Charlotte.
I open Charlotte St. Clair’s Instagram and scroll back to last summer. Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, cruises on the Seine…For three months there’s nothing but pictures of Charlotte living the high life in Paris. I scroll through more carefully, looking specifically for pictures from around the time of the assault just in case I missed something, like a quick trip home or a block of time when she didn’t post at all and could have conceivably been home—anything to prove that Tucker wasn’t lying—but then I find it. A picture on June 11, the exact day of the assault.
Shopping on the Champs-Elysées! the caption reads.
Tucker’s cousin was in France the night he was arrested.
The car is dead quiet. Across the street watery sun peeks out over the gabled roof of Tucker’s mansion. I watch the house so intently I’m surprised it doesn’t catch on fire.
Lyla drums her fingers on the steering wheel. “Are you sure this is a good idea, Hope?”
I give a bitter laugh. My palms are slick with sweat and my stomach roils with nerves, so no, I’m not sure it’s a good idea. But I need to know. I bob my knee until the car shakes. I didn’t sleep all night, but I’m not the least bit tired. Betrayal has a way of keeping you wide awake.
“Are you okay?” Lyla presses. “You don’t look so good.”
That’s what Mom said. It took all the acting skill in me to get her to go to work today so I’d be home alone. She’s going to murder me herself if she finds out I left the house. The thought would have scared me before, but not now. Not when my body has live wires firing inside it.
“Garage door around the back is opening,” Lyla says.
I quickly slide down in the seat. Tucker wouldn’t recognize Lyla’s car, but he’d know something was up if he saw me.
“What’s he doing?” I ask.
“Pulling out. Here he comes.”
I slide farther down, so that my neck is pressed against the leather seat and my legs are mashed up under the dash. Tires peel past.
“Okay, you’re good,” Lyla says.
I clamber into the seat and peer through the back windshield. His brake lights flash at the corner, and then he’s turning off the street.
“Showtime,” I say.
“I’m just going to say it,” Lyla says suddenly. “I think this is a bad idea, and I don’t think you should do it.”
“I’m not going to get caught, Lyl.” I say it with so much confidence I honestly believe it’s true. “You have your phone?”
She nods.
“Call the second you see someone coming,” I say, making sure my ringer is on.
Then I step out of the car and cross the street toward Tucker’s house. My hands are shaking when I ring the doorbell, and I wipe my sweaty palms on my pants. Footsteps clatter behind the thick door, and then the maid is pulling it open.
“Hi, Martina!” I say brightly, then flash a brilliant smile. “I don’t know if you remember me, but I’m Tucker’s girlfriend, Hope. I forgot something in his room for our history project. He said I could run in and grab it since he’s got to meet the coach before class.”
“Of course I remember you. Come on in.”
She moves away from the door, and I smile as I pass. “Thanks so much! I’ll only be a minute.”
My instinct is to run up the steps and get this over with as quickly as possible, but I know rushing will only make me look guilty, so I force myself to walk calmly up the spiral staircase toward Tucker’s room. Martina, thankfully, doesn’t follow. I don’t know what I’d do if she insisted on supervising.
Once upstairs and out of her sight, I jog on the pads of my feet across the long hallway to Tucker’s room. I find it in just as much disarray as the last time I visited.
If I were Tucker, where would I hide my darkest secrets?
I race to the bed and lift the mattress, shouldering the weight of it while I peer underneath.
Nothing. Not even porn.
Dropping the mattress, I move to the bedside table and rummage through it, then comb through the stuff on his bookshelf headboard. Nothing. I run to his dresser and quickly scan the contents on top, then pull the drawers open one by one and dig my hands under the piles of clothes, searching for something someone might want to hide. Then I see the antique dresser with the single drawer. The last time I was here, I asked Tucker what was inside and he joked about gold bricks and steered us back to the project. What didn’t he want me to see?
I cross to the dresser in two long strides and turn the key. The drawer opens with a soft click. Inside is a black leather folder. I pull it out, then untie the leather wrap and crack the spine.
The ground falls away. It’s me. Going into the doctor’s office, talking to Ethan in the quad at school, huddled outside the apartment as firefighters put out our blazing car. Dozens of long-lens pictures of…me.