Page 154 of This is Why We Lied

“I had to go through my mother’s papers after she died. My father’s too. She had never really bothered to sort them out. There was a folder in the back of his filing cabinet. It had everything to do with the accident. Not that there was a lot to see. A four-page police report. A twelve-page autopsy report. I’m a plastic surgeon. I’ve worked on people after car accidents. I’ve testified at criminal and civil trials about the damage. I have never seen a case that didn’t have boxes of paperwork. And that’s not even with a death. Gabbie died. Mercy almost died. You’re telling me that only took sixteen pages?”

Will had read his share of autopsy reports, too. The man was right. “Did they run a toxicology?”

“You’re not just a pretty face after all.” Paul’s smile had a sad quality. “That was what really stood out. Gabbie had marijuana and a high concentration of alprazolam in her system.”

“Xanax,” Will said. The McAlpines had a predilection for the drug.

“Gabbie smoked, but she liked being up,” Paul said. “She took stimulants—Adderall, molly, sometimes coke if anybody had it. She wasn’t addicted. She just liked to party. It’s one of the reasons my father forced her to do the internship at the lodge. He’s the one who found the listing. He thought the fresh air, hard work and exercise would put her on the right track.”

Will said, “Mercy was never charged with anything related to the accident. Your parents didn’t find that odd?”

“My father was a big believer in truth, justice, and the American way. If a cop said there was nothing to see here, then there was nothing to see here.”

Faith cleared her throat. “Which cop?”

“Jeremiah Hartshorne the first. Number two has the job now, which is an appropriate designation.”

“Did you talk to him?”

“No, I hired a private detective,” Paul said. “He made phone calls, knocked on doors. Half the people in town refused to talk to him. The other half seethed every time he mentioned Mercy’s name. She was a whore, a junkie, a murderer, a bad mother, a waste, a witch, possessed by Satan. Every single one of them blamed her for killing Gabbie, but it wasn’t really about Gabbie. They just fucking hated Mercy.”

Will asked, “How did you find out what really happened?”

“We were approached by an informant. Very cloak and dagger.” Paul’s smile turned bitter. “It cost me ten grand, but it was worth it to finally hear the truth. Obviously, I wasn’t able to do anything about it. The asshole shut up as soon as he had the cash. Wouldn’t testify. Refused to go on the record. We looked into him. He’s an oily little turd. I doubt his testimony could’ve sent Jeffrey Dahmer to jail for jaywalking.”

Will knew the answer already, but he had to ask, “Who was the informant?”

“Dave McAlpine,” Paul said. “You arrested him for Mercy’s murder, but for some reason let him go. You know he’s not just her ex-husband, right? He’s also her adopted brother.”

Will rubbed his jaw. There wasn’t anything Dave touched that didn’t turn to shit. “What did you say to Mercy on the trail last night?”

Paul slowly let out a long breath. “First, you should know a bit more about Gabbie’s letters. She wrote at least once a week. She loved Mercy so much. They were going to rent an apartment in Atlanta and—you know how stupid you are when you’re seventeen. You do the math and you can live off mac and cheese for ten cents a week. Gabbie was so happy to have found a friend. It wasn’t easy for her in school. I told you about the violin. She was in band. She’d been teased for years. It wasn’t until she blossomed into her looks that she finally had some kind of life. And Mercy was her first friendship as part of that life. It was special. It was perfect.”

Will asked, “What’s the second thing?”

“Gabbie also wrote about Cecil. She felt like he was hurting Mercy. Abusing her physically, maybe something else. I don’t know the specifics because she didn’t say. I doubt she had the words, really. Gabbie didn’t grow up with fear. This was before the internet took away our innocence. We didn’t have twenty zillion podcasts about beautiful, young women being raped and murdered.”

Will could hear the sadness in his voice. The one thing that was clear was that Paul had loved his sister. Still, he hadn’t answered the original question. “What did you say to Mercy on the trail last night?”

“I asked her if she knew who I was. She said yes. I told her that I forgave her.”

Will waited, but he had stopped.

Faith prompted, “And?”

“And, I had this long speech prepared about how I knew that she had loved Gabbie, that they were best friends, that Mercy hadn’t been at fault, that it was her father all along, that she had nothing to feel guilty about—all of those things. But Mercy never gave me the chance to say any of them.” Paul forced a smile onto his face. “She spit on me. Literally. Just horked up something ungodly and let loose.”

“That’s all?” Faith asked. “She didn’t say a word?”

“Yeah, she told me to go fuck myself. Then she walked toward the house. I watched her until she went inside and slammed the door.”

Faith asked, “And then what?”

“And then—nothing. I was stunned, obviously. And I wasn’t going to chase her down after that. She made it clear how she felt. So, I walked back inside and sat down exactly where I’m sitting now. Gordon had heard everything. We were both kind of speechless, to be honest. I hadn’t been expecting a Hallmark moment, but I thought I would at least start a dialogue, maybe help both of us get some closure.”

The sadness had left his voice. Now, he sounded perplexed.

“Okay, I need to rewind a bit.” Faith obviously shared Will’s skepticism. “Mercy spit on you, and you didn’t do anything?”