Page 148 of Through the Water

Or, if she had, she’d recovered from the death quite nicely.

Dean’s laptop fired up with a chime and, after stabbing his password in, he shifted his attention to the back seat. “Gonna tell us why you’re here this time?”

She took me by surprise when she matter-of-factly answered, “Ari’s necklace.”

“What?” I wrapped my hand around the pendant protectively and scooted closer to the window. “Not how you’ve been alive this entire time? Or why you’re dressed as a reporter? Just here for the necklace?” My voice rose with each word, leaving me almost shouting toward the end of it.

Ashlynn winced. “I was going to explain everything, but I know what the necklace is, even if you don’t.”

“It was a gift from Tristan after he tried to kill me in a car accident! But if you want it so badly—” I unclasped the chain with shaking hands and tossed it at her. “Here, take it! Now, you have everything you came for!”

My chest rose and fell with a dull ache. It would have been easier to accept she was dead, but the truth was that she’d left me behind without a second thought.

“Do you know how we all grieved for you?” I mumbled, blinking back the tears. “He might have pretended like you never existed, but we never got over it. It changed everything.”

Tsega’s sympathetic eyes met mine in the rearview mirror, but I turned away to watch the cars around us.

Ashlynn didn’t answer immediately and instead, began rummaging through her purse, probably pocketing her new piece of jewelry.

“Ari,” she said softly. “Can I show you something?”

“No,” I replied, petulantly adding, “Tsega, would you mind dropping Ashlynn off at the nearest gas station? I’m sure she can find her way to her home, wherever it is.”

“Stop! I want to show you what you did—”

“What I did?” I snapped, turning back with a flare of anger. “What about—wait, what are you doing?”

“Watch,” she murmured, slipping a silver pin into a small hole hidden in the center of my pendant. It opened with a soft click, revealing a thumb drive.

My mouth fell open. I reached up to pinch my arm as hard as I could, just to ensure I was still awake.

There was a tense moment of silence, during which Dean arched over the console, studying the device like it was a cipher, while my heart flailed helplessly against my ribs.

He carefully lifted it from her palm and asked, “What’s on it?”

“Why don’t you plug it in and find out? If I’m right, there’ll be more than enough evidence to put Tristan away forever,” she stated with more than a hint of bitterness. “Something you could have done six months ago had you not dismissed my theory on there being a second laptop somewhere in the house.”

“Under his bed,” I blurted, before covering my mouth in surprise. Tristan had hidden a laptop in the same place I’d hidden my treasures, but there was no earthly reason for me to have known that.

Unless…

Someone within my own house was conspiring against me.

My stomach knotted, and I licked my dry lips, pushing past the feelings of lightheadedness. Now was not the time to vomit or pass out.

I thought I was running away that night, but I wasn’t. I’d been fighting back. And if Ashlynn had the key to my necklace, it meant she hadn’t abandoned me.

We’d been working together.

My face scrunched up in confusion, everything in me rejecting the idea that I’d been part of a conspiracy to overthrow my father. I wasn’t brave enough.

“I-I don’t understand,” I stammered. “He told us you were dead. Does Matt know? Does Tristan? Where have you been hiding? How did I get the necklace?”

It was two years’ worth of questions in one sentence.

Ashlynn gave me a watery smile and reached for my hand. “If it wasn’t for Matt and his family taking me in, I wouldn’t have survived. Let’s just say they have certain connections that even Tristan couldn’t break. Agent Simons tracked me down not long after I left, wanting to know if I had any information that might help the FBI build their case, but I didn’t.”

“Tsega.” I was still having some trouble picturing the woman as a federal agent. To me, she was still a tech from True North.

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