The Inmate (15)

“Hey, you were the one who must’ve told one of them you’re not married.”

He’s right, of course. The first thing Dorothy warned me was not to share any personal information, but I got careless. To be fair, a lot of these men don’t look like criminals. They just look like harmless old men.

“And you have a kid,” he adds.

Now I’m really going to be sick. I’m such an idiot. What am I supposed to say when a patient asks me if I have a child? None of your damn business? Well, that probably is the right answer, but it’s hard not to talk about my son when I’m away from him the whole day. I’m learning this lesson the hard way.

“Anyway, congratulations,” Shane says. There’s no bitterness or anger in his voice, which is a relief. “How old is he?”

I cringe at this question. Like Tim, he’s not stupid. If I tell him I have a ten-year-old son, he will figure it out. But unlike Tim, he has no way of finding out the truth on his own. “He’s five.”

He flinches slightly as the needle passes through his skin again. “I always wanted kids. Guess that’s never going to happen.”

I don’t reply to that. I just quietly tie off the suture.

“I can’t believe you’re living out here again,” he comments. “I figured you would be gone for good. Except maybe to visit your parents.”

“My parents died in a car accident,” I blurt out. I shouldn’t have given him any more information, but this seems like the most innocuous thing I’ve told him. I want him to know that I’ve had other tragedies in the last decade that have not involved him. That what he did hasn’t defined my existence.

He frowns. “I’m so sorry, Brooke.”

“It’s okay,” I mutter. “We weren’t close.”

I can’t explain to him why my relationship with my parents fell apart. Partially, they were angry that I had defied them and dated Shane in the first place. That I had lied and gone to his house, which almost resulted in the end of my life. But what they were furious about—what they could never forgive me for—is that when I found out I was pregnant, I decided I wanted to keep it. I have no regrets about doing that, but my parents’ love for Josh was always reserved. Even when Josh was part of the family, they still made it clear that they thought I made a mistake. My son was a mistake and an embarrassment—the child of a monster.

And that’s what I couldn’t forgive them for. It’s the reason I eventually cut them out of my life

“My mother died a couple of years ago too,” Shane says.

I tie off another suture. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

I mean it. Shane was close with his mother—after his father took off, it was just the two of them. If she’s gone, that means he has nobody.

He holds my gaze for a moment. “She died believing that I had killed those people.”

My hand gripping the needle trembles, nearly missing his skin. But you did kill those people. I want to say it, but it would be unprofessional. And there’s no point. Despite all the evidence, Shane would never own up to what he did that night.

But it doesn’t matter. Shane is guilty. I was there that night. If it were up to him, I would be dead right now.

I can never forget that. And I will never forgive him.





Chapter 9


ELEVEN YEARS EARLIER




The farmhouse where the Nelsons live is about a mile off the main road.

It’s on a dirt road. One that you would miss if you didn’t know exactly where it was. Shane told me that when he was in elementary school, the school bus wouldn’t travel that extra mile up the dirt road to the farmhouse. He used to have to walk that mile every morning to get to the bus stop, then another mile back home in the afternoon. Even if there was a foot of snow on the ground.

It made me feel guilty when Shane told me about it. After all, the school bus used to stop right outside my door. I walked exactly fifteen feet to get from my door to the bus in the morning, and I still used to whine about it. And Shane walked a mile. But he didn’t tell me to make me feel bad. He just said it in that matter-of-fact way he always tells me things about his life.

“You sure Shane’s mom is gone?” Chelsea asks as the tires of her Beetle slip on the dirt road. The rain hasn’t quite started, but the air outside has turned into a fine mist.

“Yep. He texted me that she left.”

Mrs. Nelson is nice. The times I’ve been to her house, she’s always been kind to me in a way that my parents would never be kind to Shane. But she’s not nice enough that she would be okay with six random teenagers spending the night in her house. Especially since Brandon surely brought alcohol.

The farmhouse where Shane lives looks like it has seen better days. It might have once been a brilliant red, but now the paint has worn away to practically white in some places and just bare wood in others. The roof is crooked and covered in moss, and it looks like one powerful storm could easily rip it right off. The window frames all look a little crooked as well, like whoever built the farmhouse wasn’t quite sure how to put everything together properly but they were giving it their best college try.

As Chelsea pulls up beside Shane’s Chevy, the door to the farmhouse swings open. Shane appears in the doorway and his eyes light up. He waves vigorously. “Come on! Before the rain starts!”