by David Bell
He followed her, hurrying. The denim from her jeans made a sharp brushing noise as she walked away from him, and Jared had to jog to reach her before she made it to the living room.
“Wait. Please.”
She stopped. He started to reach out and touch her arm, but some instinct told him to back off, that no one as angry as Tabitha was wanted to be touched at a moment like this.
But she had stopped.
She kept her back to him, her shoulders moving as she breathed heavily with anger.
“I’m sorry,” he said again. “I was just . . . I didn’t mean anything.”
She didn’t respond. But she didn’t leave. He took that as a good sign, one that meant he still had a chance to keep her in the house for a little while longer.
“I didn’t mean to insult you or your dad. I don’t care where you live. I was just being a smart-ass. I do that sometimes.”
“It’s not . . . That’s not what I’m mad about.”
“What, then?”
“Forget it,” she said. “I should go.”
“No, I want you to stay. Please?” Jared decided to pull out all the stops, open up the way he wanted her to. If he was going to lay it all on the line, he figured this was the time to do it. “I want to tell you something else. About Celia. And my mom. About what I had to do with her disappearing.”
She turned to face him, her eyes open wide.
And she stayed.
David Bell is a bestselling and award-winning author whose work has been translated into multiple foreign languages. He’s currently an associate professor of English at Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green, Kentucky, where he directs the MFA program. He received an MA in creative writing from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and a PhD in American literature and creative writing from the University of Cincinnati. His previous novels are Since She Went Away, Somebody I Used to Know, The Forgotten Girl, Never Come Back, The Hiding Place, and Cemetery Girl.
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