Page 16 of Finding Our Reality

“Why would you shatter her jewelry box? That’s how you found this, you broke it?”

“I don’t think that’s relevant. It’s a hard story to explain.”

He nods, giving me some latitude. “But what about other people who were in your house after her disappearance?”

“Who, Ry? You?”

His jaw twitches.

I count off the people on my fingers. “My parents. Marcum. Leary. Uniformed police. Uncle Ray. Aunt Teresa. Raylee. Holt. Ridge. Cullen. Their parents. Janine. Caleb. Kristie. Hudson just a time or two. And you. That’s it.”

“Hudson was in your house?” His words are bitter and deadly.

So, he knows. I don’t know why I thought he wouldn’t. Marcum and my family may not have talked about me, but it’s highly doubtful that he would live in this town and not know. “Yes, Hudson.”

This time the muscle in his forearm twitches. He stretches his fingers to stop the renegade movement. “What about the news people? All of those interviews your parents did?”

“They did all the interviews from the Big House. No one ever came into our section of the house. Even when they had visitors or parties, the Children’s Wing was off limits. How could they play the part of the doting, overprotective parents if they showed the world that they blocked their children off with a long hallway and a locked door.”

Bypassing that comment, he goes back to my list. “Janine? Your old nanny?”

I grab a bottle of water from the small, glass-door cooler in the corner of the room. “May I?”

“Everything in this room is ours. For the foreseeable future.”

I take several swallows to cool my flaming throat. “She came back from Arizona for a few weeks to help with the search. It was devastating to her. We were basically her daughters.”

“And what about Kristie?”

“What about her?”

“I never liked her.”

I tilt my head. I figured as much. He made a few comments in the past. He didn’t like her coming and going as she pleased. “She wouldn’t have put the pictures in Carrie’s room. She doesn’t know any of the people in these pictures.”

He sits back in his chair, eyeing me. “I caught her high once.”

“You what?” Did I hear him right? “You mean when she showed up drunk?”

“No, before that. She was high as a damn kite. I could tell in her eyes.”

I blink. “High on what? Weed?”

“I’m pretty sure it was pills.”

I clench my teeth. “And you didn’t feel the need to tell me that? She was in my house.”

“I didn’t wanna upset you.”

I snort. “My, how the tables have turned.”

He lowers his voice. There’s a tremble to his whisper that hurts my soul worse than it should. “I upset you? Now?”

Be a bitch. Protect yourself. Wrap your armor around your heart. “Just being in the same zip code with you upsets me.” His eyes widen at my honesty. “Can we please get back to the pictures? Focus on our job.”

Using his gloved hands, he spreads the pictures out between the two of us. “Fine. Read them. Tell me what you see.”

I don’t even look down. “I see your brother. That’s what I see.”

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