by Clara Kensie
Courtney killed Miss Buckley.
Chapter Sixty-Four
Ever ~ Present Day
My best friend, Courtney Nolan, is a killer. And Courtney is missing. No one knows where she is. She was last seen at the Little Warriors Training Camp, but she disappeared when her father was arrested. The Training Camp was called off once the news spread about the arrests of Brandon Lennox, Chief Paladino, and then Coach Nolan. Javier Soto turned himself in.
There are cops and reporters all over Ryland. The cops are looking for Courtney. The reporters are looking for Ash and me. A helicopter flies over town, its propellers making a whup-whup-whup sound when it’s above our house. I don’t know if it’s a police helicopter or a news helicopter.
Ash and I are hunkered down in my family room with a couple of cops for protection against the reporters outside. Principal Duston and Devi Mallick are here with us as well, conferencing in the kitchen.
Joey’s home too. News of Ryland’s chief of police and MLB Hall-of-Famer Brandon Lennox being arrested right outside our house had already reached the Yosts at the campground, and concerned and curious, they ended their trip early and came home. Joey’s disappointed his camping trip was cut short, but he’s too excited by all the commotion to give it much thought.
The family room is a mess: the broken coffee table, the spilled glasses, the scattered books. In the clutter, I spot the romance novel I used to fight off Brandon Lennox. I give a silent thank-you to the woman on the cover who looks like my mom.
I use our landline to call my dad, who’s awake and recovering, but still too groggy to talk much. I tell him I got stuck at home, but I’ll be there as soon as I can.
Next I call Courtney, not expecting her to answer, and she doesn’t. I tell the police that her mother lives in Cleveland, so they alert the search team to look for her on the highways heading there. “I feel so helpless,” I tell Ash. My ribs ache. But I’m on pain pills, so maybe the ache is coming from my heart.
Questions spiral around in my mind, but I’m too distressed to organize them into a mental, numbered list. Instead, I ask them aloud to Ash. Why did Courtney push Miss Buckley down the stairs? Did she know all along what her father did all those years ago? Did she know that Vinnie Morrison was innocent—is that why she was trying to stop Ash and me from investigating Lily’s murder? Did her father make her kill Miss Buckley? Did Paladino? She was so distraught when Miss Buckley died. Was that anguish caused by guilt, or was it all just an act?
Ash doesn’t have the answers, but he keeps his good arm around me, stroking me with his thumb. Occasionally, he kisses the top of my head. Joey catches him doing it and giggles.
I shift closer to Ash and brush a kiss on his jaw. His messy dark hair curls around the collar of his dirt-stained T-shirt. He’s so gorgeous, even now, with stitches under his lip and his tired, troubled eyes. He gazes at me with those eyes, soulful and dark. “You’re so beautiful.” He sighs, and I love him so much that I can feel it in every cell of my body.
Principal Duston comes out of the kitchen. Ash pulls me closer but doesn’t lash out. I think he’s starting to trust him now.
“The guys in the copter spotted someone on the bridge over Deep Creek,” Principal Duston says. “They think it’s Courtney.”
Chapter Sixty-Five
Ever ~ Present Day
It takes us under ten minutes to get to Railroad Bridge. Principal Duston drives, but when we reach the movie theater on Main Street, Ash tells him to pull over. We can get to the bridge faster on foot from here than driving around the long way. I leave Joey with Principal Duston and Devi Mallick, and Ash and I dash as fast as we can, sliding through the hole in the fence, dashing across the pebbled lot and along the tracks through the woods, until we reach the creek.
Courtney is sitting on the bridge, wearing a Little Warriors Training Camp T-shirt, her black hair in braids behind her back.
When she sees us, she scrambles shakily to her feet. “Get back. Stay away.” Above us, the helicopter whup-whup-whups. On the other side of the creek, a police cruiser’s red-and-blue lights flash in the parking lot beyond the field, and a train horn wails in the distance.
“Court,” I call. “We can work it out. We can help you.”
“It was an accident,” she says.
“Of course it was!” I yell to her. “Come back here and tell me what happened.”
She shakes her head. “I just… I saw her messages to my dad on his laptop and he told me what he did. I know it was awful, but it was so long ago. He’s a good person. It was just one mistake.” She speaks through her sobs. “The next day I saw her in the back stairwell. I was just going to talk to her, to make her understand. But I… I don’t know what happened. I didn’t mean to push her. I didn’t mean to kill her.”
“It’s okay, Courtney!” Ash yells. “We can help you.”
Above us, the helicopter hovers, tilting, perhaps looking for a place to land in the field. Across the creek, the cops are getting out of their cruisers. I wave at them to stand back. I don’t want them to spook my friend.
The ground rumbles, vibrates. The train is in view now, coming closer. The engine’s single headlight is getting bigger, brighter, the horn louder. “Courtney, get off the bridge!” I shout. “Everything will be okay. Come to me. Please.”
“Come on, Courtney. You can do it,” calls a familiar voice, sweet and young.
“Joey?” I look behind me, and my little brother is walking toward the bridge.
Principal Duston comes running up from the woods. “He ran after you,” he says, panting. “I tried to stop him but he’s too fast.”
“Joey, stop,” I say, but he ignores me. He continues walking to Courtney.
“Ever showed me how to cross the bridge,” he says. “It’s easy. You just have to be very careful and you have to hold someone’s hand. Come on.” He takes a step closer to Courtney, extending his little hand to her.
“Joey, get back here!” I cry.
The train is coming closer. The horn blows. Startled, Joey looks up and freezes.
I run toward him, but I slip and fall, and this time I know my ribs must be broken. “Court!” I scream. She’s closer to Joey than I am. “Get him!”
She’s standing in the middle of the bridge; Joey’s frozen a few feet away. She’s hesitating, looking first at the train, then at Joey, then at the train, coming closer, closer, faster, faster, its horn blowing madly.
“Get him, Courtney!” I scream. “Joey!”
In a flash, Ash runs onto the bridge and scoops up Joey, then drops him onto the bank. Joey cries and runs to me, crushing me, and somewhere in my brain I register the pain in my ribs as he hugs me, but all I can think is he’s safe, Ash saved him, but Courtney is still on the bridge and the train is still coming, and Ash is running back onto the bridge, heading for Courtney, heading for the train, and the train is huge and loud and close and it’s on the bridge, closer and closer and bigger and bigger, huge, immense, monstrous. The whistle blows, the tracks tremble, the ground shakes, the train is feet away, inches away, and Ash reaches Courtney and pushes her into the creek, but he—
Brakes screech and squeal and scream, horns blow, the train roars by—the longest train in the world; it won’t end. Principal Duston grabs me and holds me back, and I scream, scream, screeeeeam, louder than the train whistle, louder than the roar of the wheels on the tracks. “Where’s Ash? Where is he?” Courtney’s bobbing in the creek, but where’s Ash, oh God, oh God, oh God…
Finally, the train passes, getting farther away, and the whistle stops blowing and the ground stops shaking. I yank myself from Principal Duston’s grip and run to the bridge, clutching my ribs, not caring about the pain. Two cops are in the creek, pulling out Courtney, but where’s Ash? I don’t see him. I can’t look on the tracks. I don’t want to see what’s left of him—
“Hey, beautiful,” a voice rumbles from behind me.
I turn, and there he is, soaking wet, covered in mud a
nd seaweed. My gorgeous boyfriend. I collapse into him, sobbing with relief. “How—?”
“I jumped into the creek on the other side,” he says. “Then I swam to shore and climbed up the embankment. Easy.”
“With one arm in a sling?”
He shrugs with his one good shoulder. “That’s why it took me so long.”
Chapter Sixty-Six
Ever ~ Present Day
He catches me on the Summerhayses’ porch, coming up behind me just as I’m about to knock on the door. “What are you doing here?” he asks in that delicious rumbly voice of his. “It better not be to withdraw yourself from the scholarship.”
“What are you doing here?” I ask back. “It better not be to withdraw yourself from the scholarship.”
He grins. “Busted.” The stitches under his lip are starting to dissolve, leaving a tiny scar that makes me want to kiss it constantly.
“You’ll win it anyway,” I say. “You deserve it more than I do.”
“No, you’re going to win,” he counters. “You were the one who brought the whole thing to light. If it weren’t for you, my dad would have been executed yesterday. Brandon Lennox would still be free, and Paladino would still be running this town.”
I sigh. We can add Coach and Courtney to that list too. Unlike Paladino and Brandon, the coach and Courtney were both released on bail and are on house arrest until their trials. Devi Mallick informed us that Coach, as an accessory, will likely get the same sentence as Paladino: life in prison. Courtney, who’s just months away from eighteen, will be tried as an adult for voluntary manslaughter. She’ll probably get ten years and will be released in five.
Javier Soto was also arrested for his part in sabotaging the Piper. Even though he did it because Paladino threatened his daughter, he’ll most likely be convicted of attempted murder in the second degree.
The prosecution team is going to recommend that Brandon Lennox be sentenced to death, just as they recommended Vinnie Morrison be executed. Everyone knows it won’t happen—his celebrity status practically guarantees that—but he will most likely spend the rest of his life behind bars. He has enough money and fame that the best defense lawyers in the country are offering to represent him, but he hasn’t hired anyone. He confessed that Diana Buckley delivered the first blow to Lily the night of her murder, pushing her into the brick fireplace hearth, and that he finished her off in order to protect both Diana and himself. He and Diana stayed a couple for about a year after graduation, and she even went to Florida with him. But the stress and guilt was too much to handle, so they broke up and she came back home to Ryland. He says his life has been utter hell since the night he killed Neal Mallick and he just wants to go to prison and serve his time.
“The car accident that killed Neal Mallick eighteen years ago destroyed so many families then, and so many families now,” I say.
“I know,” Ash says. “But how do you think Lily would feel about what you did?”
“She’d be glad I did it.” I know this, because I’m glad I did it. She is me, and I am her.
“Exactly. You need the scholarship for yourself and for Lily. I’m withdrawing.” He raises his fist to knock on the door. “You need it. You deserve it.”
I pull down his arm. “You need it and deserve it just as much as I do. I won’t let you give it up.”
“And I won’t let you give it up.” He grins. “We’re at an impasse. What should we do?”
I grin back. “Let’s let the Summerhayses decide. No interference from either of us.”
He considers it, then nods. “No interference. Deal.” He puts his arm around me, still a little stiff from his shoulder injury. “Come on. I’ll walk you home.”
He turns serious as the sun shines down on us. “How’s your dad? Settling in okay?”
“He’s tired and sore, but he’s okay.” I took Seth Siegel up on his offer to take Joey and me to get our dad at the hospital in Illinois and bring him home. On the way there, Mr. Siegel said that when he was a teenager, Paladino got him out of some scrapes that he otherwise should have been arrested for. Stupid things like shoplifting, underage drinking, and buying weed from Vinnie Morrison behind the movie theater. But he grew up and cleaned himself up, while Paladino had only become more corrupt.
We got back with Dad yesterday, the same day Ash brought his own father home. Vinnie is living in a small apartment just outside of town, and Ash is helping him get adjusted to the outside world after spending almost two decades behind bars.
“Maybe your dad can get a job at Siegel Freight,” I suggest to Ash. “Mr. Siegel is really generous. He’s giving my dad a twelve-month paid leave, and when he goes back to work, a job as the office manager. With a pay raise. Mr. Siegel might be able to find something for your father too.”
“I’ll tell him,” Ash says. “But is your dad happy about the office job?”
“I think he’s apprehensive about being around Joey all the time,” I say, “but I gave him the number of a grief counselor and he took it. So he’s trying. When I left to come here, he was watching SpongeBob with Joey. It’s not much, but it’s a start.”
Ash and I walk in silence for a while. We’re both mourning so many people, so many things: Courtney, Miss Buckley, the years Vinnie Morrison lost to prison and injustice. But there’s also a sense of peace and contentment as we walk. I feel free, liberated, right.
We turn onto my driveway. Across the street, Keith is in his own driveway, getting into his car, wearing a Batter’s Box polo. I give him a little wave, which he returns with a nod. We haven’t spoken since the morning of my birthday, before the plane crash, so there was no formal breakup. But he knows it’s over. Even if he hadn’t cheated on me, even if I hadn’t fallen in love with Ash, it would be over. He wanted to marry his childhood sweetheart, but I’m not that person anymore. He wants who I used to be, not who I am now.
Keith looks at Ash and nods at him too. Then he gets in his car and drives away.
“You know, I did a Google search for Neal Mallick last night,” Ash says, smiling a little as we step onto my porch. “Found his obituary. Strangest thing. He died on the exact same day I was born.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Same time, too. I was born a few minutes after midnight, and Neal was killed right around that time. Cool coincidence, don’t you think?”
I stop, stand on my tiptoes, and kiss his neck on the soft spot under his jaw. “That,” I say, “is a very cool coincidence.”
Chapter Sixty-Seven
Ever ~ Present Day
The Lily Summerhays Memorial Scholarship Announcement Ceremony is a semi-formal affair held in the high school’s conference room. Usually the only people who attend are the committee and the finalists and their families, but this year many of our classmates come to watch, and there are several reporters too. It’s in the auditorium this year.
I wear a nice dress, a new one, loose to account for the bandages around my ribs. The arrests of several of Ryland’s most respected citizens was just two weeks ago, but I’m still too sore to balance in heels, so I have to wear my black ballet flats. Joey pulls at his little red bow tie and scuffs at his new dress shoes. His button-down shirt is already half untucked. Our dad swings in on his crutches, insisting on leaving his wheelchair behind. He’s wearing his old suit, but it’s fresh from the cleaners, so it looks new.
Ash wears a new sport coat and navy blue tie. The stitches under his lip are barely visible. He comes with his dad, who is wearing a brand new suit and tie, and his mom, who is wearing a pretty floral dress. His parents are not getting back together, but they are cordial to each other. Vinnie gives me a hug, a gentle one because of my ribs, and almost cries when he thanks me for clearing his name. He has a lot of work to do to get reintroduced to life on the outside, he says, but he promises to make Ash and me as proud of him as he is of us.
Principal Duston is here, smiling, and Devi Mallick is with him. They had their first date last night, and now they’re holdin
g hands. Twice I catch him kissing her cheek. She blushes, then kisses him back.
Mr. and Mrs. Summerhays arrive last, he in a gray suit and she in a dress and heels. Her auburn hair is down today, the first time I’ve seen her like that, and it makes her look younger and vulnerable. When they see Ash’s dad, they freeze, just for a moment, then acknowledge him a tiny nod. He nods back. They’re all victims, but there’s too much to say, too many feelings to process, and there hasn’t been enough time to heal eighteen years of pain. That will come later.
The Summerhayses ignore the reporters’ questions and walk straight to the stage to take their seats with Principal Duston, who shakes Mr. Summerhays’s hand and gives Mrs. Summerhays a hug. The scholarship committee is now only three people, two people fewer than a month ago.
The oversized poster of Lily Summerhays is displayed on the stage, the one that shows her smiling demurely, her copper hair hanging straight down her back. That’s not the real Lily. The real Lily was wild and fearless and impulsive and reckless. I think each one of my previous incarnations had those same traits. I rarely died in the same place I was born, so I know I traveled a lot. I usually died doing adventurous and heroic things. The impulsiveness and recklessness ended with Lily, driven away by terror when she was so brutally murdered by trusted friends. But the fearlessness survived, hiding itself away in me until now. And now I’m going to set it free.
Ash comes up behind me as I gaze at Lily’s poster. He wraps his arms around me and pulls me close.
The Summerhayses are looking at me, and Mrs. Summerhays gives me a small smile. There’s something maternal and affectionate in her smile, and I know, my heart soaring and sinking at the same time, that the scholarship is mine.