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Dropping my hands to my lap, I fidgeted restlessly. “On her body.” Guiltily, I looked up at him and blurted out, “Too many things that have happened too many times and are too coincidental to be explained away as an accident.”

Gibsie’s eyes narrowed as awareness dawned on him. “Things like bruises?”

I nodded slowly.

“Where?”

“Everywhere.” I released a pained sigh. “All over her body, Gibs.”

“Shit.”

“At first, I thought she was being bullied again—” I paused and scrunched my nose up, feeling like a piece of shit for breaking her confidence, but this was eating me up. “She had a shitty time at BCS, Gibs. A real fucking bad time, lad. So I fixed it—or at least I thought I had, but…”

“But?”

“But I know it’smorethan that, Gibs. I know I’m sounding like a madman, but this is real to me. I know there’s something going on. I remember her telling me something the other night,” I growled, furious with myself for not retaining the crucial piece of the jigsaw. Because I knew in my bones I was missing something vitally important. “And now I think I’ve figured it out.”

“You have?” Gibsie asked, sounding more serious than I’d ever heard him speak. “You’ve got a name?”

Nodding slowly, I looked him in the eyes, begging him not to judge me for saying what I was about to say. There was a chance that I was off the mark—a huge, colossal, Grand Canyon–sized chance, but I didn’t think so, and the risk was worth her safety.

“I think it’s her da, Gibs.” Swallowing down my uncertainty, I looked my best friend straight in the eyes and said, “I think Shannon’s father is abusing her.”

I was a mathematician by nature, and the common denominator in every problem I tried to solve regarding Shannon Lynch was her father.

She saidfather. She told me that. Iknewshe had.

She told me something about her fucking father.

I just couldn’t be certain what it was.

For days, my mind reeled, going back over every single conversation I’d had with her, trying to find something I knew I was missing.

No matter what I did, or how hard I thought about it, my mind kept returning to that first day, to the conversation we had when she was only semi-aware of what she was saying:

“Here.” I trailed my finger over the old mark. “What’s this from?”

“My dad,” she replied, breathing out a heavy sigh. “My dad’s going to kill me,” she continued to choke out, clutching her torn skirt. “My uniform’s ruined. Johnny,” she groaned and then winced. “Johnny. Johnny. Johnny. This is bad…”

“What?” I urged. “What’s bad?”

“My dad,” she whispered.

If I was wrong about this, and there was a huge chance that I was, she would never forgive me. I figured I was already in the doghouse over the way I acted, but accusing her father of abusing her would be the nail in the potential coffin for us.

You’ve probably already fucked yourself over there, too, Johnny, lad…

Fuck.

I was losing my bleeding mind as my brain concocted the most depraved, disgusting, inhuman, drug-induced thoughts.

Was Shannon’s father hurting her? Was he abusing her? Was that what was happening?

Was I being ridiculous? I was ashamed of thinking the thoughts I had, but they were there in my head, loud and proud and driving me batshit with anxiety.

I’d never met Shannon’s father, but surely her brother or mother would have stepped in. I’d met her mother once; granted it wasn’t the friendliest of encounters, but the woman genuinely seemed to love her daughter.

She looked well. Healthy and pregnant. Shannon’s brother was strong and fit. Her other brothers were practically babies.

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