ll find something to do.”

“I’ll call you later.”

I locked my car, watched Angie head toward her friends, then I texted Josie.

I’m here and I have information directly related to Parsons’s death. Can you get me through the line to talk to the detective in charge?

Then I called my mom.

Ten minutes later, Josie brought me through the crime scene tape and into the center courtyard. “King is pissed,” she muttered.