Chapter 3

Grant was sitting right next to me. His hand shot out and clamped around my throat, and he forced my jaw open. A mouthful of blood came up.

"You'd go this far to protect him?!"

His eyes were red, his teeth clenched so hard I could hear them grind.

Dr. Pierce rushed in and packed the wound. Biting down had taken almost everything I had left. I lay there like a doll and let them move me around.

I looked at Grant and smiled.

It was the worst thing I could have done. His whole face twisted, and the crowd went up with him.

"Who does she think she is?"

"People like that don't deserve to breathe."

"Go to hell, you piece of trash!"

Over the noise, the giant screen began to move again.

It was high school. I could tell by the scuffed desks and the old lockers, the kind nobody had replaced in years. I was walking out of the building with my backpack on one shoulder and Grant beside me. He was a senior then, and he'd already started carrying my books without being asked.

We hadn't made it ten feet past the doors when I heard her.

"Cass! Grant! Wait up!"

Emma came flying down the steps, ponytail swinging, and hooked her arm through mine.

I dug into my bag without even looking and pulled out a lollipop. I always kept one in there. Emma never got through a test day without one.

"I knew you'd have one," she said, tearing off the wrapper. "This is why you're going to be my sister-in-law."

"Stop it," I said, my face going hot.

Grant just shook his head and let her have her fun.

A murmur ran through the arena. Diane had started to sob out loud.

"She was such a good girl! Cassie, why won't you tell us who did it? Why won't you let my baby rest? You're going to burn for this. You're going to burn."

She choked on her own crying. The people sitting near her looked away.

Richard had stayed steady through every crisis in his career. Even he couldn't stand there and watch his wife come apart. He pulled her into his chest and murmured something in her ear. Over her shoulder, his eyes stayed locked on me, and they were full of hate.

On the screen, the three of us left school together and cut through the trees behind the athletic fields, down to a place only we knew about.

Ridgemont Campground had been closed for years. It was a rotting picnic area with a creek running through it. We'd pitched a tent there one summer and left it up. Hardly anyone knew about it. We bought snacks on the way and grilled hot dogs on a rusted fire pit and lay in the grass until it got dark.

A gasp rolled through the stands.

Everyone knew that name. It was the place where it happened.

When the police had made their partial public appeal for tips, Ridgemont came up in it. They found nothing useful. The place had been abandoned too long. The grass had grown over everything.

On the stage, Grant started to cry.

"This is my fault. If I hadn't taken Emma there, none of this would have happened."

Then he turned to me.

"She loved you so much. How could you be so cruel? What are you made of, stone?"

He slammed his fist against the bed rail again and again, as if it would let something out of him. One of his tears landed on the back of my hand. It burned.

"I tried," I said, so quietly I wasn't sure anyone heard. "I tried, Grant."

"Tried? You're covering for a criminal! That's obstruction! You helped him walk away from justice!"

He was shouting now, his control gone.

I closed my eyes. I thought of a bright, loud girl with a lollipop stick in the corner of her mouth, and how her smile could melt anything.

"Mr. Hartley," Dr. Pierce said.

He looked like he wanted to say more, and then like he'd changed his mind.

Grant gave him one look. Dr. Pierce felt the temperature of the room drop ten degrees, and a shiver ran down his back.

"Say it."

"She's... I think she's resisting. On purpose. She's steering around that memory."

Grant laughed, and there was nothing funny in it.

"Good. That's just great. Then turn it up. Let's see how tough she really is."