No, it was crazy—not even worth thinking about.
Sighing, she slumped down in her seat and looked out the window at the gray, drizzly day, which perfectly matched her mood.
Before long, they’d pulled up to the church. They followed the procession into the old stone building, Ava’s father’s hand pressed firmly against her back. When they walked inside, Ava sucked in a breath. Every pew was filled end to end with her teachers, classmates, and friends. She spied Caitlin at the front, then Mac a few rows back. She looked around for Julie—she was surely around somewhere—but didn’t see her in the throng of bodies. Then, a quick movement in the outer aisle a few rows ahead caught her eye. She saw the flash of a man in a dark suit stepping quickly behind a pillar, then reemerging on the other side. It was a detective, speaking into his cell phone, his eyes flitting across Ava’s row before finally resting on her. She flinched. Had he moved to get into a better position to see her? But why? Now that Alex was in jail for Granger’s murder, they weren’t suspects anymore. Right?
Alex. Ava swallowed hard. Don’t think about it, she told herself.
Her attention turned to a girl in a black blouse who sat hunched over, sobbing loudly into a tissue. Behind Ava, another girl in navy wept so hard she gasped for air. Ava looked around the church and saw several more of her classmates who seemed inconsolable. God, get over it, people, a voice rang in her head. He was just a teacher. And a perv at that.
Then she realized who was crying. There was Jenny Thiel—whose Texas belt buckle had been prominently featured under her bare boobs in a series of sexts with Granger—gazing sadly at a photo montage of their dead teacher through the years, tears streaming down her puffy cheeks. And there was Polly Kramer, whose henna-tattooed hands had been on full display in a lurid series of pictures, rocking back and forth, the light from the stained glass window casting her face in a scarlet shadow. Justine Williams, Mimi Colt . . . they were all here. Every single girl who’d figured prominently on Granger’s iPhone. And all of them were sobbing like the world had ended.
They really loved him, Ava realized with a start.
Ava hadn’t thought it could be more disgusting than a high school teacher messing around with several of his students, in his classroom, and getting them to send him naked pictures. But it was worse—way worse. Lucas Granger had convinced these girls that he loved them. He had manipulated them, lied to them, all so he could fulfill his own perverted desires. She could just imagine him whispering I love you to a dozen girls, and she could see the excitement and nervousness on their faces as they bought it. She still couldn’t understand why the cops had seemed totally unconcerned when she’d told them about Granger’s affairs with his students. Had they even investigated what she said? She’d told them that Granger had hit on her, but it was almost as if they didn’t believe her.
Disgusted, she stumbled toward a seat in one of the back pews, her father sliding in next to her. Sean Dillon sat to her left and gave her a quick nod as she settled in. Ava stared at the altar, where an old priest stood from a chair and patted at his robes before approaching the dais. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Sean turn to whoever was sitting on his other side—probably his girlfriend, Marisol Sweeney—and whisper something, before they both broke out in hushed giggles. She tried to ignore them. But she had a feeling she knew what it was about.
The priest adjusted the microphone, placed his hands firmly on either side of the pulpit, and contemplated the crowd. In the brief pause before he spoke, Ava heard a stage whisper from the pew behind her. She didn’t recognize the voice, but she heard the words, which were definitely meant for her ears: “Alex Cohen never seemed right to me.”
And then came the response: “Totally. He was always just a little off, right?”
“It doesn’t surprise me that he beat someone up at his old school,” came the booming whisper behind her. “He always looked like he was about to go apeshit.” The other person let out a snicker in response.
Ava’s father shifted his weight and turned his head ever so slightly. Clearly he heard them, too. He reached over and gave Ava’s hand a reassuring pat.
Ava blinked back tears. She felt suddenly self-conscious, hyperaware of what felt like a thousand eyes on her. Of course everyone was staring. She was Ava Jalali, the ex-girlfriend of Granger’s accused killer.