“In my truck.” I gestured behind me. “Show me the money first.” I had to get her talking about what had happened that night, but I wasn’t sure how to do it without revealing that I’d never read any diary—and that there wasn’t one. Just in case Shauna asked to see something, I’d found a pink diary at a dollar store and had filled some of the pages, but that was only going to get me so far.
She walked to her car and opened the back door, took out a duffel bag, and threw it a couple of feet in front of her. “Come and get it.”
It would look strange if I didn’t try for the money. I stepped forward and was reaching down for the bag when I heard a rustling noise. I looked up. Shauna was holding a gun on me. Her arm was straight, the gun unwavering. I held up my hands, stumbled back a couple of steps.
“What the fuck?”
The driver’s door opened and a man got out of the car.
It was Frank McKinney. I stared in shock.
“Shauna, get the diary,” he said.
How was he involved? Was he going to kill me? My heart started to race frantically. Could I make a run for it? I looked around. The trees were too far away. I’d be shot before I got a few feet. McKinney’s eyes met mine.
“What are you doing here?” I said.
“Like you don’t know.”
He obviously thought I knew more than I did. But what?
McKinney shifted his weight and I caught sight of the gun in a holster on his belt. It also looked like he was wearing a bulletproof vest underneath his windbreaker, his body bulky. I remembered the phone in my pocket. Could I try to call 911? Before I could do anything, Shauna motioned for me to step away from the truck. I moved to the side, keeping an eye on McKinney, who had his hand hovering near his gun as he watched me. Shauna searched under my seats, in the glove department. She found the diary, flipped through the pages, and laughed. She climbed out of the truck, threw the diary onto the ground.
“It’s empty.”
“The real diary isn’t here,” I said. “I’ve put it somewhere safe.”
Shauna looked enraged. “What do you mean, it’s not here?” She pointed her gun at me again. In the shadows, McKinney also looked furious.
“I knew you’d pull a stunt like this,” he said, and took a step closer. McKinney unsnapped his holster and brought out his gun. “Where is it?”
I couldn’t stop staring at the gun, the way he held it so casually, his thumb resting on the safety. They weren’t going to let me walk away from this, not now. I tried to focus my panicked thoughts. I had to buy myself some time, had to distract them. Shauna turned to look at her father, and I caught a flash of silver from her necklace. It reminded me of something, something I could use.
“I’ll tell you, when you tell me where my sister’s necklace is. She had a diamond pendant that disappeared the night she died. Like someone didn’t want her to have it anymore. Someone who was jealous.”
“She shouldn’t have had it!” Shauna’s voice was high and shrill. “It didn’t belong to her.”
My breath hitched in my throat. I was close to the truth, and for a moment I wanted to run from it, didn’t want to know.
“What happened to it?” I looked through the dark at McKinney, outlined in the headlights, wondering if he’d stop Shauna, but he was silent.
“I took it.” Her voice was triumphant.
McKinney spoke now. “Shauna…” But his voice wasn’t just warning her to be quiet, there was anger in there. Like he was upset with her for taking the necklace—and surprised. What was I missing?
Shauna spun around and faced her father, her voice thick with tears. “You said you were busy, always so fucking busy at the station, but you weren’t, not that summer—you were with her.”
Dread came over me as I finally connected all the pieces. That diamond necklace was too expensive for a teenage boy, too sophisticated.
It had been a gift from someone else.
“Shauna, control yourself.”
“Control myself? You’re the one who was screwing a teenager.”
“You killed her.” McKinney’s voice was furious.
There it was. I felt shattered, pulled into a million pieces. I wanted to run at Shauna, wanted to beat her down to the ground like she had Nicole. I started to move forward, then I saw the gun in McKinney’s hand.
Anger again from Shauna. “She deserved it. Coming to our house, pretending to be my friend … It was disgusting, Dad. She was younger than me.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“What was it like, Dad? Tell me.”
“Shauna—”
“God, you were fucking my friend! It was sick and perverted, and—”
“Enough!” McKinney’s voice was a roar. “I made a mistake, and I’ve paid for it every damn day. I’m tired of cleaning up your messes.”
The rest of the picture unfolded before me.
“You knew all along,” I said. “You knew she killed my sister and you helped cover it up.”
“I had no choice.” His voice was stony.
“Of course you did, you asshole.” My chest was tight with anger, my hands clenched. “You lied. You let Ryan and me go to prison—for years.”
“You two would have ended up there eventually anyway.”
“Is that how you justify it to yourself? We were no good?”