It was easy to get drugs in these parts; easier than getting a job or affordable insurance, truly.
I clutched the empty vial in my hand, realizing that I needed to let the hospital know exactly what she’d overdosed on. As I tossed it back in the bag, between a tangle of clothes and toiletries, I spotted something else inside. A tiny piece of folded paper. A note written on one of the complimentary notepads the motel gave you.
The letter was addressed to me.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Natalie,
Is it better to administer the truth in small doses, or inject it all at once? I used to think I knew the answer, but I know nothing anymore.
I tried to tell a pretty lie. I told Jenny that her boyfriend was pursuing me and that we had slept together. I thought that would be enough. Sadly, I thought if she believed he was a cheater that would deter her even more than the truth. We women are strange … jealousy overrules fear most of the time.
Because I didn’t “sleep” with John at that party. The sex wasn’t consensual, do you understand? Her boyfriend was a rapey piece of shit. And when she got back with him, even after the cheating, I knew I had no choice but to share the ugly truth.
That’s why we were fighting in the parking lot. She didn’t want to hear what I had to say. She wasn’t ready for the truth. But finally, I convinced her. I told her about the rape. I told her that I was going to the police the next morning. John Bishop was a rapist who had to pay. I couldn’t let him do it to her, or some other poor, unsuspecting girl.
She was calm when I told her, understanding, but then she showed up over at Jack’s (your house). For so many years, I thought she went there for revenge. I was right—but it was a different sort of justice she had in mind. She didn’t want to steal the boy I loved; she wanted to destroy him. Just like she thought I was going to destroy John when I turned him in for what he did to me.
I think she accused your brother of rape. And maybe that’s why he killed her … because I didn’t, Natalie. I have nothing to lose, no reason to lie anymore. I did not hurt Jenny.
Jack never said he killed her, but I know he was hiding something. He said the proof was in the trunk. But I couldn’t find any trunks when I stayed at your house and I was scared to tell you … maybe the trunk of his old car? I don’t know and I don’t think I even want to know anymore.
I’d rather leave this world, letting them think I did it. Let your brother rest in peace. He was a good man; I promise he was.
I want to be with Jack now. Do you think I’ll see him where I’m going? Please pray that I do.
Love,
Chrissy
Chapter Twenty-Nine
As I drove home, my body shook—fear, cold, exhaustion, adrenaline … I couldn’t be certain which. Why would Chrissy do this? My thoughts jettisoned from guilty to angry to guilty again…
The proof is in the trunk.
Chrissy suggested a car trunk, but that wasn’t it. My brother drove a truck before his suicide, and I’d sold it a few months after returning to the farm.
The windows of my car were all the way down, air pushing against me. The wind knocking me dangerously side to side on the road, like some unseeable force trying to stop me—trying to prevent the inevitable…
The proof is in the trunk.
Moments later, I was home, running through the drenching rains to get inside.
First, I dialed the hospital, breathily explaining the bottle I’d found in Chrissy’s bag. Not the letter. I told no one about the letter I found.
“Can I come to the hospital and see her? Is she going to make it?” I braced myself for the emergency room operator’s answer. She sounded distant and busy, the squeaky sounds of a busy ER in the background.
“Only when, and if, she becomes stable, she can have visitors. But family only,” she told me.
Family only.
But Chrissy had no family. And for the most part, neither did I.
“But will she be okay? Can you tell me that?”
The woman groaned on the other end. “I can’t give out medical info, dear, okay? But … she’s stable. Your friend is stable for now.”
“Thank you,” I breathed, hanging up the phone with a relieved whoosh.
Chrissy might have been ready to leave this town, this earth … but Austin and the powers of the universe weren’t ready to let her go. Not yet at least.
Her suicide letter shook in my hand as I paced back and forth in the living room. I couldn’t stop thinking about the Cornwalls’ trailer, empty and desolate. No traces of the past left behind.
That wasn’t the case with my family’s farm. Evidence of our past was still here, right here, hiding in plain sight. Pictures and letters … boxes of stuff downstairs. But the real question was: where is Jack’s trunk?
Because the moment I read the letter, I knew which trunk Chrissy meant. Not the trunk of a car, but his prized trunk—the place where he’d kept parts of himself hidden away as a boy.
Is that where he hid the murder weapon?
But I haven’t seen that old trunk in years!
It had been years since I’d even thought about the trunk; it hadn’t been here when I moved in, which didn’t seem strange. Over the years, we’d all gotten rid of past toys and possessions … not seeing it never struck me as odd, and frankly, I hadn’t even realized it was gone.
I had no idea where to look for it. Could there be
