Two Sides to Every Murder, page 21
In just one week she’ll be boarding a plane to Key West and leaving this place forever. She can feel her excitement humming through her skin, pumping in her blood like adrenaline. Just seven more days until sun and sand and margaritas…
She’s come to the campgrounds to talk to her brother about the final details. She’s been trying to call, but he never picks up the phone and she’s tired of leaving voicemails. If they’re going to stay on schedule, they need to discuss when to move their mother over to his house, not to mention all the details of her care. There are lots. Karly’s been making notes for the past few weeks, making sure to jot down exactly when to give their mother her medication, when she needs to eat and walk and go to bed. So far, she has three whole pages in her notebook. She’s getting a little nervous, worried there won’t be enough time to teach Jacob everything he needs to know.
But no. She’s being silly. It’s just a few pages of notes. He’ll figure it out.
Jacob is out in the archery field when she gets to the campgrounds, unpacking archery equipment, getting ready for summer. His bow is leaning against the wall of the shelter, the wood gleaming in the dim light. As Karly approaches, he’s setting up the straw-filled targets in the field, hauling them out of the equipment shed one by one. They must be heavy because he’s panting hard, a sheen of sweat on his face. The target he’s moving still has an arrow sticking out of the bull’s-eye, a leftover remnant of the previous summer.
“Hey, Karly,” he calls out to her, his voice a grunt. She instantly feels her body go still and tight. He’s using that low, serious tone he only ever uses when he’s preparing to disappoint her. She knows that voice well.
All of a sudden, she’s nervous. She can feel what’s coming, and she already knows she’s really not going to like it. The only thing she can think to do is prolong this moment, keep him from saying whatever he’s about to say. She looks around for something to change the topic, to keep him from talking.
There’s an open box of assorted camp things next to the nearest target. It looks like a mix of whatever Jacob had to pack up at the end of last summer: some lost-and-found items, a camper’s missing flip-flop, an iPod, a rubber witch’s mask. Campers and counselors bring these masks every year, use them to scare the younger kids after dark. They’re a staple of Camp Lost Lake.
Karly plucks the mask out of the box, holds it up. “You planning on terrifying some little kids?”
Jacob gives her a weak smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. She doesn’t blame him. It wasn’t a particularly good joke.
He swallows and shifts his gaze to the ground. He’s working his mouth like he’s chewing on something and Karly knows, instantly, what he’s about to say. Her mouth goes dry and, in that moment, the only thing she can think is how badly she wants to stop him from speaking.
So she pulls on the witch’s mask and turns to Jacob like she’s trying to scare him. “Better get back into your cabin,” she says in a low, cackly voice. She even curls her fingers toward her palms. It’s all she can do to keep from shouting Boo!
This time he laughs, but it’s a low, pitying sound. He feels sorry for her. Karly drops her hands, anger bubbling inside of her. Screw you, Jacob, she thinks.
He rubs a hand over his chin and takes a breath. When he speaks, it’s in a rush, just trying to get the words out. “Look, Karly…there’s no easy way to say this, but…we’re not going to be able to take Mom next week, after all. Matthew…uh, well, Matthew came to us last night and confided that he’s gotten himself into some trouble. He, uh, well, he got someone pregnant, is the thing. Twins, if you can believe it. We all talked about it, and we agreed that the right thing to do is to take this girl and her babies in, help them out for a few years, just until Matthew graduates and finds a job so he can take care of his family himself.” Then, as if it makes up for anything, he adds, “I told Mom already. She’s disappointed, of course, but I think she’s excited to meet the babies.”
“Where is this girl’s family?” Karly sputters. “Why is it up to you to take care of her?”
“Don’t be that way,” Jacob says, frowning. “The kids are young, and twins are a lot of responsibility; they’re going to need all the help they can get—not just time, but money, too—and taking care of Mom on top of it all…it’s just too much for us right now. You understand, right?”
He doesn’t say it like he’s asking a question, he doesn’t ask, “Do you understand?” It’s a statement. You understand.
As in, you have to understand because I’m not offering an alternative. We all talked about it, and we agreed, he said. But that isn’t true. Karly didn’t talk about it. Karly didn’t agree.
Karly feels like the entire world has gone quiet and still and dark. She doesn’t understand, not at all. She’s already put her entire life on hold to take care of their mother. For fourteen years she’s put her life on hold. Jacob got to go to college, got to fall in love and start a family. And the whole time Karly’s been here, stuck in a town she despises, playing nurse, taking a job at the police force because it was the only thing she could train for locally. And they talked about this! They agreed it was Jacob’s turn, that Karly deserved a chance at having a real life.
What’s happening now is selfishness, pure and simple.
Karly does the math in her head. Four years until Matthew gets out of college. And then, what? It’s not like he’ll instantly be on his feet, able to take care of a new family. He’ll need time to find a job, earn a living, save up for rent on an apartment. And what if they have another kid? What if this girl wants to go to school, too? What happens then? Karly can already see it, how four more years will turn into eight, then twelve.
All around, the sky seems to simmer, the stars pulsing like distant heartbeats. Karly doesn’t even remember grabbing the arrow from the target. She doesn’t hear her brother ask her what she’s doing or tell her to put the arrow down. She can’t think, can’t see past the blood thumping in her temples.
She stares at Jacob, watching his eyes go wide, watching the way he trembles as he starts to back up, his hands lifting in front of his chest, like he’s warding off a wild animal. She doesn’t breathe. She just stares, the sound of her own heartbeat like cannon fire in her ears.
You deserve this, she thinks. Her anger is hot and all-consuming. She can’t think past it. The past and the future don’t exist. There is just this moment, him and her.
She lunges forward and stabs her brother through the throat.
Karly and Jacob used to go hunting with their dad when they were kids. Karly remembers shooting a deer once. It was her very first kill; she was only nine years old. She got the deer in the shoulder, took it down but didn’t kill it. She remembers walking up to the dying animal, her heart lodged in her throat. Its eyes were wide and scared, and it couldn’t stop shaking, trying to get back up, to run away. It released the most terrible sound, a low, keening wail. Karly will never forget it.
“You have to put it out of its misery,” her dad had told her, putting a heavy hand on her shoulder. Karly had been scared, but she’d lifted the bow and arrow—she and her dad and brother always used to hunt with bows and arrows—and she shot that deer in the head, killing it instantly.
Before this moment, that had been her most visceral experience with death. That deer in the woods, the sound it made right before it died. If she’d stopped to think about it, she might have thought that killing a man would be like that, that it would be hard and horrifying.
It’s not. Killing a man, it turns out, is quick.
Jacob’s mouth falls open after the arrow enters his throat. His eyes go wide, but he doesn’t seem able to focus them anymore. They roll around in their sockets for a few seconds, before landing on some point above him. His body jerks, and then he falls to his knees, blood pouring down his chest. Seconds later, he’s still. It’s that fast.
What did she do? Oh God, what did she do?
She’s still wearing that stupid mask. Her breath is hot and sour against the rubber. The smell of it fills her nostrils, making it feel like she can’t breathe. She thinks she might start hyperventilating. She grabs for the bottom of the mask and tries to pull it off, but her hands are shaking too badly, she can’t peel it away from her skin—
She hears a sound behind her. A creak of wood, a gasp of a scream. She whirls around and there’s a girl standing on the porch outside the camp director’s office, watching her. The girl’s mouth hangs open, and she doesn’t blink. It’s clear to Karly that she just saw everything.
Karly doesn’t think. There’s no time for that. She just snatches her brother’s bow and arrow from the ground, aims—
And shoots.
23
Olivia
The first thing we see when we get to the lighthouse is Officer Knight’s cop car parked at a reckless angle.
Andie swallows hard. “We should hurry,” she says. “Just in case…”
She doesn’t have to finish her sentence because my brain fills in the blanks. I hope we’re not too late.
We make our way around the car, toward the lighthouse. My skin itches as we get closer. The two of us look up in unison, cold fear spreading through us.
“I guess we have to go up,” I say.
“The stairs,” Andie says.
“What? They’re dangerous, right?” I glance at them, thinking that they look pretty sturdy to me, but I guess that’s the problem with rotten stairs—they look fine until you put your foot on one.
Andie shakes her head. “No, they’re just…loud. You can’t walk up them without alerting whoever’s at the top that you’re coming. If the killer’s up there, they’re going to hear us.”
I carefully place my foot onto the lowest stair, staying as close to the edge of the wall as possible. It’s the same thing I did earlier in the day when I was sneaking up to Mom’s office.
The stair is silent as I shift my weight onto it.
Andie looks at me, amazed. “When did you get so good at sneaking around?”
“It’s a gift I didn’t realize I had,” I tell her, quietly climbing up another step. “Follow me and stay as close to the wall as possible.”
Andie nods.
Silently, we begin to climb.
24
Reagan
“That’s why you murdered all those people?” I say, once Officer Knight has finished telling me her story.
She twitches when I say the word murdered. I can tell she doesn’t like that. Maybe she doesn’t want to believe she’s a murderer. “Weren’t you listening? Jacob expected me to just put my life on hold forever. To be our mother’s caregiver forever.”
“So you killed your family,” I say, my voice bitter. I’m not really trying to hide what I think of her anymore. Why bother? She’s going to kill me no matter how polite I am. “And not just them, but Gia North, too, because you didn’t want her telling anyone what she saw.”
Officer Knight licks her lips, but she doesn’t deny it.
“And now you’ve come back to kill me and Olivia, just so you can get some money?” I feel sick to my stomach. I’m desperate to sit down, take some of the weight off my ankle, but I’m sure that if I move even the slightest bit she’ll take me out. “And not just us, but also Sawyer, because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
But Officer Knight is frowning now. “I didn’t mean to kill that kid with the purple hair, but he stepped in front of you right after I took my shot. I get that you’re going to die thinking I’m a monster, but I never killed when I didn’t have to.”
“Jack—”
“I shot Jack in the shoulder,” Officer Knight explains, cutting me off. “He’ll live. In fact, I went out of my way to try to get you on your own. I could’ve killed you out in the woods, but I didn’t want to risk hitting another kid instead.”
“Yeah, you’re a real humanitarian,” I mutter. “What about that bear trap? Anyone could’ve stepped into that.”
“I didn’t leave a bear trap in the woods.” Officer Knight fits the arrow into the bow and raises it to her shoulder. Points it at me. “Any last words?”
I grit my teeth together, thinking, So unfair.
I say, “Wait.”
Officer Knight doesn’t lower the bow and arrow, but she lifts her head slightly. It’s the only sign she gives that she’s willing to listen to anything I have to say. This is my chance, my last shot. I feel something inside of me harden.
I’m standing at the top of a lighthouse, at a murder scene, with a rogue cop. I’m seconds from death. And I’m nowhere closer to clearing my mother’s name than I was this morning.
Screw this, I think. I’m done. I tried to do the right thing. And now?
Now, I just want to live.
Steeling myself, I say, “Maybe I can help you.”
Officer Knight stares at me, head cocked. “Why would you want to help me?” she asks, skeptical.
“The only reason I came to this horrible place was to clear my mom’s name,” I say, my voice shaking in a way that completely undercuts my confidence. It doesn’t matter, this is my only chance. I keep going. “I don’t actually care who the real killer is. We could help each other.”
Officer Knight stares at me, her expression giving away nothing. But she lowers the arrow so it’s no longer pointed at my face. “Has it occurred to you that maybe I don’t need your help?”
I have absolutely no idea how to respond to that, but I have to come up with something. “You were planning to blame this all on my mom again, right?”
“Worked out pretty well for me last time,” Officer Knight says, her tone dead even.
“Maybe, but it’s going to be a lot harder this time.”
Officer Knight just raises her eyebrows, clearly not believing me.
“She’s on her way here now, you know. She’s taking the bus, so there’s going to be evidence: bus tickets, witnesses, maybe even cameras…” I’m thinking on my feet, trying to come up with anything that might convince this cop that her plan won’t work, when I look from her face to her hands. Her strong, healthy hands, so different from my mom’s gnarled, arthritic ones. Hope leaps in my chest. “And she’s older now. She has arthritis all in her hands. Most days she can’t even drive our truck or tie her shoes. She’d never be able to shoot that thing.” I nod at the bow and arrow. “Any doctor will back me up.”
“You’re lying,” Officer Knight says. But she’s working her jaw again, grinding her back teeth together. She looks concerned.
“Look,” I try, “you’re clearly smart, otherwise you never would’ve gotten away with this last time. But no one’s going to believe my mom killed anyone this time around.” I wait, leaving space for Officer Knight to refute this or even offer some part of this plan I haven’t yet thought of. But she only frowns slightly. Like she’s thinking this over.
“We want the same things,” I continue. “And your story is going to be a lot more convincing if you have a witness to back you up.”
After a long moment, Officer Knight says, “If I took you up on that…what, exactly, would you claim to have witnessed?”
“The way I see it, you and I both need someone else to blame all of this on,” I say. “Another killer.”
“Got someone in mind?”
I say, “Andie Edwards.”
Officer Knight’s eyebrows go up.
I force myself to keep going. “No one knows that Andie Edwards was here that night back in 2008, but we found a video proving she was on the grounds and that she attacked Gia North. She’s the perfect person to take the fall.”
“You’d set your own family up for murder?”
I feel something move through me. A jittery, anxious feeling, the feeling I get when I’m about to do something I know I shouldn’t do. When I’m about to hurt someone.
When I think of family, I don’t think of Andie and Olivia. I think of my mom, kissing bumped knees and bruised shoulders, teaching me to ride a bike, telling me that I didn’t need to go with her when she went on the run, even though I knew it killed her to imagine letting me go, giving up her whole life to keep me safe.
It takes everything I have inside of me to swallow and push that feeling far, far down.
Out loud, I say, “Olivia and Andie aren’t my family. I don’t even know them.”
25
Olivia
Andie and I are crouched on the stairs outside the landing. We hear everything. I’m watching Andie as Reagan talks, so I see the pain flash across her face when Reagan says, “I don’t even know them.”
I feel something sick twist through my gut, a pocketknife plunged through my belly button and jerked up a few inches.
“How am I supposed to trust you?” Officer Knight is saying. She hasn’t lowered her bow completely, but the arrow threaded through it isn’t pointed at Reagan anymore. It’s pointed at the floor. If I were thinking clearly, I might’ve figured out that this was my moment. I might’ve darted out of the staircase and attacked her while she was still off guard, her attention entirely focused on someone else.
But I’m frozen in place, too shocked and devastated to move.
By the time it occurs to me to try to attack, Reagan’s already looking into the stairwell. I feel a jolt go through me as our eyes meet.
“Because Olivia and Andie are hiding on the stairs,” she says calmly. “If all I wanted to do was get away, I’d just let them attack you.”
Officer Knight reacts immediately, swiveling around with a jerk to aim the arrow directly at me. I inhale sharply, feeling every muscle in my body seize. She’s so fast. I was an idiot to think I might’ve been able to take her down. If I’d tried to attack her, she would’ve killed me for sure.
