“Clues of what? Who killed her?”
I wince at the word choice. “Yes.”
Or, if I’m being honest, I’m looking to find no clues. Because if her kidnappers were really after me, there should be no evidence that points to Lydia.
“Do you want to know who I think it might be?” Hannah’s voice is timid.
I turn to her, take in her porcelain doll face and round, blue eyes.
“If you don’t, it’s okay.” Hannah toys with the end of her braid. “Nobody else seems to care who I think it might be. Except for that detective. The cute one.”
I perch on the edge of the bed. “I would like to know, Hannah.”
“I don’t have any real evidence.” She sucks in a breath and draws her knees up to her chest. “It’s just a feeling.”
“That’s okay. Who?”
She swallows. “David Barrow,” she says to her knees. “Lydia didn’t like him. And Lydia liked everybody. I think that means something.”
“It definitely means he’s a real creep.” But why would he have killed her? What could he have gained from it?
“And she was supposed to be at his house,” Hannah continues in a volume barely above a whisper. “Couldn’t that be considered evidence?”
“I don’t know.” I think of Cole’s sullen behavior several weeks ago. I haven’t been to visit since the baby was born. Perhaps it’s time I do my neighborly duty and bring them a casserole.
My gaze drifts to Lydia’s nightstand, where a copy of Persuasion sits, forever unfinished.
“I hope, in heaven, she gets to find out how it ends,” Hannah says.
“I hope it’s too wonderful there for her to even care.” But there’s something unnerving about the thought—that everything that once mattered to Lydia may no longer—and I rush away from it. “You come get me if you ever need me, Hannah. Okay?”
She scrutinizes me, and for a moment I expect her to ask why I think she would need me. Or maybe to accuse me of not keeping Lydia safe when I knew she was sick. Instead she says. “Are you going after David?”
“I’m going to look into him, yes.”
Her expression relaxes. “Thank you.”
I close the door behind me as I retreat, leaving Hannah in the airless, suffocating room of her dead sister.
Downstairs, Mrs. LeVine’s smile is polite and pasted. “How was it, dear? Do you feel better?”
After weeks of sitting in my room, grieving and stewing and jumping at every creak in the house, Hannah has given me a direction to go.
“Yes,” I say. “I really do.”
CHAPTER
FOURTEEN
When I get home from walking Sidekick, Joyce springs on me that my brother won’t be home for dinner tonight, because he’s out on a date. A strange sense of betrayal billows up inside me. “What do you mean, he’s on a date?”
She blinks at me over the steaming pot of potatoes she’s mashing. “A date, Piper. Dinner, dancing.”
“But . . .” But what about the way Nick used to look at Lydia? What about the way his face would fall if she didn’t come home from school with me? “With whom?”
“He didn’t share many details.” Her forearm flexes as she resumes mashing. “She’s a journalist. I guess they met because she’s doing a story on Lydia and Matthew.”
My teeth grind together. How long is this stupid reporter staying in town? And how can Nick go out with that pestering woman? Yes, she’s beautiful, but is he really so shallow? Tears well in my eyes as I sink to a seat at the counter.
Joyce rests the potato masher against the edge of the pot. “I know.” Her words are steady, comforting. “The two of you have always handled your grief in very different ways. This doesn’t mean that Nick is over what happened. But, Piper, life has to be gotten on with.”
Sidekick strains at the end of his leash, and I untie him.
Joyce picks up the potato masher. “Jane is coming for dinner—”
I groan.
“—so maybe it would be a good idea for you to call a friend and go out yourself. Or call Tim and see if you can spend some time with Gretchen and Howie.”
I’d rather eat my own toenails than listen to my sister-in-law ramble about floral arrangements and how to knit the perfect booties. If I can’t be with Lydia, then the only person I really care to see is—
I brush away the idea, but embarrassment still heats my cheeks. I’m not going to call Mariano, on a Friday no less, and ask about his evening plans.
Piper Caroline Sail, I can hear Lydia scolding. Good heavens, who are you? Zelda Fitzgerald? Only a woman of loose morals would even think of something so brash as outright asking a man for a date.
I mutter excuses to Joyce and leave the kitchen.
It’s been several days since Mariano and I last talked. The department is a flurry of activity due to yet another missing adolescent. This one also ended in tragedy, and has caught the eye of the nation now that it’s come out the boy was murdered for sport.