Or guilty.
Instead, I’m just . . . centered? I don’t know what it is, but I like how it feels beneath my bones, and when Bren calls the home phone and gets forwarded to my cell and I tell her I’m fine, for the first time in ages, I’m not lying.
45
I’m barely home when another text message comes through from an unknown number.
What else do you have?
Hello to you too. Carson must have got himself another burner phone. I dump my bag and sit down heavily on the floor. What else do I have? Um, nothing.
Nothing won’t fly with Carson. I need something he can’t reach himself. Something good.
I rub my eyes hard and, in the dark, I see my sister. My perfect, blond sister. Huh.
Chelsea was a blonde. Lell was a blonde. They were close in age . . . could that mean something? It might if I didn’t know Chelsea was probably killed over leveraging Lell’s pictures, so that leaves . . . Lell.
And suddenly, what Jason said before he passed out at the carnival party comes roaring back to me: “Looks like Lell.” If she was his first kill, it all starts with her, and whatever he started four years ago is finishing now . . . hmmm.
I double-check the security system and go upstairs, powering on my computer. After a few moments of waiting, I open Google and type in “Lell Daley Peachtree City.” Several listings appear. Since the body’s discovery, there’s been a fair amount of news coverage and it’s all pretty much saying the same stuff: local girl, tragic end, who could have done such a thing?
I click through the articles, finding nothing useful—no background revelation, no big clue. Unsurprising really. It’s not like any of the local papers are going to make some amazing, case-breaking reveal. I finish one article, scroll to the top . . . and see Lell’s picture grinning out at me.
I’ve seen this one before, but where?
Oh, yeah, Carson used it at his press conference and it’s easy to see why. Lell’s smile is stretched wide as it can go. She’s leaning into Kyle, who’s squinting into the sun. They look so happy.
I spend so much time staring at her smile that I almost miss the other arm linked through Lell’s. Kyle is on her left. Someone else is on her right. I click on the picture, enlarging it. It’s a man’s arm. You can tell from the size of the forearm and the size of the watch. Judging by how he’s holding on to Lell, they must be pretty tight.
So who is he?
I skim the article once more, looking for any information on the picture and there’s nothing . . . except for a line about how Lell’s mom took the photo a few weeks before the girl disappeared.
I wiggle my mouse, thinking. If Mrs. Daley took the picture and gave it to the press to use, she would probably remember who the other guy was, right?
Only one way to find out.
I open a new tab and start searching for Reichelle Daley’s address.
Reichelle was an easy find. Even after Lell left, she never moved from our old neighborhood, and as I study her trailer through my windshield, I wonder if it was because she was waiting for her daughter to come back. The single-wide is at the end of a shallow cul-de-sac, its plastic shutters faded from yellow to tan, the edges of the metal siding peeling away from the frame.
When I knock on the door, the whole side porch shakes underneath me and, briefly, I think I’m about to cave through the boards.
I sigh. This better be good. I bet Mrs. Ellery is phoning Bren even as we speak. “Mrs. Daley?”
The plastic door opens and a woman in a stained sweatshirt and leggings stares at me through the screen. “Yeah. Who’re you?”
“Wicket Tate. I used to live on Sycamore.”
“And?”
“And I wanted to talk to you about your daughter.”
A pause. She studies me. “You look like Lell.”
I give Reichelle a tight smile, the skin along the back of my neck tingling. There is definitely something here. I just have to find it.
“I’m really sorry for your loss, Mrs. Daley.” I hesitate, chew my lower lip for a beat. “Do you think I could ask you a few questions about her?”
“Why?”
I blank. Because I’m doing a report for school? No. Because I work for the school newspaper? Not likely.
“Because I knew Kyle and I think he killed her.” Nowhere near the truth, but her eyes focus at the words and I know I’ve said what she wants to hear.
“I think he did too.” Reichelle pulls open the screen door, motions for me to come inside. “I’d rather talk to someone from the neighborhood than those damn cops anyway.”
I follow her into a cramped living room that smells like the inside of an old lady’s purse. It’s musty and stale, and when I breathe through my mouth, I can feel the dust hit my teeth.