Saturday, 11:35 a.m.
For several minutes, Leyna and Rocky stood in silence. Then Rocky set the dog down. Both of them watched to make sure Goose didn’t intend to run off, but he instantly burrowed between Rocky’s legs, his belly flat on the ground, resting his snout between his paws.
Rocky looked down at Leyna. “Smoke can travel hundreds of miles,” he said as if to comfort her.
“So you don’t think the fire’s close?”
He scanned the sky, still a pale blue, and she was grateful for the thought he gave before answering.
“The wolves would’ve been heading away from the fire,” he said. “So it’s probably good that they’re here.”
But they’re still on the move.
Leyna kept that comment to herself, eager to return to their previous conversation.
“Was Grace pregnant?”
Rocky’s forehead creased and what looked to be genuine surprise flashed in his eyes. “What?”
“Grace left sixteen years ago. Ellie’s sixteen.”
He shook his head in apparent confusion. “Grace would’ve had to be near the end of her pregnancy when she left. Did she look nine months along to you?”
Though she’d thought the same, she sighed, frustrated. “There’s a connection there. There has to be. Ellie showed up at the restaurant where I worked. Showed up here, asking about Adam.”
Silence stretched, fed by the wind and the itch of instinct.
Finally, he said, “There might be a connection. Probably is. But not the one you’re seeing.”
Leyna didn’t tell him that it wasn’t her theory; it was Dominic’s. He’d always been more sentimental than her. When she’d stalked him on social media, she saw that he still listed The Purge as one of his five favorite movies, and he’d once posted a photo of himself wearing that old T-shirt from the band they’d seen in San Francisco.
Leyna, in contrast, was a realist. Either Grace was dead or she’d chosen to cut Leyna out of her life forever. Both possibilities wounded, but she held to the second one more tightly—the one where Grace lived, happy without her sister.
“What is the connection, then?” she asked.
“No idea. I wish I could give you what you want. Give everyone what they want.” He checked his watch. “Sorry. There’s somewhere I need to be.”
“I’ll pay you.” She calculated how much she had in her bank account. “A hundred and fifty-two dollars.”
He grinned. “Very specific.”
“It’s all I have. But I can get you more later, I promise.”
The pity he’d kept from his face earlier bloomed there now, and Leyna’s cheeks flamed with the humiliation of it.
“I can get money from my mom, too, if you need it sooner.”
When she mentioned her mother, his expression hardened. “I don’t want anything from her.”
“Please.” She hated how desperate she sounded.
He looked abruptly uncomfortable too. “I already told you I don’t know anything about Ellie Byrd. I stopped at the grill for a pastrami sandwich, then I picked up some parts to fix the Millers’ shower.”
“What about Grace and Adam?”
His expression was sympathetic. “Your sister’s been gone a long time.”
Five thousand, nine hundred, and ninety-two days.
“I’m aware,” she said. “You’ve got to have a theory about what happened.”
“Theories are just rumors. Spread by fools, believed by idiots.”
Rocky shot her a pointed look, and she knew it was a reference to her public takedown of Adam’s memory. If he expected an apology, he’d be waiting until every last leaf fell from the surrounding trees and the wolves’ great-great-great-grand-cubs passed back that way.
If Adam hadn’t killed Grace directly, he’d had a part in it. Leyna was sure of that.
True, Adam never left bruises or broken bones, the only scar from that final day not on Grace’s arm but Leyna’s.
I know you’re not going to say anything, right, Leyna? That acrid smell of body spray when he’d moved in close. We’re friends.
But how many times had Adam used his affection as a bludgeon to convince Grace to cancel plans with friends? And charmed her into believing she’d misunderstood a situation? He’d only been having fun, he’d say. He hadn’t meant it that way at all.
Even Leyna had missed it for months, but Dominic leaving for college had emboldened Adam. Without his brother and with the adults around him either uninterested or deluded, who was there to act as witness? Only a twelve-year-old girl who kept silent because her sister convinced her she was imagining things.
It’s nothing, Ley. You’ll understand when you’re older.
“Come on, Rocky. You’ve got to have a theory about what happened to them.”
He exhaled, the weariest sound she’d ever heard. “I think they’re both dead.”
Heart thrumming, a rush of blood made her dizzy, and she could force out only a single word. “Why?”
“If they weren’t, we would’ve heard from them.”
Leyna shook her head aggressively. “I don’t believe that.”
“There’s a difference between what we need to believe and what we actually do.”
She squared her shoulders, her eyes daring him to doubt her conviction. “Grace is alive.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t okay me. She might be alive.” She immediately regretted the way she’d hedged her words and the slightest crack in her voice that brought back Rocky’s look of pity.
He hesitated as if considering whether to share more. Then he said, “Olivia blew the family’s savings on private detectives looking for Adam. In the first few months, there was that tip about the campground and a few other leads that didn’t pan out, but we’ve heard nothing else in years. No one’s that good at hiding. And there are too many ways it can go bad for kids out here on their own.”
Maybe Rocky really doesn’t know what happened to her, Leyna thought. Then, a second later, remembering the message in her pocket: Maybe Grace really is dead. Not just because of Adam, but also because of me.
“Did you know?” she asked.
“Know what?”
“That Adam was abusive.”
“Let’s not rehash all of that,” he said, not unkindly. “I’ve already told you everything. I wasn’t home when Ellie visited Ridgepoint, and I didn’t see Grace or Adam the night they disappeared.”
“You don’t remember anything else?”
“Nothing that’s any good to them. Some nights, I run through that day again, hoping I’ll remember something new.” His eyes lost focus. “I never do, but I can still see them as clearly as if they were standing in front of me. Both in black shirts and jeans. Both so damn young.”
As he talked, the sky seemed to darken, but Leyna knew it was only a trick of her eyes. Stars pricked, black pressing in from the edges.
Rocky continued, apparently unaware of the shift in her mood. “Grace was cranky that day, I’ll admit that, but they seemed… not quite happy, but comfortable, at least.” His eyes sharpened as they locked with hers, and he scowled. “I never saw any abuse. You’ve got to know I wouldn’t have stood for that.”
Unable to speak, Leyna gave a quick nod.
He smiled, but it was as weary as his sigh had been. “If they were alive, this place would’ve drawn them back by now,” he said. “It draws us all back eventually.”
His pointed look let her know he was talking about her. Rocky started moving away again. With his longer legs, Leyna knew she wouldn’t catch him, and even if she did, he wouldn’t say more. But she wouldn’t have followed even had she been able to keep pace, because he’d already said enough.
Both in black shirts.
If Rocky hadn’t seen Grace that night, how did he know she’d changed her blouse?