The man stationed to watch him straightens. “What door?”
“At the end of the hall.”
“No way. I checked that one myself.” He scans the room, jaw tight. “Where’s the sheriff?” Then he stalks off, disappearing into the dark corridor.
The noise of the pageant swells behind us—applause, nervous laughter, the metallic crackle of the mic—but Ben and I are left in a pocket of shadow, only a few feet from everyone else, and yet apart.
A gust of wind slams against the glass. And my mind is a war of questions—what that open door means, and where Abel is, and how I’ll keep Mom warm enough through this endless night, and what Kennedy Claire might have done, and her last words to me:You nevercould think straight around him—but when I open my mouth, the one that comes to my lips is, “Why didn’t you try harder? All these years. There were a million ways you could have contacted me.”
His eyes meet mine. “I hoped you were happy,” he says, in that simple, matter-of-fact way Ben says everything.
Ben was always a quiet kid, but when he spoke, you felt like you could believe him. I think of the time I showed him some of the pictures I’d developed myself.They’re good, Ben said, and though my mom had already gushed over the pictures, going on about how talented I was, and buying a frame to hang one up in the stairwell, I didn’t feel it was true until I heard it from Ben.
I believed him then.
And I believe him now.
“I’m sorry,” I tell Ben, and I am sorry. Sorry he lost Izzy too. Sorry he lost his own family, sorry that I ever doubted him.
His face relaxes, like I’m the first person to see him in a long time, see him, and not just the things he’s been accused of. And in the dark, without the beard, he looks like the boy who gave me my first kiss. And I wonder if he sees me right now. Or if it’s Izzy he’s looking at. He never got to say goodbye to her either.
I lean in before I can stop myself and press my mouth to his. His lips are cold, but the kiss is warm, familiar. And despite it all, I feel something certain slip into my bones, like remembering the words to a song my heart knew all along.
And then a gunshot cracks the air.
CHAPTER EIGHTY-FIVESARAH LYNN
The gunshot rips through the room like lightning. One heartbeat I’m holding Hannah’s hand, the next it’s pure chaos—girls shrieking, scattering across the stage, the audience surging to their feet. Someone clips the tripod lights and they crash down, bulbs exploding in a white flash before everything plunges into black.
Girls shoulder-check me in their frantic rush off the stage. I lose Hannah’s hand, then find it again in the dark.
“Where did that come from?” she gasps.
My throat is tight. “The dressing room?”
“Olivia.” Just her name, but it’s enough. Enough to send us toward the sound, toward the danger.
I can’t see, only feel the crush of bodies, the heat of panic. My eyes strain, useless. We push toward the wings, palms dragging along the wall until the dim red glow of the exit sign finally shapes figures from shadow. Kayden, Billy, Teddy—all three of them bunched outside the dressing room door.
“The door is locked,” Teddy says, voice raw.
Beside me, Hannah whimpers.
“Where is Olivia?” I say, each word a silent prayer.
Billy looks wide-eyed. Teddy only shakes his head.
“Fuck it,” Kayden mutters, and throws his shoulder into the door. It crashes open, spilling yellow light into the hallway, and Kayden tumbles inside.
I lunge after him, grab his arm to pull him upright.
His sneakers skid. A wet squeak on the floor.
And then I see the blood.
CHAPTER EIGHTY-SIXMELANIE
I break into a sprint, boots pounding the corridor, breath tearing in my throat. “Girls? Hannah!”