by Kara Thomas
“Kat.” He’s full-on sobbing now.
He knew when he suggested running away together—it was the reason he suggested it—the reason why he didn’t want to come home—
If we go back, we can never be together.
“No.” I cover my mouth. “Oh my God. Oh my God.”
“Kat,” he pleads. “We didn’t grow up together.”
“Let me the fuck out of the car, Jesse.”
He wipes away his tears with the back of his hand. The second the lock clicks, I stumble out of the car, slam the door shut behind me over the sound of his sobs.
CLAIRE
MAY
The voice mail is brief.
“Claire, how ya doing? It’s Bill Novak. Give me a call.”
There’s no mention of Amos, or his death, on the recording, or of a summons to testify in any upcoming proceedings that will decide Kat’s and Jesse’s fate. I’d been waiting for the latter ever since Agent Cummings personally called me to break the news that Kat and Jesse had been found alive.
I’d nodded along as she recounted what details she was allowed to give, even though Cummings couldn’t see me.
Can’t say for sure what is going on—
—going to be a complicated investigation—
—you could be called to testify about that weekend.
The weekend on Bobcat Mountain, I’d had to remind myself. Not the weekend in Timsbury, New York, that never happened, as far as the FBI and police are concerned.
I’d thanked Cummings, told her to keep me posted. I went to my classes as if nothing had happened, watched the news of Kat’s and Jesse’s reappearance ripple through the student body for a day or two. I started and ended each day monitoring the news reports, waiting for the alert that Amos’s body had been found.
It never came. Kat’s and Jesse’s arrest never came, despite Brenda Dean’s nightly call for them to be charged with criminal conspiracy, the chorus of voices on Reddit backing her up.
I don’t read the threads much anymore, but I know the debate rages on among people who still care.
She was the mastermind.
He was the mastermind.
They’d actually been kidnapped.
The FBI has only commented to say that the investigation is still ongoing and active, and that they haven’t ruled out the possibility of charges being filed against the parties involved.
I took my last final yesterday morning. I drove straight home, no pit stops. Tonight, I worked my first shift at Stellato’s since returning home for the summer; tomorrow, Ben comes home, and I don’t know what will happen with that, but first, I have to finish burying her.
The girl in the mirror of the Sunfish Creek emergency room, bloodied and robbed of her memory. The girl in her dorm bathroom, sobbing under the steamy blast of the shower, praying that no one had seen her car fleeing that farmhouse in Timsbury or seen her arrive at the dorm building at four in the morning, a shivering mess.
I remind myself that I am here, in Brookport, behind the wheel of my car, parked outside Stellato’s. I’m right back where I started but I’m not the same. And I’m not going to hide.
I play the voice mail again, ignoring the slick of sweat coming to my palms. When it’s over, I call Novak back, wait for his grunt of a hello.
“Hi,” I say brightly. “It’s Claire Keough. You wanted to talk?”
* * *
—
He suggests meeting at a park not far from the FBI office, on his lunch break the following day. I find him on a bench, eating out of a Subway bag, not far from the entrance. Exactly where he said he’d be.
“Where’s Agent Cummings?” I ask.
“On vacation.” Novak dabs his mouth with a napkin. “She made sure to dump her paperwork on me first.”
“Is that why I’m here? To help with paperwork?”
“No.” Novak pops open a bag of Baked Lays chips, offers it to me. I shake my head. My insides have turned to solid rock, despite the fact that if Novak were about to arrest me for Amos Fornier’s death, he probably wouldn’t be stuffing potato chips in his mouth.
“Jesse’s new attorney called the DA’s office yesterday,” Novak says, taking a pull from his soda. “He’s talking.”
I bite down on the inside of my cheek. “What is he saying?”
“That it was his and Amos’s idea to stage the kidnapping. It was their grand plan to save Kat from Johnathan Marcotte.” Cummings sighs. “Kat didn’t know anything, and when everything went south, they convinced her she couldn’t go home or she’d be implicated too.”
A tingle in my hands. “And you believe that?”
“Of course I fucking don’t.”
I’m shocked to hear it come out of his mouth. I swallow. “Is Jesse facing any charges?”
“None that will hold up at trial. The only person we can put at the scene of the extortion is Mike Dorsey, and without Amos to testify that it was actually Kat’s and Jesse’s idea…” Novak shrugs. “I’m sorry, Claire. I know this is hard to hear, after what you went through.”
Not as hard as you’d think. “A lot of people think they’re guilty, though,” I say.
“Perception can change. Or be bought.” Novak’s mouth forms a line. “In lieu of Amos answering for his role in what happened, his family has reached a settlement with the town of Sunfish Creek. Marian Sullivan-Marcotte will compensate the sheriff’s department for expenses incurred during the search for Kat and Jesse.”
I fiddle with the drawstring at the neck of my thin hoodie, desperate to steer the conversation away from Amos. “I just don’t understand why she never told anyone about her father.”
“There are loads of reasons why abuse victims stay quiet. None of which you or I can really understand.” Novak crushes the empty bag of chips into a ball. “If new evidence emerges, we might be able to get them on lying to investigators. But putting an abused girl in front of a jury is a prosecutor’s worst nightmare. A lot of people witnessed the abuse over the years. Kat’s and Jesse’s lawyers are the best of the best—they’ll find anyone out there with a story to tell about Johnathan Marcotte and get them on the stand.”
“I don’t understand,” I say. “I thought Jesse had some random public defender.”
“He just retained Young and Associates, a criminal firm out of Manhattan.”
There’s no way Jesse could afford a fancy attorney without the Marcotte family’s help. Amos was right; Marian Sullivan-Marcotte really would do anything to protect her family, even if it means buying off the boy she hated. The boy her family had been destroyed over.
I lean forward, rest my elbows on my knees to match Novak’s stance. I bury my head in my hands and inhale.
“It’s not over until we hear what Amos has to say,” Novak says, mistaking my silence for disbelief. Despair, that they would get away with what they did, to their families, to me. “We’ll keep looking, but my guess is he’s on some yacht halfway around the world right now.”
He shrugs, as if to say there are actual missing people who need to be found, who deserve all the FBI’s attention.
“I’ve got to head to a deposition,” Novak says. “If there’s anything you need—you have my number, right?”
I nod, even though I know I will never see him again. There won’t be a trial for what happened that weekend; I won’t have to look Kat and Jesse in the eye as their lawyers call me a liar. I won’t have to be a headline again.
It’s a small comfort. I’ll have to live with the truth living in me like a cancer.
I was surprised at how quickly the fentanyl patch worked on Amos. He’d already been on the verge of passing out from how much he’d had to drink. I almost didn’t expect it to work, but I didn’t think twice about slipping it out of his pocket, onto his skin when he climbed on top of me, all to
o eager to pick up where we left off in his room three years ago.
It was easy. The choice between my escape and Amos’s life wasn’t even a choice.
I wonder, wherever she is now, if that’s how Kat felt when she decided to leave.
I don’t think I’ll ever know for sure. But as I’m finding out, there’s a lot I can live with.
I feel a little lighter when I reach my car. I tilt my face to the sun. Summer is close by.
While this is a work of fiction, emotional and physical abuse is a reality for many, regardless of age, gender, or socioeconomic status. If you or someone you know is experiencing abuse or domestic violence, you are not alone. Please contact the following hotlines:
CHILDHELP NATIONAL CHILD ABUSE HOTLINE
1-800-4-A-CHILD (1-800-422-4453)
NATIONAL DOMESTIC VIOLENCE HOTLINE
1-800-799-SAFE (1-800-799-7233)
I have endless gratitude for my editor, Krista Marino, who always sees the trees even when I am so deeply lost in the forest.
Thank you to Suzie Townsend and the entire team at New Leaf Literary, especially Dani Segelbaum, Joanna Volpe, Veronica Grijalva, Victoria Henderson, Pouya Shahbazian, and Hilary Pecheone.
Thank you to Agent Extraordinaire Sarah Landis at Sterling Lord Literistic and all my other early champions of this book, especially Courtney Summers, Kit Frick, Karen McManus, Erin Craig, and Rachel Strolle. Many thanks to my film agent, Will Watkins at ICM, for your enthusiasm for this book.
Thank you to everyone at Random House Children’s Books—Lydia Gregovic, Barbara Marcus, Beverly Horowitz, Elizabeth Ward, Kelly McGauley, Jenn Inzetta, Kate Keating, John Adamo, and Mary McCue. I am also eternally grateful to the art department for yet another beautiful cover.
Thank you to my supportive group of friends for their late-night brainstorming sessions and encouragement through multiple drafts of this book. Thank you to my family and everyone in my life who helped me keep a small human alive and entertained during said drafts.
And thank you to my readers. I hope this one was worth the wait.
Kara Thomas is an unsolved-mystery enthusiast who dreams of one day solving a cold case. She lives on Long Island with her husband, son, and rescue cat. She is the author of The Darkest Corners, Little Monsters, The Cheerleaders, and That Weekend.
kara-thomas.com
@karatwrites
@karathomaswrites
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