Page 64 of Tell Me (Savannah 3)

No longer hearing any sounds from the other side of the door, she turned and walked in her stocking feet along the unheated corridor, which ran alongside an interior wall and eventually dumped into the garage. Her uncle’s escape route was now, hopefully, hers.

Quickly. Quietly. Running on tiptoes along the plywood floor that ran the length of the house, she reached the far end. Paused. Heart thudding. Listening hard. She heard nothing in the garage. Snapping off the light with one hand, she cautiously opened the door and found herself one step away from Aunty-Pen’s Mercedes, its engine still ticking, raindrops running down the windshield and off the hood. Wasting no time, she cut across the cement, skirting the water dripping from the luxury car, hoping she was leaving no footprints. At the main door, she slipped through. But only when she was on the far side of the property, out where she could breathe the fresh, rain-drenched air, did she pause to slip on her shoes and then hurry along the path wedged between the fence line and the foliage.

The day was dark, clouds blocking the sun, rain coming down in a torrent. Nikki glanced back once and saw, in the warm light of the kitchen window, her aunt’s silhouette as Penelope peered through the gloom.

For a second Nikki felt a twinge of remorse. What she’d done wasn’t right—was downright criminal, actually—as she’d committed a theft. But it was done now, and she realized she should probably feel a whole lot worse than she did.

Get the hell out of here before you get caught. She probably sees you already, so you’d better come up with a damned good story when you meet her again.

Feeling like a traitor, the keys and jump drive in her pockets suddenly weighted down like lead, Nikki let herself out the back gate to run past the campfire as she made her way to her car.

Once behind the wheel and on her way home, she could breathe again, feel a little better. Learning more information on what had led to Amity’s death would be worth it. Maybe she could finally help bring justice to her friend by exposing the truth. Maybe she could even assuage her own guilt a little.

“Come to the cabin, okay?” Amity had begged, her words seeming to echo through the interior of Nikki’s Honda. “. . . Please. It’s a matter of life or death!”

December 12th

Fourth Interview

“If you would just tell me your story, how you remember things,” Nikki Gillette begs from her side of the glass window, as if she pleads with me enough, she will finally get through. She’s gripping the dirty receiver as if her life depended upon it, her fingers clenched tight, her knuckles showing white in her desperation. “Talk to me. Let me know what really happened. If not to clear your conscience or to vindicate yourself, then, at least for those who died because of you.”

“Everyone dies,” I say before I can stop myself.

She blinks. Surprised. Her eyes spark with anticipation, as if she thinks she’s broken the dam of my silence, and when I don’t elaborate, she tries to bait me again. “I know, but this is different. This is murder.”

An ugly word. In an ugly place. My skin crawls whenever I let my mind wander down that forbidden path that reminds me I’m not free but locked away. If some had their way, the key to my freedom would be thrown away forever.

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nbsp; “I can help,” Nikki is saying, and I want to believe her—oh, how I would love to give into that soothing balm of trust, to open up and tell her everything, but it won’t help. Of course it won’t.

“You’re accused of awful crimes,” she is saying, her eyes wide, her eagerness for the truth palpable, despite the smudged glass and thick walls separating us. “Either you’re innocent and should want to clear your name, or you’re guilty, and if so, everyone wants to know, I mean I want to know the answer to a simple question: Why? Why would you do something so heinous?”

I bristle a little at that and feel my eyes narrow a fraction. Who is she to judge me? Who is anyone? Hopefully, I hide my irritation, and my facade must work because she’s still blathering on.

“Just help me understand. I know we’ve had our differences, for years. You never liked me hanging out with your daughter, but . . . please, for your children’s sake . . .”

My children. Oh, dear God, the innocents in all of this. I blink against a sudden wash of unwanted tears, and Nikki reacts.

“Tell me about them. The children.”

As if she doesn’t already know.

As if she hasn’t lived with the knowledge as long as I have.

As if she hasn’t had her own secrets.

“I want your story told,” she says, for what? The dozenth time? The hundredth?

I stand, slamming the receiver back in its cradle and motioning to the guard in one quick motion.

“No!” I’m sure she says, but I can no longer hear her or see her as I’ve turned my back to the window. Oh, I can feel her staring at me through that little pane, but I don’t look back. I thought I could do this, I thought I could say something, but I can’t, not yet.

I wonder about life and death and God and heaven and hell as I’m walked back to my cell. I believe in God. I do. I have. Even when heaven and hell were used to torment me and coerce me and the fear of God’s wrath was the reason I surrendered.

Once alone, I walk to my bed and fall to my knees to pray again. Squeezing my eyes shut as I invoke His name, I hope by everything that is holy that God is still listening.

CHAPTER 19

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