Dead Ringer

53

The soundless vacuum of Ciar's sobs haunted me the whole way home, filling my mind and my lungs and my heart until I had no room left to dwell on Clarissa's lies.

He'd watched Tilda kill herself. He'd seen her jump. The woman he loved, tipping off the Tobin like I'd wanted to fall off the Golden Gate Bridge the night Mark had stopped me. Maybe Ciar had tried, maybe he'd made a grab for her as she fell.

But he had failed. She was gone.

Had she said anything? Given him a tiny smile before she went? Had she even known he was there?

Had she cared?

His haste to jump into the lake after me so many weeks ago made perfect sense now.

If I really stopped to think about it, I was an idiot. When the police had called me to say she'd washed up on the shores of the Mystic, I hadn't questioned how they knew she'd jumped from the Tobin Bridge. Its name alone had completely driven everything else from my mind, turning it into a beacon.

As I pulled up to my apartment, I threw a glance at the SUV surreptitiously parked in the neighboring driveway. The outline vaguely visible behind the tinted windows was male. Where was Clarissa? Researching the women I'd thrown through her window? Or following me around Boston?

It didn't matter, because when I climbed out of my car, someone else was already standing in the driveway.

Tall, blond-haired, and with the sun backlighting his silhouette, I couldn't make out the finer details of his face. My heart hammered as my thoughts bolted out of control, stampeding in an ever-increasing cycle of Mark? Donovan? Mark...no, Donovan.

Who do I want it to be?

Neither of them, and both of them, really.

I wanted Mark to still care, but I also never wanted to see his face again since he couldn't even be bothered to answer when I called.

I wanted to face Donovan and tell him I knew him, all of him, the ugly bits and the betrayal. But I also knew that if I wanted to find out the truth about the missing women, I couldn't say a word.

Tilda may have really fallen victim to suicide, but the others still deserved justice. And I couldn't deny the possibility that, while Donovan might not have pushed my sister off that bridge, he'd probably played a part in driving her there.

Either way, I hated him.

And yet, when I got close enough that the house blocked the sun and I recognized him, the first thing that jumped out of my mouth was, "Where have you been?"

Idiot. Stupid, stupid Maisye.

Then: Maybe it's not stupid. He needs to think I still need him.

He cocked his head. "What do you mean?"

I hated how easily the answer came to me. "I mean that I haven't heard a word from you since you showed me the...the locked room"—I couldn't bring myself to call it a nursery—"and do you even have any idea what's happened since then? I got arrested! They think I killed someone!"

"Shh. Hey." He reached for me, and I took a step back. "It's okay. I know. We'll figure it out."

"You knew?"

"Of course." He stood there, his arms outstretched as he waited for me to come back to him. "I know people on the force. They know we're—that we know each other."

They know we're what? Did you show them a tape of me, too?

I bit my tongue before the question could escape. "You knew and you didn't come back?"