“Anyway,” he said, “last year, when Jason was my roommate. I got back from dinner and heard Taryn in the room, and I was going to leave because, well, that’s what you do when your roommate has a girl in the room.”
I shifted uncomfortably, because I didn’t really want to hear about all of this. Of Reid and girls in his room and that there was this whole system because it happened so frequently, and Reid must’ve sensed it because he rested his hand on the small of my back. He continued, “But they were fighting. Jason was yelling. And I heard something. You know how you hear something and you know exactly what it is? Jason hit her. I’m sure of it. But when I got in the room, she was on the floor next to the desk, holding her chin, and she was bleeding. And Jason kept saying she fell, she fell, and Taryn was crying, but she wouldn’t look at me.”
He found me looking at him. “I know what you’re thinking. Weird that I dated the girl my roommate hit, right? Hard to explain. It was like we had this connection. Because I knew, and she knew I knew, and she didn’t have to pretend around me. It was like we could skip all the small stuff, all the bullshit. It was all wrong, obviously. All the wrong reasons . . .” He trailed off. That was something I could definitely relate to.
“She wouldn’t tell, though. I guess because of who Jason’s dad is. He said, she said, right? And then she and Krista were best friends all of a sudden and Taryn stopped hanging out with me, like she wasn’t allowed to or something.”
“Reid,” I said. “What you’re saying is that Taryn had motive.”
“No,” he said, taking my hand. “What I’m saying is that Taryn is weak.” He squeezed his hand around mine, and I knew that he meant that I wasn’t, and I hated it. I stood up and started pacing in front of the big rock.
“So it had to be Krista.”
“I don’t know, Mallory. I don’t get that. It doesn’t make any sense. She’s nothing without him.”
“Reid,” I said, “she’s not even related to him.”
“What? Of course she is.”
“Where does she go in the summer? Does she stay with the Dorchesters?”
“No, I think she goes to camp or something.”
“Does she go there for holidays?”
“I don’t know. I guess so. Maybe not. It’s not like we talk. Jason said she was his cousin.”
And then I saw Jason as something else. Someone holding all the truths, all the secrets, that Krista had. If secrets were currency, Jason was the richest one of all. Turns out, the richer you are, the more people want you dead.
Then I thought of Krista taking care of the Taryn situation for Jason, convincing her not to tell, because he held the secrets over her. And Krista having to pretend to befriend this preppy girl with a preppy name and a preppy satellite phone. And Bree coming along with the same preppy kind of name and attitude. And Bree telling me that Jason had kissed her under the bleachers, but she’d been trying to tell me something else. Krista had to fix that too. I remembered Jason holding Krista around the neck outside the bathroom, threatening her.
Krista hated him.
Krista hated them all.
I didn’t tell Reid. Secrets weren’t a currency. They were a burden. A heavy, dangerous burden.
“Okay,” I said. “But Reid, someone did it.”
“I know, I know.” He stood up and walked toward me, like he was looking for a way to forget and I looked like the perfect way to do it.
He kissed me like he wanted something from me, but not like how Brian wanted something from me, not that thing at all. But something. Definitely something. And I didn’t know what it was. But I didn’t stop him either because I felt myself sinking into him, wanting to be more than a way to forget.
His hands were in my hair and then they were on my hips, and I flashed back to that day on the beach with Brian. And I knew Colleen had been right—he hadn’t been right for me, not even a little.
I pulled away, glanced down the strip toward the hotel room, and cleared my throat.
“They’re interviewing us all,” he said. And then he was whispering. “About that night. I can say something.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Like I snuck over to see you but you were already asleep. So they’d know there was no way you could’ve done it.”
“You mean you could lie.”
“But I could have. So easily. It doesn’t have to be a lie. I’ve snuck over to your place before. God, I should’ve done it.”
“Don’t,” I said.
“I don’t even have to lie. I can just start a rumor. About me and you that night. It’ll make its way around and this will all be done.”
“It’ll make it worse,” I whispered.
“It won’t,” he said, and now he was getting agitated.
But I knew it would. It had happened before.
Colleen had lied. Before she found me. The cops showed up at Brian’s house, looking for next of kin. Looking for his parents. But nobody knew that. They saw the cops show and they ran. Except Colleen. She never ran away. Besides, they all knew her by then.
She could tell, I guess, that they weren’t there to break up the party, once they started asking for Brian’s parents. Once they took their hats off. And when it was obvious that his parents weren’t there, they asked if anyone had seen me. So Colleen said, “Yeah. You just missed her.”
I had about twenty-seven missed calls from her that night. First she went to my house. Then to her own. And then she found me, under the boardwalk. And I know she meant well, because she did. But the cops wouldn’t listen to a word she said after the initial lie. So at first they didn’t believe my story—the lawyer’s story—either.
But eventually the cops stopped asking, because someone else confirmed the lawyer’s story.
I never asked who. And I never found out.
And now Reid was offering to lie for me. “Promise you won’t.”
“I almost did,” he said. “I almost came to see you.” He was looking past me, like he was imagining it in his head. Like he was trying to make it real.
Mom’s voice traveled down the strip. “Mallory?”
“Right here,” I called back. “Promise, Reid.”
“Promise,” he said. I couldn’t tell if he really meant it, but I wanted to trust him. I was choosing to believe him.
“How was your walk?” Mom asked, extra emphasis on the k. Translation: I know you were making out with that boy, and that’s all he’s interested in, by the way. Also, you should know better.
“You could’ve been nice.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Is that why I’m here? In New Hampshire? To be nice to the boys my daughter—”
“Your daughter what?”
She threw her hands up in the air and waved them around. “This stuff,” she said, like there was chaos everywhere, “that you are so fit to ignore, is important. A boy died, Mallory. A boy is dead. Dead. It’s serious stuff. Do you get that?”
I stared at her and she stared back and I waited and she waited and finally I said, “Yes, Mother, I get that. I get that, and I’ll never not get that.” Then I took shallow, short breaths so I would not cry in front of her. Not now.
“I need to call Colleen,” I said. And when Mom cocked her head to the side, I added, “She’ll be worried. I was supposed to call.”
“You can’t. You can’t call anyone. They could be recording our conversations.”
“I have nothing to hide. And besides, this isn’t one of your shows.”
“Yes, Mallory, I get that. I don’t think I’ll ever not get that.”
She couldn’t look at me. But that’s okay—I couldn’t look at her either. And while we were busy not looking at each other, she unplugged the phone and brought it to her room.
I went to my room and turned on my cell. And even though there was no service, I sent Colleen a message. It would go through whenever we drove through a place with signal. If I was ever allowed out of here again.
I typed: Something happened. Something bad. Will call when I can.
And then I watched as the phone searched for signal, and searched some more, willing something to happen. But nothing did.