Where the Blame Lies

But she nodded quickly. “Yes. The man I had an affair with. The police believe the other two women found murdered had a relationship with him as well.” She looked between all of them. Reagan’s eyes widened as she seemed to still completely. Cooper’s lips parted in surprise. “I’m just wondering if you might be able to think back, remember anything about him that might help.” She shrugged sort of helplessly. “I don’t know, but . . . some small thing might be helpful.”

She looked first at Cooper, who shook his head slightly as though shaking off the shock. “I didn’t know the guy,” he said. “I only knew his name through you. I knew you were upset about things ending.”

That wasn’t totally accurate. She’d been upset about finding out he was married, and had a difficult time letting go. She’d latched on to him, her dysfunctional emotions making it hard to walk away. But she nodded anyway. When she looked over at Reagan, Reagan was looking down, her hands fidgeting in her lap. She glanced at Evan again and sighed. “Maybe it doesn’t even matter, but”—she cast her eyes downward again—“after you went missing, we were all beside ourselves. We spent so many hours printing flyers, making calls to news stations, just trying to get the word out and then to keep the story alive.”

A knot of guilt twisted in Josie’s stomach. They’d done so much for her when she’d disappeared, and she’d repaid them by ignoring their calls when she’d escaped.

Reagan sighed. “It was an emotional time. Professor Merrick came over a couple of times, asked what he could do to help . . .” She looked up at Josie, her eyes filled with shame. “One night . . . it was late, I’d been crying, he comforted me and . . .”

“One thing led to another,” Josie finished dully, even as her muscles tensed. She wasn’t angry . . . exactly. Just . . . God, that’s what Reagan had been doing while she sat terrified and alone in a warehouse room?

Reagan looked up, nodded. “Yes. It only happened once and I . . .” She glanced at Evan again whose expression was blank. “I confessed to Evan. We’d only been seeing each other for a short time then.” She grabbed his hand, squeezed, and he offered her a thin smile. “He forgave me and we moved on. I told Vau . . . Professor Merrick that it wasn’t going to happen again. He stayed away after that. I haven’t seen him since.” She glanced at her husband once more. “In the end, everything that happened, that terrible time, brought Evan and me closer.” She smiled but it seemed shaky.

Josie let out a long, slow breath, letting go of the bitterness that had gripped her. She’d made bad choices too, hoped for grace. How honorable would it be if she now withheld it from others? Josie glanced around. Cooper had picked up another cookie and had a mouthful, and Zach was looking at Reagan, his expression a mixture of surprise and suspicion. He glanced at Josie, his gaze lingering as though he was wondering how the news that her friend had slept with the man she’d been involved with in the aftermath of her disappearance affected her. Her muscles loosened as she relaxed back in the chair. Emotionally, she was long over Professor Merrick. “He was, probably is, extremely charming when he wants to be,” Josie said.

“I hope you don’t hate me for it,” Reagan said. “If I could go back . . .” Her eyes filled with tears and again, she glanced at her husband.

“I could never hate you, Reagan,” Josie said. “And that was a long time ago.” She leaned forward, reaching across the coffee table. Reagan reached back and Josie squeezed her hand. Reagan gave her a grateful smile. “Thank

you for being honest about that.” Josie looked over at Zach. “That might help in some way.”

They talked for a little while longer, the conversation moving on to less heavy subject matter. She told them about fixing up the farmhouse, and when they asked if she’d met any neighbors, she told them about the woman named Rain, thinking to herself that she was going to make a point to visit her as she’d offered. Friends, she’d been reminded, were a vital part of a full life. Zach disappeared back onto the porch where Josie heard him on the phone again as she caught up with her friends, all of them chuckling at remembered shared jokes. When they got up to leave, Josie’s heart felt lighter, and she was glad she’d reconnected with them. Perhaps they’d do it regularly once life returned to normal for her, whatever that might mean.

The picture of the farmhouse wavered before her, the grass swaying in the peaceful breeze, Zach stepping out onto the porch, a smile on his face . . . Again, she pushed that thought away.

At the door, Reagan hugged her tightly, telling her to call her soon, and Evan took her hand in his, offering her what looked like a sincere smile. “Be well, Josie.”

Reagan gave Cooper a hug too, wishing him well and stepping away. “I hope to see a lot more of you, Reagan,” he said on a smile.

Cooper stood with Josie, watching Reagan and Evan walk to their car. “Must have been hard for Evan to listen to his wife admit she’d cheated on him to a roomful of people.” He paused, a glint coming in to his eye. “Sort of put him between a rock and a hard place.”

Josie laughed, her chest warming as she remembered the joke they’d once found amusement in. The reminder of simpler times when she could laugh without the still-present stab of guilt. She wrapped her arms around Cooper. He kissed her on her cheek and then stepped away, the sun glinting off the caramel highlights of his hair as he walked to his car, waved, and drove away.

For a moment she watched as their vehicles disappeared down the road, her eyes moving to Zach where he stood by his car, talking on the phone. He held up his finger indicating he’d be right in. She heard her cell phone ring from the kitchen and walked to answer it. She didn’t recognize the number. “Hello?”

“Hi, J-Josie.”

Josie’s muscles turned to water, and she sagged against the counter. “Who is this?” she said, her voice deadened, her heart thumping wildly.

She heard an exhalation of breath, and there was something in the background—rushing water maybe?—that made it difficult to hear.

“Slayer of r-rats. Deliverer of poetic j-justice. Did it m-make you happy? What I d-did to your bitch of a mother?”

His voice was slightly muffled by whatever sound she heard in the background but it sounded like him, just like him, and horror clawed through every cell in Josie’s shock-riddled body.

It can’t be. It can’t be.

“Marshall?” she whispered, her voice a mere slip of sound. Was she in a nightmare? It felt like she was.

He laughed. “No. No, this is n-not Marshall. He d-died, Josie. Don’t you know that? Blew his own b-brains out.”

“Who is this?” she asked, her throat clogging with tears, with terror. She heard the front door open and close and Zach stepped into the kitchen. He began to smile, but as soon as he took her in, he rushed to where she stood, trembling, holding the phone to her ear in a death grip.

“I think about you, Josie. I’ll n-need to see you once more. You h-have to know that, right? Just once m-more. You and me. Finally.” His voice deepened. “It’s been hard to stay away.”

She clenched her eyes shut, a tear rolling down her cheek. Zach leaned in, trying to listen, but it was almost as if whoever was on the phone could see through the device, because the call disconnected. Josie opened her eyes, the phone dropping from her hand as she let out a tortured sob.

“Who was that?” Zach demanded, taking her shoulders in his hands.