Page 58 of The Missing Half

“Okay.”

I snap my head sideways. “ ‘Okay’?” Mere days ago, Jenna was like a freight train of determination to talk to Brad, to prove his guilt.

She sighs. “What? Do you not want me to believe you?”

I want you to tell me what the fuck happened,I think. Instead, I say, “There’s more. There’s a lot we didn’t know about.”

“Like what?”

So I tell her. I tell her about Sandy discovering Kasey and Brad in the alley, and about how Sandy confronted my sister at work. I tell her about Kasey asking for money and her trip to the lake the night she went missing, which still leaves 250 miles unaccounted for on the car.

“Something occurred to me last night,” I say after I’ve given her every detail I can remember. There was so much to recount, we’ve already made it to my apartment. Jenna’s put the car in park, but the engine’s still running. “What if Kasey and Jules were wrapped up in something?”

“What d’you mean?” she says.

“Kasey wouldn’t have asked for that kind of money unless she was desperate. Desperate why, I don’t know. To get out of something, maybe, to pay somebody off. But it looks similar to what Jules did in 2009, doesn’t it? She started acting off and withdrawn, then out of nowhere, she quits her job, moves her entire life, and never tells you why? It all points to something big, don’t you think? Bigger than the two of them.”

Jenna is quiet, so I keep going.

“What if we were right from the start? What if all of this has something to do with McLean? I mean, we got sidetracked with this whole Brad thing, but McLean’s always been a suspect. We still need to look into him. I know the police believe his alibi, but what if they got it wrong? McLean knew both of our sisters, and he’s definitely shady enough to be involved in something. The timeline is throwing me because all that stuff with your sister happened three years before she and Kasey went missing. But what if…”

I glance at Jenna, but she’s staring at a spot on the steering wheel with a faraway glint in her eye.

“Jenna?”

“What?”

“I was talking about McLean. Was there anything that could’ve pointed to Jules being wrapped up in something with someone like that? Did she ever seem desperate for cash? In 2009 or 2012? I know we’ve gone over this a million times, but maybe we missed something.”

Again, Jenna is quiet. A minute turns to two.

“Jenna?”

“Do you ever just imagine Kasey on a beach somewhere?”

I freeze, my coffee cup inches from my mouth. “Um. Sorry, what?”

“For years, whenever I’d think of Jules, I’d always think of the night she was taken. I’d picture her standing beside her car as some stranger creeps up to her in the dark. I’d think of the way he might’ve held a knife to her throat or slammed her head against the top of the car. I’d think of all the violence he could have done to her, of the pain and fear she would’ve felt and the casual way he would’ve taken her life.”

I’m startled to see tears welling in Jenna’s eyes. It’s the first time I’ve seen her cry.

“But recently,” she continues, “I’ve starting thinking about her somewhere else. Somewhere where she’s free and happy. Somewhere where her body is her own. Jules always wanted to go to Thailand—that was her dream vacation. And recently, when I think of her, that’s where I try to imagine her. I imagine her on the beach in cutoff shorts and an oversized T-shirt, her toes in the ocean. Sometimes, I put a piña colada in her hand. And the only reason she can’t call is because the cell reception is shitty.” She lets out a watery little laugh as she turns in her seat to face me. “Do you ever do that?”

When I think of my sister, the oldest she ever gets is nineteen. She’s a teenager curled in her bed, playing with my hair as we laugh about some long-forgotten inside joke. Or she’s in a strange room, duct-taped to a chair, bruises on her face. She’s driving a car, singing with the windows down, or she’s a pile of bones in the earth. I don’t imagine her with a present and future, because that was taken from her a long time ago. “No,” I say. “I don’t do that.”

“You should. It makes things easier.”

“Fine. I will.” I won’t.

Jenna looks at me expectantly.

“What?” I say. “Now?”

“Yes. Close your eyes and picture Kasey somewhere safe. Somewhere she always wanted to go.”

“Jenna. I don’t want to do this right now.”

“Just try it, Nic.” Her voice is unusually forceful.

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