Page 35 of Her Dying Secret

“It’s a protein bar,” he adds. “Your favorite flavor. Birthday cake.”

Spit fills my whole entire mouth. “We’re not supposed to eat those.”

“I checked this one. Just like the others. It’s okay to eat. I wouldn’t offer it to you if it wasn’t.”

I make my hand go slow when I take it from him and also when I open it. The smell is so delicious that a weird feeling goes through my whole body. I think it’s called anticipation. I might not be a regular, normal person who goes to school but I know some big words. It tastes so good, I want to cry again. I don’t understand my brain sometimes.

“Remember to bury the wrapper when you’re finished,” he says. “Things will be very bad if it’s found.”

This is one of the most special-est treats that he brings me, and the rarest. I know he is trying to make things nice between us again. I know he won’t tell me about the blood, but this is a good time to ask questions.

“Did you give her back? Like you promised?”

He stands up and sighs. “I’ll get you a new coloring book, okay? Maybe a book to read.”

I hate the way my heart soars when he says these things because I know he’s trying to distract me from the fact that the only bad person here right now is him.

TWENTY-SIX

Josie and Noah drove to the stationhouse. The arrest warrant for Seth Lee was their top priority for the moment. Turner sat at his desk, throwing his tiny foam basketball over and over again into the small net next to his blotter. He didn’t look up when they walked in and waited until they were seated to speak. “Let me guess. Jane Doe died from a stab wound.”

“You’re so smart,” Josie said, intentionally keeping the sarcasm from her tone.

Turner’s gaze snapped toward her, confusion creasing his forehead. Josie liked it when he didn’t know what to make of her, or when he wasn’t sure if she was insulting him or not. Let him wonder.

Noah said, “Her name is April Carlson. We’ve got a lot to catch you up on.”

Josie started preparing the arrest warrant while Noah brought Turner up to speed. She kept glancing over at him while Noah spoke. It was difficult to tell if he was listening. Most of the time he wasn’t even looking at Noah, his gaze wandering around the room. Using his feet, he rocked the seat of his chair back and forth. His long fingers drummed against his desk, unless they were throwing his tiny basketball at its tiny hoop. If Noah noticed any of this, he didn’t let on. When he finished, he asked, “What did Mira Summers say when you asked her about Seth Lee?”

Turner leaned forward and dribbled the foam ball along the surface of his desk. “She didn’t say anything. By the time I got up there, she’d already been discharged. Some work friend came and picked her up. Bobbi Ann Thomas. Summers is staying at Thomas’s house, which is good since Stabby Stabberson is still out there.”

Noah said, “Did you try to follow up with Mira Summers at her friend’s residence?”

Turner pushed his chair away from the desk and tried to make a basket from three feet away. As usual, he missed. “This isn’t my first day, LT. Thomas said she was resting. Refused to wake her up. Told me to come back later.”

Josie stopped typing. It had been hours since they saw him outside the morgue. “Did you go back later?”

Turner reached for the ball again. Threw it. Missed. “No, because the LT wanted me to do a bunch of other shit. Speaking of which…”

He picked up a stack of papers from his desk. They were clipped together in a thick pile. He tossed the packet across to Noah and resumed playing desk basketball. “Summers’s phone? A whole lot of nothing. She didn’t make any calls on Sunday morning and didn’t get any. No text messages either.”

“What about Friday and Saturday?” asked Josie.

“She texted back and forth with Bobbi. They talked about work and yoga class. On Saturday, Summers had a reminder text about her stable session on Sunday and some dentist appointment coming up next week. That’s it. Pretty sad for a woman her age. Lonely spinster with a cat by the looks of it.”

“So every woman who lives independently is sad?” Josie said, immediately regretting taking the bait.

A smirk lifted one side of Turner’s mouth. “Come on, sweetheart. There’s gotta be something wrong with her if she doesn’t have someone in her life, don’t you think?”

Bastard.

“Or she keeps meeting people like you and decided it was far better to be alone, champ,” Josie shot back.

She glanced at Noah, who was flipping through the reports. To anyone else, he’d look stone-faced, but she knew him well enough to know that the purse of his lips was him holding back laughter. Before Turner could respond, Noah asked, “Social media?”

“She’s got Instagram and TikTok accounts. Looks like she uses both to view other people’s shit but not post anything of her own. Probably because her life is so damn boring.”

This time Josie ignored his comment.

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