Page 19 of Secrets Along the Shore

“How do you know that? I need more evidence than a gut feeling, Noa.”

“Don’t you need more evidence than a gut feeling that itisconnected?”

Something flickered in his eyes. There was more that he wasn’t telling me. For all his bravado, Reuben held his cards close to his chest. Maybe it was protocol, maybe it was just him, but he wasn’t going to open the vault of evidence he’d been working on and spill all his theories.

Fine. He wanted evidence? I would give him something. I drummed my fingernails on the half-full glass of water. “Sophia was left there. I was buried.”

A frown creased Reuben’s forehead. “Tell me what you mean by that.”

He was interrogating me, though he’d never admit it.

“Sophia was only fifty yards or so from the parking lot. Whoeverleft her there, didn’t try very hard to hide the body. But, they didn’t make any statement with it either.” I paused.

Reuben waited.

“What I mean is, I think Sophia was killed where we found her.” The image of Sophia face down in the water, a man straddling her back and holding her under, flashed through my recollection. “At first I thought maybe someone dumped her there—convenient and quick—but thinking about it . . .” I’d talked myself into a corner.

Reuben studied me.

“She just looked—put together.” That might have been the dumbest thing I’d ever said in my life. A put together corpse wasn’t evidence for anything.

“I get what you mean. The autopsy has to be completed, but first assessment indicates Sophia drowned, which makes it a safe bet that the place we found her also the place of the crime.”

I’d been right. I’d seen it happen—in my mind. “So, my point is,” I glossed past Reuben’s conclusions because I didn’t want him to ask how I’d drawn mine. “Sophia being drowned, left at the scene, and easily discovered . . . that speaks to an entirely different killer.”

“Why do say that?”

Another open-ended, non-leading question. I wanted to be annoyed at him, but I had a moment of appreciation for Reuben instead. At least he wasn’t trying to coerce me into stating something to support any unspoken theory he was kicking around. He at least wanted factual statements.

“Because I was buried in a shallow grave.” My answer wasn’t anything he didn’t already know. But I added the one new insight I was willing to share. “And it wasn’t where he’d tried to kill me.”

An alertness entered Reuben’s eyes. He pushed off the island, pressing his palms on the countertop instead. “Do you remember the location?”

“No.” I shook my head. I averted my attention to the almost-gone glass of water in order to avoid the second of disappointment on Reuben’s face. “I just—remember being in a new place. I remember seeing—” I bit off my words. I’d said too much.

“Seeing what?” Reuben leaned forward.

I ran my index finger around the rim. “The grave. I saw the grave he buried me in.” I lifted my eyes. “He’d planned it. There wasn’t anything impulsive about how he disposed of me.”

Reuben nodded and I guessed he was trying to digest my observation.

“You said there’s been two other women who have gone missing recently?” I verified. Mostly to get the concentration off of me.

He nodded. “Yeah. Neither has been found.”

“So you don’t know if Sophia’s death is even related to them?”

He glanced at me.

“You can’t talk about it?” I offered.

“I’m not supposed to.” His answer affirmed my observation. “But I will say we have other evidence to suggest theyareconnected.”

My mind skimmed the list I’d made of things I knew about Sophia.

The snake.

That stupid snake under her bedroom window.