“I don't understand. What about the other crimes?”
“You let me take care of that. There's gonna be some egg on my face, but nothing I can't salvage. Oh and Sam’s place is on the market now. I checked myself. Once it passes hands and new people move in and bring their stuff in, it’ll be impossible to retrieve untainted evidence.”
That last bit of news stings--the thought of Sam being truly gone. “This doesn't feel right.”
“This, right there,” he points a finger at me, “is what's going to give me a heart attack.”
I roll my eyes.
“Vesper, this man is a brutal murderer. He is a danger to society. And the disconcerting truth is, California is rife with these men. It's the Wild West out here sometimes. If I trump a charge on him, it's doing the world a favor.”
“Have you done that before?”
“Vesper, I promise you, never. But I'm in an impossible place. We can’t just seem satisfied with no answers. We both have to look like we want someone to pay for this. If we don’t close this case, I can’t keep stopping others from snooping around, finding something I couldn’t hide. And I want us all to move past this. You—” he leans in with a hushed tone. “You didn't want to turn him in. I never forced you.”
I'm glad I kept the box a secret. Something tells me if I handed it over, it would find its way into an incinerator. Suddenly Sheriff Ridgefield's constant need for reassurance worries me. I'm an inconvenient loose end and maybe Sam's not the only one capable of doing bad things.
“You're right. This works out perfectly. So we can all move on.”
“Vesper, I need you to understand. You've saved my family. If you need anything. If you want to leave and start over somewhere, or just need a hand, I have ways of helping.”
“I appreciate that,” I say, coming to my feet, feeling like the walls of this office are going to move in and crush me.
Sheriff leans back and crosses his arms holding a sly smirk. “So you’re really planning on never telling me?”
I pull my purse close to my side. “Telling you what?”
“How far along are you? You’re not showing, but Katie didn’t show with James until she was six months.”
“What?” I gasp.
“You’re protective of Sam. You wouldn’t let the doctors examine you, but they took your blood, urine. Did you think I wouldn’t know?”
“I promise you. I’m not,” I declare through tremulous lips.
“We need to trust each other if we are going to pull this off,” he says, leaning forward. “You understand if a child comes out of this, and it looks like Sam with those fucking eyes or the blood work doesn’t match with this Northern Woods fella, this could bite us in the ass. Like I said, there are ways we can take care of things. Quietly.”
“There is no baby,” I insist through a clenched teeth, rage bubbling in me at the thought that our dead baby is such a convenience to him.
My gut twirls with a feeling of dread that I'm not sure why I didn't feel sooner around this man. Maybe it's the uniform he wears, the one that tells us all that he's one of the good guys. Just like how Sam's mask told me he wasn't. But sometimes those costumes deceive us. Sometimes the man in the police uniform wants you dead. Sometimes the man in the ski mask saves your life. I don't think Ridgefield ever intended to see me alive. I knew who he was. He doesn’t trust me. And unlike Sam, I have no motive in Andrew's mind to keep the secret.
The present danger is in the sheriff, not Sam. So I choose to say something that isn’t just a shallow reassurance. It shouldn’t be true. I’m supposed to be moving on. In fact, as I prepare my words, my throat gets heavy and clogged and it almost pains me to say it. But it shouldn't hurt so much if it's just another lie.
“You want to know why I won't tell?” I ask, leaning my hands onto Ridgefield’s desk.
He gives me a subtle nod.
“Because Sam is mine.”
Tahoe is next week. I've been doing my best to give this life a try. Sam's box sits there like a twisted version of a comfort blanket, assuring me he still exists. Whenever Carter is not home, I go out to the park, library, anywhere away from the phone so I am not tempted by his random calls.
I can feel it growing slowly around me, like ivy. This new life trying to take root and rebuild itself over me. I can't be her again, the girl before all this, but maybe I can smother everything that happened and find a place where I can exist here.
I left the sheriff's office a month ago with news that someone else would be taking the fall for Sam's crime. That guy was plastered all over the news shortly after. A press conference was held. I watched it with Carter as he held my hand. But I pulled it away and left the room. I couldn't watch the lies. I couldn't sit there while Carter thought that was the man who had me.