Reece shut the door, slid the chain back, and two uniformed officers stepped into the room. He waved to the female officer and gestured coolly to the file on the milk crate. “Hey, Rhonda. No need to search. I’ll spare everybody the drama. It’s right there.”
The other officer crossed the room and inspected the tab. He thumbed through the file, pausing to glance at me over the photos, and then nodded to his partner. She approached Reece and turned him face-forward against the wall. He didn’t resist. She smiled apologetically, as if they knew each other.
“Sorry, Reece, but you know the drill. You’re under arrest for obstruction of justice.” She snapped the first cuff shut and recited the rest of his Miranda in a monotone voice. “Do you understand these rights as they have been read to you?”
Reece nodded, his face turned in profile against the wall as the second cuff clicked shut. He craned his neck, speaking over his shoulder to her as she patted him down. “Do you think you can give us a minute?”
“Make it quick,” she said, dropping back a few feet. The blue uniforms stood close to the door, hands on hips, listening to their radios.
Reece spoke in a low voice, careful not to be overheard. “You need to know something. We busted Lonny after the rave. I’ve been in lock-up all night. We had to make him think I got busted too. I grabbed your file when they released me this morning, and I left the reports from last night’s bust on Nicholson’s desk. Lonny made a deal and turned over a list of his ketamine buyers,” he said so quietly I almost couldn’t hear him. “You weren’t on it . . . but Jeremy was.”
“Jeremy?” I stared at Reece. That just wasn’t possible. It had to be a mistake. Jeremy wouldn’t buy street drugs, let alone from someone like Lonny.
I took a step back. “No. They’ve got the wrong Jeremy. There’s more than one Jeremy at West River. There has to be someone else I know on that list. Who else did Lonny sell to?”
The officers paused their conversation and turned toward us. Reece spared them a glance and pitched his voice lower. “Vince.” He bent to look me in the eye and whispered, “Think about it, Leigh. You know he’s not smart enough to pull off something like this.”
But Jeremy? Jeremy was smart, and he knew me better than anyone. He knew I read the Missed Connections. He had access to my locker. He’d been at every crime scene. And he and Anh . . .
Nicholson’s question haunted me. Do you know the person who wrote these ads, Miss Boswell?
“What are you saying?”
Reece didn’t speak, his thoughts implicit in his silence.
I shook my head. My heart warred with itself. All the clues, all the circumstantial evidence fit. Anyone who didn’t know him as well as I did could actually believe he did this.
“Maybe you’re wrong,” I said, desperate to believe it. “Maybe it isn’t the same Jeremy.”
Reece put his lips close to my ear and whispered, “Leave town, Leigh. Get out of the state. Get someplace safe until I’m . . .” I felt him pause for a breath. “Just get away until this whole thing blows over.”
“I can’t!” I whispered back. Where would I go?
The officer cleared her throat in warning. Reece pulled back and raised his voice just enough to satisfy her. “Try. For me. I’ll be gone at least two weeks, and that’s if things go well.” If not, then they’d send him back to juvie. He’d risked everything. His future. His freedom. For mine.
“Take the trash out before you leave.” He aimed a meaningful glance toward the sofa. “And try not to do anything stupid while I’m gone.” He straightened as the officer laid a hand on his shoulder.
I shook my head. They couldn’t take him. This wasn’t his fault.
“If you get into trouble, call Gena,” Reece said quietly. “I’ll find you when I’m out. I promise.”
They escorted him to the door. His cuffs rattled and something crumbled inside me. He stopped in the doorway and turned.
“And Leigh? I always knew you were worth it.” He smiled weakly as the officers closed the door.
I pulled back the curtain and watched through the window as he ducked into the squad car and the door snapped shut. Reece didn’t look back.
39
I knew something wasn’t right the minute I stepped off the bus. Sunny View was too quiet. No filthy puddle-jumping kids with shaggy hair pitching gravel in the street, the usual troublemakers nowhere in sight.
I paused beside a neighbor’s trailer. I could just make out the corner of my own a few yards away. A car was parked in front, but we didn’t own a car. The dark blue Crown Victoria sat catty-corner in the street, its front fender leaning into our trash cans. There were three antennae on the roof and extra lights mounted in the rear windows. An unmarked police car. I couldn’t see my porch from where I pressed up tight against the neighbor’s siding, but I heard a persistent knocking on my door.
I patted my pockets as I backed up the street, retracing my steps to the bus stop. I’d left the phone in Reece’s apartment and locked the door behind me when I’d left. No way to call Gena. And nowhere to run.
I jumped at the snap-clink of a lighter flipping shut. Lonny perched on his saggy front porch, elbows on his knees. His tank top was moist at the neck, tattoos blooming like ghosts through the thin white cotton. He squinted at me, reaching slowly behind himself into the waistband of his jeans. He laid something between his legs. The silver barrel glinted in the sun. We stared at each other while he lifted the cigarette to his lips. His exhale felt like a bullet between the eyes.
A screen door slammed on the opposite side of the street. I turned slowly. TJ stood barefoot on his front step, holding a trash bag full of empty cans. His uncle was slurring and swearing through the open door, but TJ didn’t seem to hear. He looked at me with his brows drawn together, and then to the gun between Lonny’s legs. The two locked eyes. TJ set the trash down, but he didn’t go back inside. Instead, he watched.
I slipped quickly between the police car and my porch, and stood behind the two plainclothes officers. Lonny’d spent the night in jail because of Reece, and his girlfriend was dead, maybe because of me. He wouldn’t think twice about shooting me, but he’d think twice about doing it in front of two cops and a witness.
My mother stood in her robe in the open door. Her hands weren’t visible, and the detectives stood at the bottom of the porch, eyeing her cautiously. Sweat trailed over their temples and darkened their collars, their balding heads cooking pink in the sun. My mother kept her eyes square on their faces and said, “Nearly, get inside.”
I scrambled past the officers and under her arm. “Gentlemen,” my mother said sharply, “my daughter is a minor. I know her rights. You need my consent to ask her anything or to come inside my home, and I’ve no intention of giving it to you.” They couldn’t see her fingers close over the baseball bat she kept behind the door. “You’d best be on your way.”
The older one placed a toe on the stoop. “We just want a few words with her . . .”
The bat came off the floor, and my mother’s voice dropped low. “We’ve got nothing to say, unless you’ve got a warrant.”