Page 81 of The Teacher
I wish more than anything that I could tell Hudson everything that happened tonight. I wish I could tell him and he would understand and then tell me exactly what to do. We used to have that kind of friendship—the kind where he would do absolutely anything for me. But then he did do absolutely anything for me, and now we’re not even friends anymore.
“I made some bad decisions,” I finally say.
“Okay…”
I can’t tell him. I want to, but I can’t. In spite of the fact that Nathaniel left me out here, I can’t betray him.
So instead of answering his question, I turn away and look out the window. We don’t say another word during the entire drive. At one point about fifteen minutes before we reach our destination, his phone buzzes, and I’m scared his parents have realized he’s gone and now he’s grounded for all eternity. But he doesn’t even check his messages. I’m aware of his eyes glancing my way at the red lights, but I try to ignore it. For his own sake, it’s better he doesn’t know. And if he did, he would definitely never speak to me again. Not for the rest of our lives.
When we arrive back at my house, Hudson turns to me one last time. His pale blue eyes look sad. “You can still talk to me if you need to, Addie,” he says.
I bite back a comment about how his girlfriend probably wouldn’t like that. “Okay.”
He frowns. “I mean it. I’m here for you if you need me. And I’m sorry I’ve been kind of a jerk to you last year. What happened… It really messed up my head for a while. I couldn’t even look at you without seeing…well, you know.”
I bow my head. “I know.”
“But…” He squeezes the thighs of his jeans with his long fingers. “You’re still my best friend, Addie.”
Again, I get that urge to tell him everything. I want to so badly. But he’s only just forgiven me, and I can’t risk it. But there is one other favor I desperately need from him.
“There’s one other thing I need you to do for me,” I say.
“Anything.”
I look him straight in the eyes. “You can’t tell anyone at all that you picked me up tonight.”
He places a hand on his chest. “I swear I won’t tell.”
I hope he still feels the same when we get to school on Monday and he discovers that Mrs. Bennett has gone missing.
Chapter Sixty-Three
NATE
When the morningsun dawns on the horizon, I am momentarily surprised to find the space next to me in bed is empty.
Despite my recent lack of affection for my spouse, her companionship is something on which I had learned to rely. Every morning, she was beside me in bed—me on the left and her on the right. Her absence is so disconcerting that for a moment, I feel around her side of the bed, searching for her silhouette.
And when my hand touches only the cold sheets beside me, I feel a rush of relief.
Eve is gone.
She set out to destroy my life, and in the course of one night, I managed to solve this problem. Eve is dead—Addie has either buried her in the ground or was caught attempting to bury her after I drove off. And the photographs Eve took on her phone have been deleted from her device, which is buried in the ground with her.
I am a free man.
I rise from the bed, stretching luxuriously. If things had gone differently last night, I would be stumbling out of a motel bedroom, likely clutching my aching back. When Addie called me, I was sitting at a bar, nursing a glass of scotch, contemplating my next move. I didn’t realize that phone call would solve all my problems.
Out of curiosity, I reach for my phone, which is charging on the nightstand. I’m not surprised to see several messages from Addie at around three in the morning. Some of them are slightly different, but they all amount to the same thing:
Where are you?
Poor, wretched Addie. Stuck in the middle of that pumpkin patch in the middle of the night. Truly, I hated to do it to her. I am not a monster. I do hope she made it home in one piece, although it would make my life easier if she came to a bitter end last night while trying to hitchhike with some trucker. I stare down at the phone, wondering if I should risk one last message to her.
No, I can’t. I don’t know who has her phone right now. I’ll simply have to trust that she heeds my final words of wisdom.
Deny everything.
