Page 53 of Everything She Feared

“Okay if I sit here?” Benton indicated the chair at Katie’s desk.

She nodded and Benton turned it and sat, dwarfing her workspace.

“I’ll leave you guys to talk.” Sara forced a smile, then left, closing the door behind her.

“May I sit with you on your bed?” Pierce asked.

Katie scooched over.

“Thank you. You pretty much told us everything about Anna. But we’re here in case you forgot, or we forgot, anything, and to ask you some new things. Will that be okay?”

“Okay.”

“And because we want to get things right, Carl’s going to record us, make a video on his phone for our notes, like before. Okay?”

Katie nodded.

“And we’ll keep this confidential, private, which means we can’t tell people what you tell us and you shouldn’t tell anybody what we ask you, okay?”

“Okay.”

Pierce then casually relayed a summary of the events, confirming details with Katie from the previous interviews she’d given to her and Deputy Hirano. Katie listened, answering Pierce’s occasional questions, clarifying aspects leading up to and after Anna’s fatal fall. As Katie spoke, she gently twisted the tiny gold heart on the fine chain around her neck.

“I like your necklace,” Pierce said. “Where did you get it?”

“Anna gave it to me, that day.”

“It’s pretty. Can you hold it so I can take a picture on my phone?”

Katie raised it and it sparkled in the light as Pierce took a photo.

“Thanks,” Pierce said. “We didn’t know that Anna gave it to you. When did she do that?”

“On the bus, just before we got off. She told me the night before, on the sleepover, that Tanner gave it to her and that she didn’t want it. He wouldn’t take it back, so she was, like, going to throw it away.”

“She wanted to throw it away, why?”

“Because she was mad at Tanner.”

“Why?”

“I think he had another girlfriend.”

Pierce weighed the information.

“Katie, do you remember at the park, I asked you what you and Anna talked about on the bus and at the park, but you never mentioned her giving you the necklace. Why’s that?”

Katie thought, shrugged, then lowered her head.

“I guess I forgot. So much stuff was going on. I’m sorry.”

“Where did you put it after Anna gave it to you?”

“In my pocket.”

“And this was on the bus?”

“Yes.”

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