North Starr

22

Scott picked up Melanie and drove to Stiles' house.

Sheriff Stilinski frowned while they told him about Matt. "So this kid's the real killer?"

Melanie nodded. "Yup."

"No."

"Yes!" Stiles exclaimed.

"No."

Stiles threw his hands into the air. "Dad, come on. Everybody knows that the police look for ways to connect their victims in a murder, okay? So all he had to do is, like, look through their transcripts and figure out which class they all had in common."

"Yeah, except for the fact that the rave promoter Kara wasn't in Harris' class."

"All right, okay, you're right, sorry. Then I guess they dropped the charges against him?"

The sheriff shook his head. "No, you know what? They're not dropping the charges. But that doesn't prove anything."

"H-"

Sheriff Stilinski turned his gaze to his son's friends. "Melanie, Scott, do you believe this?"

"Oh."

Scott and Melanie nodded before the latter said, "It's really hard to explain how we know this, but you gotta trust us. We know it's Matt."

Stiles said, "Yeah, he took Harris's car, okay? Look, he knew that if a cop found tire tracks at one of the murders, and that if enough of the victims were in Harris's class, that they'd arrest him."

The sheriff sighed. "All right, fine. I'll allow the remote possibility, but give me a motive. I mean, why would this kid want most of the 2006 swim team and its coach dead?"

Melanie scoffed. "Maybe because the swim team sucks?"

Stiles pointed to her and said, "They haven't won in, like, six years. Okay, we don't have a motive yet. I mean, come on, does Harris?"

Sheriff Stilinski frowned at his son. "What do you want us to do?"

"We need you to look at the evidence," Scott replied.

"Yeah, that would be in the station, where I no longer work."

"Trust me, they'll let you in," Stiles answered.

The sheriff looked at his son. "Trust you?"

"Trust -- trust Scott? Or Melanie?"

"Scott and Melanie I trust."

Melanie smiled sweetly and Stiles pouted.

---

They got to the station and there was a deputy at the front desk. "It's 2:00 in the morning."

Sheriff Stilinski shot her an apologetic look. "Believe me, I wouldn't be here if it wasn't extremely important."

"We look at hospital stuff first, okay?" Stiles told them.

Melanie frowned. "Why?"

"Because all the murders were committed by Jackson, except for one, remember?"

Scott nodded. "The pregnant girl, Jessica."

Stiles glanced to his friend. "Yeah. Since Matt had to kill her himself, somebody from the hospital could've seen him."

"Thank you. Boys. Melanie," Sheriff Stilinski called.

They browsed the security camera footage and the sheriff sighed. "I don't know, guys. I mean, look at this. There was a six car pileup that night the hospital was jammed."