Another silence. Longer. The kind of silence that filled a room and pressed against the walls.
Her father spoke. "Is Blake—is he safe?"
Not is he guilty? Not that can't be true. Not there must be an explanation.
Is he safe? It was the smallest possible concession. An acknowledgment that his son was in custody, that the situation was real, that the world he'd constructed—in which Blake was the victim and Mack was the villain—had just done a one-eighty.
“He's cooperating,” Alyssa said. “His attorney is negotiating a deal. He'll face charges, but his cooperation will be a factor in sentencing.”
"I see." Two words, the Colonel processing a battlefield report.
"Daniel." Her mother's voice, steadier now. "Daniel, did you know? About Syria. Did you know what Blake?—"
"I believed my son." Her father's voice was quiet. The quietest she'd ever heard him. "I believed my son, and I acted on that belief."
It wasn't an apology. Alyssa hadn't expected one—not today, maybe not ever. But it was an admission. The Colonel was drawing a line between belief and fact.
"I have to go," Alyssa said. "I'll call again this weekend. I love you both."
Her mother said it back. Her father said, "Be careful, Alyssa."
Why did it sound like a threat? Be careful of what? Mack?
Ugh. She hung up and sat for a moment in the empty room, trying to let it go. Trying to believe her dad was still the guy she wanted him to be. The one who would support her and love her, no matter what.
A sadness filled her chest. A tear slipped down her cheek and she dashed it away. Maybe he never could be that person, but she wasn’t giving up hope. Not yet.
She opened the door and found Mack leaning against the hallway wall, arms crossed, exactly where she'd known he'd be.
"How'd it go?" he asked.
"My father admitted he believed Blake without questioning it. My mother cried. Nobody yelled." She leaned into him, and his arms came around her. "So…better than expected?”
He kissed the top of her head. "You okay?"
"I will be."
She sketched Jenna on Thursday. She and Mack were back at the cabin—the place they called home for now.
These drawings were softer, drawn from love rather than observation. Jenna laughing, head thrown back. It was the way she laughed at everything, even things that weren't funny, because Jenna believed the world deserved more laughter than it got.
Jenna with her hair piled on top of her head and a coffee mug in both hands, standing in the kitchen of their apartment at six in the morning, not yet awake but already talking.
Jenna making faces at herself in the bathroom mirror while Alyssa brushed her teeth beside her.
She filled three pages. Then she closed the sketchbook because she couldn't see the paper anymore.
She'd spoken to Jenna's parents. The hardest phone call of her life—harder than the one to her own parents, harder than the testimony, harder than anything.
Margaret and David Lopez, who'd welcomed Alyssa into their home every Thanksgiving, who'd called her their "bonus daughter," who'd trusted that their girl was safe living with her best friend.
The funeral was on Saturday in Denver. Alyssa was going. Mack had arranged the security with Garrett. They’d have an SPS detail, discreet, professional. She wouldn't have to worry about anything except saying goodbye.
The apartment was still sealed as a crime scene. Claire had told her it would be released within the week, and then Alyssa would need to collect what was left, which wasn't much, after the fire. Jenna's parents wanted any of her things that had survived.
She thought about the voicemail greeting. Hey, it's Jenna! Leave me something fun! She hadn't called the number. Couldn't bring herself to find out whether the voice was still there, suspended on some server, waiting for someone to leave something fun in a mailbox that would never be checked again.
She would, though. Eventually, she'd call, and she'd listen, and she'd let herself hear her friend's voice one more time.