Two Truths and a Lie

18 VISITOR FOR VEGA

The lockup was connected to the police station, though the entrance to the jail was through a separate door, with a different set of guards. Emma hesitated in front of the steel gate, taking heaving breaths. Finally, an overweight, bald guard in a navy uniform and carrying a paperback book strutted up to the door and peered at her. “Help you?” he asked, jingling a set of long, silver keys on his belt. “Visiting hours are almost over,” he continued gruffly.

Emma checked the Cartier watch she’d found in Sutton’s jewelry box. 7:42 P.M. “I’ll just be a few minutes,” she said, forcing her face into the sweetest smile she could muster.

The guard glowered at her. Emma got a glimpse of his book. The cover showed an overly muscled man with a sword strapped to his back, kissing a lithe blonde woman. When Emma was little, she’d read Harlequin romances like that—they were usually the only types of books on her foster mothers’ shelves. For a while, she’d pretended that a brunette dressed as a pirate on the cover of Shipwrecked and Heartbroken was Becky.

Finally, the guard buzzed her in. He pulled out a clipboard with a sign-in sheet attached. Emma tried to keep her hand steady as she signed SUTTON MERCER under the column marked VISITOR and THAYER VEGA under INMATE. She knew what she was doing was risky, but she had found out as much as she was going to on her own. Now she needed to hear it from Thayer. And face-to-face in a jail, where they’d be separated by bulletproof glass, was about as safe as this conversation was going to get.

The guard glanced at the name Emma had written, then nodded. “Come with me.” He led her through a heavy steel door and down a long hallway.

A second guard, this one wearing a matching navy uniform with STANBRIDGE printed on a nameplate on his burly chest, waited for Emma in a small, square room separated in the middle by a sheet of thick glass. Emma was happy to see it wasn’t Quinlan—she didn’t feel like dealing with him today. “You’ll sit here,” Stanbridge said, gesturing to a cubicle that faced the glass and was lined up evenly with a cubicle on the other side.

Emma sat on a hard, orange, plastic chair. The two wooden panels that squared her off must have been for privacy, not that Emma needed it in the empty room. Graffiti splashed across the panels in colored marker and ink: CP LUVS SN. HEARTS 4 EVER. Dates as far back as 5/4/82 were carved into the wood.

A door swung open on the other side of the glass, and Emma flinched, her heart leaping to her throat. There, sweeping through the door, escorted by a pudgy guard with a bowl cut, was Thayer. His skin looked pale and taut against his bones. When he saw Emma, he stopped short. His mouth tightened at the edges. For a moment, Emma felt sure he’d turn back and retreat through the door. But then the guard put a hand between Thayer’s shoulder blades and gave him a small shove toward her.

Thayer reluctantly stepped forward and settled in the seat opposite Emma. When he picked up the phone receiver on the opposite side of the glass, the orange sleeve of his jumpsuit fell back to reveal a tattoo Emma hadn’t noticed at the precinct. An eagle emblem was inked on the underside of his wrist with the initials SPH printed in tiny letters beneath it. Was this the strange tattoo Madeline had spoken about?

I examined Thayer carefully, taking in every inch of him. I tried to imagine loving him. Having a secret relationship. Risking friendships just to be with him. Even dead, even memory-less, I could feel something stirring inside me for him, a magnetic pull that made me want to get as close to him as possible. At the same time, as I took in his dark eyes and menacing expression, I felt afraid. I knew there was something huge in my memories that I hadn’t seen yet, a horrible moment I had blocked out.

Emma picked up the receiver and took a deep breath. “We need to talk,” she said in the strongest voice she could find. “I have some questions for you about that night,” she went on, meaning the night Sutton died. “About everything,” she added.

Thayer raised his eyes to hers. Dark, bluish half-moons stamped the area beneath them; it looked as though he hadn’t slept in days. “You got my messages. You shouldn’t have any questions. But instead you acted like a complete psycho and ruined everything.”

Messages? A cold, clammy feeling washed over Emma. He had to be talking about the SUTTON’S DEAD, PLAY ALONG OR YOU’RE NEXT note. And what he’d written on the chalkboard at the Homecoming rally after nearly killing Emma with that falling light.

Emma opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. Thayer leaned back and gave her a cold, calculating stare. “Or is this just a game? Haven’t you heard? I’m not one to play games with. Not when I’m the only one who knows who you really are.”

Emma’s body went weak from her feet to her throat. Her fingers tingled around the base of the phone and she struggled to hold it against her ear. It was glaringly obvious. Thayer knew who Emma was … and who she wasn’t. He had done it. He had killed Sutton. She was sitting across from her sister’s murderer.

“Thayer, what did you do?” Her voice was a whisper.

I was dying to know, too. Thayer’s words, his posture, his entire being seemed to radiate anger. How could he have said he loved me, then hurt me?

“Wouldn’t you love to know?” Thayer grinned, flashing white teeth. “Anyway, did you hear the good news? We got the hearing moved up to next week. I’ll be out of here soon.”

“You’re getting out next week?” Emma repeated, beginning to tremble. That meant she was only safe for eight more days.

“Yep. My lawyer is trying to get the case dismissed. I’m a minor, and they’ve got me on trumped-up charges as an adult, but my lawyer’s going to prove it’s bullshit. This is Quinlan’s idea of revenge—that guy hates me. He hates you too, Sutton.” He gave her a long look. “And when I’m out, we’ll finally be able to talk one-on-one. Just like old times.”

The words Thayer was saying were innocent enough, but his voice dripped with sarcasm and hatred. He arched forward, inches from Emma’s face. He bent so close to the glass that Emma could see the outlines of his breath against the pane. His pupils widened into black spheres. Emma clenched the phone tighter, feeling sweat between her fingers and the beige plastic. Then he slammed the phone into its cradle. A dull tone buzzed in Emma’s ear.

A hand clapped around Emma’s shoulder, and she jumped and twisted around. Stanbridge gazed at her sternly. “Visiting hours are over now, miss.”

Emma nodded numbly and followed him out of the room. I trailed behind her, electrical impulses snapping and flashing inside me. Something about seeing Thayer—and that guard clapping a hand on Emma’s shoulder—made a few doors unlock in my mind. I smelled the dust and desert flowers of Sabino Canyon. I felt the cool air on my bare skin. I felt that hand clap around my shoulder—maybe Thayer’s hand. Maybe right before he killed me.

Once again, I was zooming backward into my past …