Annie was going to kill him.
She hurried along the forest trail, barely aware of the uneven rocks beneath her flip-flops. All she could feel was this nuclear rage, capable of stripping the entire damn forest down to pebbles and sticks.
But when she saw him in the moonlight, sitting cross-legged on Waterfall Rock, the power drained away. She was aware of the thin fabric of her dress, the flimsy rubber soles of her shoes.
Colin jumped to his feet. “Mrs. Perley,” he said.
He’d always been in the background.
Even earlier today, when she’d leaned into his car window, Annie had never bothered to observe him. That gentle, little boy’s face, wide plane of pale cheek. He was deceptively kind-looking.
“Are you enjoying the party?” Colin tried again.
“Hardly,” Annie said. It came out weak. She cleared her throat. “You were expecting my daughter.”
“No,” he said. He balled up his hands in the sleeves of his seersucker jacket, hiked up his shoulders. “I just needed fresh air. Sometimes parties get too much.”
“She’s fourteen.”
He started smoothing his hair behind his ears quickly. “I really don’t know what you heard, Mrs. Perley.”
“Abe wrote a letter about you.”
“Abe Pagano?” Colin said. “You know that he’s a pathological liar, right?”
A leap of hope in her throat. Annie should have considered that.
“Maybe Laurel has a crush, but nothing has happened between us. Like we discussed, I’m an educator, Mrs. Perley. I respect boundaries.”
The darkness cast shadows over Colin’s face, but his voice was soft and earnest and she wanted so badly to believe him.
In her mind, facts shifted like images in a kaleidoscope: Jen’s face, Abe’s boxy scrawl. Their betrayal of Laurel.
She’d felt shut out all year, had been desperate to connect with anyone, and Annie knew how that could be exploited.
“Seriously, Mrs. Perley. You’ve got it completely wrong.” It was the light way Colin said it, like he was close to laughter.
The truth clamped on to Annie like shackles. “How long,” she whispered. “How long were you—”
For what felt like a minute, he didn’t speak. Finally, he shrugged and looked around as if in acknowledgment that no one else could hear.
“Long enough.” There was the hint of a drawl in his voice.
The rage returned in a lightning bolt. It ripped through Annie’s skin and shocked her bones, propelled her forward, arms extended in attack. He captured her right wrist with a rough grab and pulled her toward him.
His elbow hooked around her neck and his forearm pressed against her windpipe. They were alone out here, Annie realized. No one would even know where to look for her.
His breath dampened her ear. “I can’t let you tell.”
She couldn’t breathe. He was squeezing too tight. A gush of liquid cascaded down her nostril; she felt her body being jerked backward across the rock. Desperately, she scratched at the slippery fabric of his jacket.
I can’t breathe.
He loosened the headlock to allow Annie a desperate raggedy gasp of air before he spoke, matter-of-fact.
“It needs to look like an accident,” he said. “You’re going to have to fall.”