Page 114 of Our Daughter's Bones

“If you’re going to be rude, then there’s no need to talk to me,” she snapped.

“What the hell is wrong with you? I got a phone call saying my wife blacked out. Do you have any idea how terrified I was on the drive here?”

She sighed. “Sterling. There is a lot going on at work. I can’t even explain how messed up it is right now.”

“It always is! Work will always be crazy, Mack. Doesn’t mean you have to jeopardize your health!”

She searched his face for a sign of insincerity. How could her caring husband cheat on her? What went on in his mind? She wanted to take his brain in her hands and peel off the layers one by one. She wanted to inspect every crevice and ridge of it under a microscope. She thought she knew him. She thought Sterling was simple. There was nothing complicated or dark about him. There were no demons in his life. It made him a nice husband.

It left her with shivers, thinking how little she really knew him. She never knew him. Who was he?

“What are you looking at?”

Nick walked in with a granola bar. “Thought you might be hungry.” He tossed it to her.

“Thanks.” She caught it midair.

“I’ll find the nurse.” Sterling left brusquely without acknowledging Nick.

Her stomach teemed with satisfaction as she ate. Nick sat on the chair and swung his legs over the edge of the bed.

“What happened with Max? Did he say anything else?”

“Nothing new. Daniel and Justin are with him right now, going over his statement again in detail.”

“They’re allowing Daniel on the case?”

“Yeah.” He scratched his growing beard. “Wow, I need to shave. You feeling better?”

“I’m good. What do you think about Max? What the hell happened?”

He threw back his head and laughed. “It made you pass out, Mack.”

“Sully’s going to gloat. He had a feeling that Abby ran away.”

“But she did it for a different reason. She felt unsafe.”

“She didn’t tell Max everything. He doesn’t know about the money or Erica’s phone.”

“It makes sense. She was being threatened because she’d found the phone. Even though it didn’t have anything on it, she didn’t want Max to be threatened too. So she didn’t tell him everything.”

“We know that Abby reached Grayson’s cabin. The blood was old enough. That means that someone followed her or caught her there. Why would Bill not clean up the blood?”

“I know. It means that Abby made a mistake in thinking that the old Club 916 was still active and behind everything.”

“There’s a copycat club. There must be. They took her.”

Sixty-Three

October 4

The air of Lakemore felt different. It was putrid. Mackenzie always believed that Lakemore was lazy and unlucky. She never realized that it could be sinister.

The city had potential; it had heart. A heart that swelled with pride when it came to football. Football was the shining beacon. It wasn’t just a sport, it was the centerpiece of Lakemore’s culture. It was a phenomenon. A lifeline. But it was tainted. The one thing that worked for Lakemore, the one thing that gave people hope, was dowsed in the blood and tears of innocent girls.

Thick ropes of sweat glided down her back and pooled in her tailbone. Her scalp felt cool.

She looked up at the sky. A storm was brewing. This September had not been rainy; it had been thunderous. October promised more of the same. She looked around at the empty street. It was five in the morning, too early for the usual runners to be out. The silence irked her.