“Right.” Burke smiles. “Then I guess we have nothing more to discuss at the moment.”
I exhale for what feels like the first time in hours as Ellie escorts Ashley and me from the interview room to the front doors. Outside, the snowfall is picking up. I want to shout it into the sky: The phone records will set me free.
So why was Burke holding them to his chest like they were a winning hand of cards?
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Ashley doesn’t speak to me as we sign out of the sheriff’s station. I keep my eyes on the powdery snow beneath my feet in the parking lot. Study the tread tracks from the boots that screwed me over.
“I think it’s best if you don’t work on Saturdays until all of this is sorted,” Ashley says once we’re shut in the car. She’s livid, I can tell. But she’s still trying to make a punishment seem like she’s doing me a favor.
“I’m sorry I snuck out. They didn’t give me a choice—they just showed up—”
Ashley cuts me off: “Leann Strauss was at the search today.” There’s something simmering under her voice. It makes my insides shrivel up.
Ashley pinches the area between her eyes. “She said Chloe has been saying that you’re witches. She knew about the—whatever it is you guys did in the barn last Friday night.”
I squeeze my eyes shut. The world is swimming.
“Lauren was with you, wasn’t she?” Ashley’s voice is straight-up terrifying. “That’s why she won’t sleep, or eat.”
I want to tell her that it was just a stupid séance, a dumb game—that nothing really happened—but it’ll only make Ashley angrier with me. She already watched one of her children fall apart. Who knows how long Lauren will take to recover from what happened in the barn?
“She caught me sneaking out,” I whisper. “She wanted to come.”
“She’s a child! A child who would do absolutely anything for validation from her older sister.”
A tear squeaks out of my eye, hot and angry. “I didn’t know you resented me that much.”
“Don’t be manipulative. You’ve done nothing but hide things from me since Bailey went missing,” Ashley says. She sounds on the verge of tears too. “Is there anything else you need to tell me?”
“No.”
“I didn’t think so.”
I feel my temper flaring. My mother would be screaming at me, and Ashley’s calmness is only a reminder that she’s not my mother and never will be.
—
Ashley doesn’t broadcast that she cut my hours; instead, she tells everyone over dinner that something has come up at the café and she’ll be working more, so basically we need to keep our shit together while she’s gone.
And Mrs. Lao will be here each day my dad isn’t home or sleeping. So basically, every day.
“That’s so not fair,” Lauren says. “We’re old enough not to need a babysitter.”
“Eat your pizza,” Ashley snaps.
I turn to Andrew when everyone seems distracted. “Did you find anything at the search today?”
But Ashley has the hearing of a bat. She sets down her water glass, hard enough to rattle ours. “Not at the table.”
I don’t even get a chance to think about how to respond, because the doorbell rings. My fork drops from my fingers. Ashley cringes, and Andrew’s face falls; nothing good follows the sound of the doorbell lately. Even Lauren stops pushing the food around on her plate and freezes.
My dad is the one to stand up. Ashley doesn’t bother barking at us to keep eating as he crosses through to the foyer and unlocks the front door.
Sheriff Moser’s voice carries through to the table, settling over us like frost. “Good evening, sir. Hope I didn’t interrupt dinner.”
“We are eating, actually. What is this about?”
“We’re following up on some things regarding the Bailey Hammond case.” Ellie’s voice now.
“You already talked to my daughter earlier,” my dad says. “I think that’s enough for one day.”
Moser’s voice is apologetic. “No disrespect intended, Mr. Markham. But we’re here to talk to your son.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“It’s just a few routine questions,” Moser says. “We’re going through everyone who knew Bailey at this point.”
Ashley puts down her napkin. “Knew?”
Moser goes red in the face. Ellie Knepper gives him a look like he’s the stupidest man she’s ever laid eyes on.
“You can follow us back to the station if you’d like,” she says, glancing at Andrew. “It shouldn’t take more than an hour.”
“Why can’t you talk to him here?” My father asks.
Andrew stands up. “It’s fine. I’m eighteen. They’re just routine questions, right?”
He looks at Ellie Knepper for affirmation, but Moser pipes in: “You bet. We’ll have you home before Jeopardy!”
“Andrew—” Ashley starts to get up, but Andrew is already putting on his jacket. “Mom. I’m eighteen. You really shouldn’t leave Lauren and Kacey alone. Russ has to work, remember?”
My father goes red in the face to match Moser’s. And then Andrew is gone, stepping out the front door and chatting with Moser about Badgers basketball like this is a perfectly normal Friday evening.
But I know better: nothing will ever be normal again.
—
Andrew isn’t home in an hour, or two for that matter. I hear his car pull in at nine, nearly two hours after Moser and Knepper showed up at our doorstep, and I hear his footsteps head straight for his room.
At a quarter to eleven, when I hear Ashley’s bedroom door shut, I text Andrew: you up?
He types back: yeah.
Me: what did the police want to talk to you about?
Him: I’m coming down. Den?
I’m up and out of my room in an instant. I slip into the den, leaving the light off. The remnants of today’s fire still glow in the hearth.
I grab the poker and stoke the fire, waiting for the delicate sound of footsteps. Andrew slips into the room, rubbing his eyes. I can’t bring myself to pounce on him about Burke just yet; he looks like shit.
I sit down on the hearth, leaving room for him to sit next to me. “How was the search?”
“Pointless,” he says.
I wait for him to go on.
Andrew rubs his eyes again. “I didn’t want to find her—I know we were supposed to want to find her, but—”
He didn’t want to find her body.
“Every time we saw something out of place, we were supposed to flag it. I saw this black trash bag.” He props his elbows on his knees and leans forward, his face in his hands.
I put a hand to Andrew’s back. Feel his sharp inhale. He sits up straight. “I don’t think they have any idea what they’re doing. They wasted so much time by not looking for her right away. They say if a missing person isn’t found in the first forty-eight hours…” Andrew covers his face again, his voice trailing off.
I mentally complete his thought. Then the odds are that they won’t be found alive. I pull my knees to my chest. “Who did you talk to at the station? Moser?”
Andrew shakes his head. “Some uptight guy. Detective Burke?”
I force myself to say the words: “What did they want to talk to you about? Me?”
Andrew’s hesitation confirms it. I nod. I am strangely calm for someone whose world is crashing down on her.