Page 27 of Haven't Killed in Years

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An hour later wewere back in the car. Dominic had picked Ellen’s brain about every detail she remembered from the time, which wasn’t much. It was clear my old friend James had kept all our secrets. I hoped this was the dead end I needed Dominic to hit.

“I knew it,” he said as I closed my door.

“What?”

“James Calhoun hid Marin.”

“What are you talking about?”

“There were only a few people with access to the kid after the arrest. He was the sappiest—had a handful of his own children, was a Little League coach, a real do-gooder.”

“I’m not following.”

“Somebody helped her disappear. There’s nothing, no accessible information on her after the arrest. I know she was a minor and that stuff is all sealed, but she didn’t walk out of the police station and take a bus to obscurity by herself. That just doesn’t happen. I’ll give you one guess who accompanied James Calhoun to Pennsylvania.”

Eff off, Dominic, you intuitive asshole.

Fifteen

I tried to change thesubject to anything other than Marin Haggerty, but Dominic didn’t have a lot of other interests. I got him to talk about TV shows for about fifteen minutes, but when I could tell he was getting antsy—too fixated on his new Marin theory—I turned up the radio.

He shot me a look. Maybe it was a little aggressive. Possibly rude. “I love this song,” I yelled, hoping he had no follow-up questions about the title or the artist.

He politely waited until it finished before reaching over to turn down the volume. “What are you doing tonight? Want to come to dinner?”

“Cometo dinner orgoto dinner?” I asked. “Come to dinnersounds like an event.”

“My stepsister, Megan, is in town for the night.”

“Another stepsibling? No wonder you have attachment issues,” I teased.

“Everyone has a date. Not that I’m saying it’s a date…I just…I’m not used to having to go to these things alone. Do you want to come or not?”

“Well, when you put it like that…Who iseveryone?”

“Megan and her husband, Leo, and Jake and Elyse. That’s it.”

“What about Kevin?” I still hadn’t met Kevin. It felt like a blind spot.

“No, Kevin’s out of town. They aren’t that close anyway. Not a lot of overlap there.”

“This is very confusing.”

“I know. Think of it likeThe Brady BunchifThe Brady Bunchrecast most of the people every season. Megan was season two; Kevin was season five. My mom and I are the only ones in every season.”

“That helps, actually.”

“I know, I use it a lot. So is that a yes?”

“Fine.” I wanted to see Elyse in a social setting outside those parties. I wanted to see all of them, actually. For research.

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Megan was older thanour collective age range of mid-twenties to early thirties. She must have been a teenager when Dominic was a little boy. How they all preserved these temporary familial relationships over time was mind-boggling to someone like me.

Megan stood to give me a hug as we approached the table. Leo was more reserved, significantly shorter than his wife, which I noticed when he stood to shake my hand. Before we could take our seats, Jake and Elyse arrived and then we all did lots of hugging, everyone standing and scooting around in the tight space to get their arms around one another. For a beat I thought Megan was going to go for a second one, so I dipped into a chair.