Page 27 of The Sleeping Girls

June squeezed her eyes closed for a moment. When she opened them, tears filled her eyes.

“I’m sorry, June. None of this is your fault.” Ellie turned to the grandmother. “Louise, someone took a photo of the girls in the locker room at school and posted it. You didn’t know they were taken, did you, June?”

June shook her head vehemently. “No.”

“There was also a meme,” Ellie said. “Did you see it?”

June’s face colored. “It was so mean.”

“Yes, it was,” Ellie agreed.

“I don’t understand.” Louise fidgeted. “What does this have to do with Kelsey?”

“I’m sorry to inform you of this, Louise, but your granddaughter and her friends were being bullied.” Shock registered on Louise’s face when Ellie showed her the photograph. “According to Mitch, Kelsey was really upset about it and ran into the woods. She said her life was over and even threatened to jump off the ridge.”

June gasped. “No… she wouldn’t do that.”

“She told Mitch that her father would kill her,” Ellie continued. “Was she afraid of him? Did he ever hit her?”

Denial swept over June’s face. “No, she was just being dramatic. I mean he was strict and didn’t want her dating. But he never hit her.”

“Do you have any idea who posted the photo of you and your friends in the locker room?”

June glanced at her grandmother, who looked shaken. Still, Louise squeezed her granddaughter’s shoulder in a comforting gesture. “If you know, tell her, June.”

“I’m not sure, but we thought it was Bianca Copenhagen. She’s one of the popular girls. She was really upset when Mitch asked Kelsey to Homecoming.”

Ellie assured them she’d do everything she could to find Kelsey, then headed back outside. Phone in hand, she called Deputy Landrum. “I may know who posted the pic and meme of the girls. Another student named Bianca Copenhagen. Find out where she lives and bring her and her family in for questioning.”

TWENTY-SEVEN

RED CLAY MOUNTAIN

Signs for Homecoming at the local high school mocked Digger as he maneuvered the switchbacks of Red Clay Mountain. The ten miles between the high school and his old homestead felt like a hundred, each mile steeped with tension. Dusk had come and gone and, with the storm clouds, the sky was as black as his soul.

For fifteen years he’d been haunted by his past. He had to see the house where it had all gone wrong. Maybe if he did, he’d remember details that had gotten lost in his befuddled brain a long time ago. Like what had possessed him to take his little sister’s life.

The shocks were worn out on the old clunker, making every bump and pothole jar his back. He rolled down the window to breathe in the fresh air, something he’d never take for granted again.

A tractor trailer barreled around the curve, and for a brief second Digger thought about jerking the wheel toward it and plowing straight into it. But Caitlin O’Connor’s voice fought through the darkness.

“I think you got a raw deal, Darnell,” Caitlin said the first time she’d interviewed him for her podcast. “You were just a kid.All the evidence is circumstantial. I’ve watched the tapes of your confession, and something doesn’t add up.”

Truth was, he didn’t remember confessing. All he recalled was the shock of looking down at his sister’s pale dead face and hearing his stepfather’s bark.You killed her, Digger!

Then his half brother’s tormented face bleeding through the haze.You killed Anna Marie.

A horn honked from an ongoing car and his tires skidded toward the shoulder as he yanked his eyes back to the road. Raindrops began to ping off the windshield, slashing though his open window, but he still couldn’t bear to close it all the way. He rounded a curve then spotted the rusted sign for Hog Hill, the dirt road leading toward his old homestead.

The tall pines and oaks boxed him in as he maneuvered the narrow stretch and he thought he spotted a wild boar rutting in the muddy brush. Fat raindrops collected on the windshield as the wind picked up, and he flipped on the defroster, then the rotting wooden house slipped into view like a monster rising through the fog.

Home sweet home, hethought with a sickening knot in his belly.

The place looked smaller than he remembered, the clapboard structure dilapidated, mud-splattered and overgrown with patchy weeds. Broken bare tree limbs and twigs had been scattered across the property. The sharp ridges jutted out over rocky terrain and the hard red clay.

As a kid, he’d thought the thin brittle branches on the trees looked like skeletal hands reaching out to snatch him.

This part of the mountain was known for rumors that its deep, Georgia red clay was the devil’s land.

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