“Turn on the TV, Ry. Channel eight.”
“Fine.” Riley cradled the phone against her shoulder and flicked on the television. The smiling, perfectly coifed anchor people grinned out at her. “What am I supposed to be looking at? I kind of don’t care if it’s supposed to rain tomorrow—”
The anchor woman’s smooth expression immediately dropped into one of practiced sympathy, and the little Hawthorne High Hornet icon filled a box over her right shoulder.
“A Hawthorne High student was the victim of a hit-and-run today at the intersection of West and Falia. The car, described as a late model dark-colored sedan, was traveling east when it struck the female student.” The anchorwoman looked down at her papers but Riley already knew the name she was going to say. “Junior Shelby Webber is in critical condition.”
The picture switched to a uniformed officer standing behind a podium, a doctor to his left as they somberly restated the facts—an unidentified sedan, high rate of speed, victim in critical condition.
Riley sucked in a breath. “Oh my God.”
The officer kept talking, blathering about a number to call if you had any additional information while the picture changed again. This time it was the intersection at West and Falia—just a few blocks from where JD had picked up Riley hours earlier. Riley’s chest tightened as she saw students and teachers huddled behind a yellow-taped police line, but it was what was in the intersection, strewn like forgotten garbage, that made the bile rush up the back of her throat: the crushed bumper of the blue sedan, the red smear of blood on the concrete, and Riley’s backpack, the color sullied from a drag across the street.
Riley didn’t remember dropping the phone or slamming the television off. She didn’t remember anything as she bent over the toilet, retching.
Tim had been driving a sedan.
Was it black? Blue?
He said he was her brother. He said he wanted to help her.
Riley stifled a sob.
Shelby had Riley’s coat, had her backpack—and didn’t look all that different from Riley. Riley flushed the toilet and rinsed out her mouth then sunk to her knees. The tears started again, and she crumpled to the floor, her burning cheek cooled by the chilled tile. A shudder ran through her body. Her teeth chattered. She pulled a bath towel from the bar and snuck under it, pulling her knees up to her chest.
It was because of her.
The sedan had wanted her and had hit Shelby instead.
Riley only lay on the floor a few minutes before the canned voice on her cell phone started her message: if you’d like to make a call, please hang up and dial again.
The second Riley—with shaking, weak fingers—mashed the END CALL button, the phone blared again.
“H—he—hello?”
“Are you OK?”
Riley swallowed then winced, her saliva like sandpaper running over her raw throat. “Did you find out about this on the news or did someone tell you? Do you know anything more?”
“No,” JD said on a sigh. “My mom saw the police tape when she was driving home. And I don’t know anything else about Shelby’s condition. But I’m about to find out.” A pause. “Ry, the blue sedan—that was the car that was following you, right?”
But Riley couldn’t answer. Guilty tears choked the words in her throat.
“Be outside the gate in twenty minutes.”
As JD clicked off the phone, Riley started to pace.
I need to tell them about Tim. He’s obviously dangerous.
If Tim was the one who hit her.
Doubts crept into her head; there were a thousand sedans in Crescent City. They really don’t know the color.
Why am I protecting him?
Riley went for the door and was on the top of the stairs when she heard the chatter downstairs.
“Does it really have to be this soon?” her mother was saying.
“It doesn’t really have to be, but it’s for the best. If you’re worried about Riley, she’ll adjust. Most teenagers get over it once they make some friends.”
Anger roiled in Riley’s belly. How dare Deputy Hempstead talk so dismissively about her? How dare he talk about her at all?
Riley pulled on a fresh sweatshirt and yanked her hair into a ponytail. Her eyes and nose were red and puffy, but there wasn’t enough makeup in the world to change that, and frankly, Riley didn’t care.
Maybe the accident wasn’t so bad, Riley told herself as she tried to breathe deeply. The news was always blowing things out of proportion. Even as she thought it, Riley knew it wasn’t true. She bit her lip and speed-dialed Shelby’s number. She heard the crackle of canned air on Shelby’s end.
No ring.
No dial tone.
Nothing but dead air.
THIRTEEN