Page 103 of Poison Wood

“Yeah. And I’ve seen Rosalie driving a similar car.” I keep the fact I saw that car after a B and E at Poison Wood to myself. No need to send him and Erin running from our new deal.

“What do you think that’s about? I mean was it just to scare you or worse?”

“Probably just to scare me,” I say. “Which it did. But I don’t know why.”

“Maybe it was a message to back off the story. Maybe you know something, but you don’t know what it is.”

I nod. “Both are possible. I’m definitely getting closer to something.”

He shakes his head. “I don’t like it. I’m working with Erin now, so you don’t have anyone watching your back.”

“I’m glad you still care about my back,” I say.

He rolls his eyes. “C’mon, now. Course I do.”

Erin returns to the sofa with her laptop and sets it on the table. “Are you ready for this?” she says to me and to Carl.

I nod, but I have no idea what I’m ready for. “You said at the hospital the results were back on the skull.”

She nods and pulls up a link on her email. “Detective Lane Gautreaux’s already gotten this information in Natchitoches. I’ve spoken to her and told her I have a source atFaceswho sent them to me as well,” Erin says. “That lab hustled and got it done in record time. I’m going live at eleven.”

Her eyes are bright and alert. I know that look well. I also know this scoop could have been mine, but I don’t feel envy tugging at me as I think that. I don’t feel anything.

Erin continues, tapping on the keys. “The condition of the skull indicated blunt force trauma was the cause of death. And ...” She turns the screen so Carl and I can see it. “Voilà.”

A computer-generated picture appears, and there he is, from his thinning hair to his bulging brown eyes. Just as I suspected.

“Hello, Archibald,” I say.

Poison Wood Therapeutic Academy for Girls

Kisatchie National Forest

November 25, 2002

Meadow

Dear Diary,

Ohmygod. I’m out of breath as I write this. Tonight was insane. We went to the lake. B.O. was all like, Don’t go to the lake it’s dangerous but whatever. It’s soooo boring here with no one around. What do they expect?

So guess who swiped a bottle of vodka from our math teacher’s room? We take it and run off at midnight into the woods, singing Tom Petty’s “American Girl” at the top of our lungs.

It’s crazy creepy out there at night. The noises areWild.

So anyway, we find the lake and at first I’m like, “I’m not getting in that.” And they’re like, “Chicken.”And I don’t take it well when someone calls me a chicken so I jumped in first. And I’m out there by myself dog paddling and suddenly I’m all by myself and I yell for them to come out and quit messing around and they don’t. And I’m not going to lie, I got a little scared for a minute but I mean it’s fine.

I started shivering though and the moon came out from behind this cloud and I saw a figure in the woods. Probably Heather. She isAlwayswatching us. Then something brushed against my leg and I screamed bloody murder and then a hand latched onto my ankle and pulled me under and I was kicking and going crazy and then it let go and when I came up, Heather was next to me laughing and I told her that wasn’t cool and she laughed even harder. And then I wondered who it was I’d seen in the woods.

I think it was that maintenance man.

So when we got back to the school I snuck into the kitchen and stole a steak knife.

I’m sleeping with it under my pillow. Thank god he’s getting me out of here.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Riverbend, Louisiana