Page 34 of Do Not Disturb
I don’t even know what to say to that. My sister opened the door for the police officer, and God knows if there was somebody pointing a gun at her head while she gave all the right answers. If Scott had only stepped inside…
“You’re sure you don’t know who those messages were from?” Scott asks.
“If I did, don’t you think I would tell you?” I snap at him.
That’s yet another piece in the puzzle. Besides Derek’s iPhone, he also had a burner phone in his pocket. Scott claimed that just prior to his death, he was texting with another woman. Planning to meet her for a rendezvous at his house while he believed Quinn to be at work.
“She could be a witness,” Scott points out.
“Or she could have killed my sister.” I glare at him. “You’re examining that possibility, aren’t you?”
“Of course,” he says. “We’re examining every possibility.”
There is one thing on Quinn’s side here, and that’s the fact that I’m pretty sure Scott is still in love with her. It’s been a decade since they dated in high school, but he still hasn’t gotten married. Doesn’t even have a serious girlfriend, from what I’ve heard. I remember the year after Quinn left for college, Scotty looked like a sad puppy dog every time I saw him. I stopped going into his father’s store because every time I did, he would be there sweeping the floor or working the cash register, and he would ask me about Quinn in that hopeful voice.
He was almost obsessed with her.
Another officer is calling to Scott from inside the house. He glances behind him, then back at me. He tries to blink away the frozen raindrops on his pale eyelashes. “I’ve got to go, Claudia.”
“You’ll call me if you find out anything?”
“I will. I promise.” He pauses. I’m sure it’s a lie. “And you’ll call me if you hear from Quinn?”
“Of course,” I say.
But that’s also a lie.
As he walks away, I reach into my purse and pull out my phone for the hundredth time. I select Quinn’s number from my favorites list. I let it ring.
And ring.
And ring.
Pick up, dammit. Please, Quinn. It’sme. It’s your sister.
“Hi! You’ve reached Quinn’s phone! Please leave a message at the beep.”
I grit my teeth. I didn’t expect her to answer, but I’d been hoping. I’m not sure if she even has her phone anymore. If she had it, she would have picked up by now. Even so, I leave another message.
“Quinn, it’s Claudia.” I grip my phone tighter with my freezing hand. “Please call me back if you get this.Please. Whatever happened, we’re going to figure it out. I promise you. Just… call me back. I love you.”
I hang up the phone. I stare down at the screen, willing it to ring. But, of course, it doesn’t.
Right now, Quinn’s husband is dead.Murdered. Quinn is gone and so is her car.
In my mind, there are two possibilities:
The first is that whoever killed Derek also did something to Quinn. When Scotty showed up at her house, there was somebody hiding behind the door with a gun, ready to shoot her if she said the wrong words. And she’s currently tied up in a trunk or in some underground dungeon without access to her phone.
The second possibility is that Quinn is the one who killed Derek.
It’s hard to imagine the second possibility. No, Quinn and Derek did not have an ideal marriage. She complained about him alot, to the point where I wasn’t sure why she stuck around. But my sister isn’t the murdering type. Even when she was a teenager, she couldn’t even bear to smash a beetle she found crawling in her bed—she would make me capture it and set it free. Hell, she didn’t even like throwing the ball at people duringdodgeballwhen we were kids. I can’t picture her stabbing her own husband in cold blood and leaving him bleeding to death in the middle of her kitchen. The same kitchen she and I spent hours flipping through magazines together in our attempt to make it into The Perfect Kitchen. She wouldn’t. Shecouldn’t.
Maybe Quinn wasn’t that wild about Derek, but she had a good life. The idea that she would stab him to death... I just can’t imagine it.
So by process of elimination, that means she’s being held captive somewhere. And we’ve got to find her.
I'm going to find you, Quinn. I triple dipper promise with a cherry on top.
