Bex bit her bottom lip. “So he was framing you all along?”
Her father held out his hands, palms up. “I don’t know about that. I just know that I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and I was the type of guy they were looking for. They thought the person who did that must have been nomadic, you know, on the road a lot? Well, I was. The guy would have been big and pretty athletic, and they supposed that he didn’t have a lot of connections keeping him in one place—like he was probably not married. That’s me too. I think I just fit and this Schuster guy jumped at the chance to get himself off the hook and look like a big hero at the same time.”
Her father shook his head, eyes downcast. Even in just the sliver of moonlight streaking in through the window Bex could see how tired he looked, how downtrodden—like a man who knew he never had a chance.
“I couldn’t fight him, Bethy. I just couldn’t.”
Bex scooched closer, for the first time in ten years feeling her father’s warmth beside her, feeling the smooth pull of his arms around her. She breathed him in, his soap and seawater smell, something she didn’t remember but was already starting to love.
“We could end this, Dad. I could help you and then”—she sniffed, tearing up again—“and then we could really be a family.”
He rested his chin on Bex’s head, squeezing her tightly. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted, Bethy. You and me to be together as a family.” He pulled away, a small, wistful smile on his face.
“Detective Schuster came here, you know. He came to my house. How did you find me, Dad? How did you find me here?”
“So you’ve seen him.”
“Yeah.”
“You got a cell phone on ya?”
Bex nodded, showing it. Her father took it, popped the little compartment open, and took out the SIM card. “He’s probably tracking you with this.”
“No.” Bex shook her head, guilt crashing over her again. She wouldn’t lead Schuster to her father a second time. “I don’t think so.” She pushed the SIM card back in and showed her father as she turned off all location markers.
Her father looked pained, his shoulders slumping. “I can’t stay around here, Bethy. They’re going to find me.”
“No they won’t. I’ll hide you.”
He shook his head. “I gotta move on.”
“Tonight? Right now?”
There was a pause, the air in the cab of the truck heavy and electric.
“Come with me, Bethy.”
She blinked.
“Come with me. Tonight. Right now. We’ll find some town where no one’ll ever know us and become new people and live out our lives. Whaddya think about that, Bethy? I could be, I don’t know, called Howard or Matthew or something.”
“And we could work on your case.”
“Sure.”
It sounded like a good idea. But then Bex thought about Trevor and Laney and Chelsea, and everything else she was leaving behind. “I can’t go with you tonight. I have to say good-bye to someone.”
“Bethy—”
“Friday. It’s Back to School Night. I’ll leave with you on Friday.” She paused, then put her hand on his arm. “Then we can be a family.”
“If only your mother were here to see it.”
Bex felt like she had been punched in the gut. “Mom? Do you think…?”
His eyes were steady on hers, and her voice dropped to a low, terrified whisper.
“Do you think Detective Schuster was the reason Mom left? Do you think he…” Bex couldn’t bring herself to finish the sentence, to say the words, but a new flare of anger raged up inside her. It was Detective Schuster who had taken everything from her, who had started to dismantle Bex’s family before she was even old enough to read.
She thought of the way he’d removed the lightbulb on her porch and pummeled her, hand over mouth, his calves pinching her rib cage, tightening like a corset, just waiting for her bones to snap. An honest detective wouldn’t have had to trick her. A respectable police officer wouldn’t have wrestled her to the ground in her own home.
She thought about how she’d lain, chin pressed against the carpet, as he dropped the newspaper clipping in front of her. He said he kept it in honor of her. Was it truly a remembrance—or a trophy?
Thirty-Three
Pink fingers of sunlight were starting to scrape against the sky as Bex crept back into her house.
“Were you outside?” Michael was standing on the landing, hair ruffled, eyes bleary with sleep.
“Uh…” Bex stammered. “I woke up early. Couldn’t sleep.” She thumbed over her shoulder. “I thought maybe a walk would be good.”
Michael nodded, yawned, and brushed past her. “You want coffee?”
“I’m actually going to try to see if I can get back to sleep now. Get in another hour before I have to wake up for school.”
She padded up the stairs, the thunk of her heart mirroring the thunk of her footsteps. She peeled off her clothes and slid into bed, for the first time that she could remember, feeling light.
Bex’s phone went off before her alarm clock did.
“’Lo?”