Page 111 of Our Daughter's Bones

Her stomach growled.

A stapler clicked.

Mackenzie’s brain turned on and off, like a flickering light bulb. The file slipped from her hands and landed on the floor. Her mind had wandered into the past. She went over every word written in Abby’s journal, every missing clue she had uncovered.

“Detective Price!” Daniel approached from behind. “I just saw Nick, he updated me on Bill––” He paused and followed Mackenzie’s eyes to Max. “Is everything okay?”

Just like that, she snapped.

She chucked the file on her desk. “In the interrogation room. Follow me now.”

“What’s going on?” Daniel asked.

But she didn’t reply. She didn’t falter at Max’s pleading face, just raised a sharp eyebrow. Max stood up slowly and nodded.

Spinning on her heel, she marched toward the interrogation room.

“Damn teenagers,” she muttered, and then raised her voice. “Daniel! Get Nick and come to Room C!”

She knew Max was on her heels. She saw his shadow trailing behind her, heard his loud breaths. Pangs of hunger forgotten, the vein in her forehead popped and pounded.

Reaching the interrogation room, she kicked it open. “Get in.”

Max staggered inside. She considered closing the door behind her, but Max’s face turned green. She left the door ajar.

It was the smallest interrogation room in the building—the size of two broom closets combined. It was strategic to interrogate in a room with musky smell, lack of fresh air, and little space.

It was designed to break anyone.

Mackenzie gestured for Max to take a seat. His bag dropped to the floor like a pile of bricks.

Once seated across from each other, she stapled her eyes to him in a hard stare. He visibly wilted.

Sterling always said to her,That look can stop hearts, baby. And not in a good way.

Max shrunk into the chair, looking younger than he was and weaker than when Quinn had beaten him.

“I don’t have a lot of patience left, Max. If you are uncomfortable at any point, you can leave. You do nothaveto talk to me. This is purely voluntary. For now. But an obstruction charge is right around the corner. Is that clear?”

He nodded.

“What’s going on?” Nick asked, walking into the room with Daniel.

Mackenzie sucked in a sharp breath. “Start from the beginning. Tell us everything.”

“Abby and I got close after Erica disappeared. We were friends before, but it was very superficial.” He sniffed. “The first six months were bad. But then something changed.”

“She was acting scared and paranoid?”

“Yes! One time she didn’t show up to school. I went to visit her, thinking she was sick. She said she didn’t come in because she felt uncomfortable, like she was being followed. She kicked me out.”

Mackenzie searched his face. What else was there to this harmless-seeming, gaunt boy? “Continue.”

“She told me she was looking into Erica’s disappearance. I begged her to let me help, but she wouldn’t. She just kept getting worse. I knew she had dug something up. After weeks of being on her case, she confided in me about a club. Of football players. They had hurt girls in the past. They would take them andusethem. They called themselves ‘Club 916.’”

“Did she give any details? Did she know any names?”

“I don’t know! I asked her how she found out. She said the less I knew, the safer it was. But what she did know was that Bill Grayson was behind it.”