Two Can Keep a Secret(84)

Ryan grimaces, burrowing his neck into his shoulders. “I screwed up there, when I questioned Declan. I was trying to rule him out while confirming that the ring was his, because at that point I was pretty sure he was getting framed. But … I don’t know. Declan and I have never had a great dynamic. I pushed too hard, and raised doubts in Malcolm’s head that didn’t need to be there. If I could take anything back, it would be that.”

The machine next to me beeps quietly. “Okay,” I say. “But … how did you show up in the nick of time? Why did you show up?”

“Your text,” Ryan says. I stare blankly at him, and his brows rise. “You didn’t know? You managed to get one letter off before Peter took your phone. All it said was ‘P.’ I texted back a few times, but you didn’t answer. I got worried with everything going on, so I checked in with your grandmother. When she said you were hanging out with Malcolm at the Nilssons’ house, I freaked. I’d done my best to get Malcolm and his mother out of that house while we were investigating, but they wouldn’t leave. And then you show up there? I know how you are—always asking questions people don’t want to answer. I headed over there, thinking I’d make up some excuse to bring you back to Nora’s. And I found …” He trails off, swallowing visibly. “I found you.”

“Where was Peter?”

Ryan’s expression darkens. “Heading out of the house just as I was heading in. I guess he’d gone back to the basement to drag you guys into the hallway so we wouldn’t know you’d ever been locked in. He didn’t say a word when he saw me, just got into his car and took off. Which was enough to make me start tearing through the house. Thank God I heard the hum of the generator when I got into the kitchen, because you were nearly out of time.” His mouth sets in a grim line. “Peter almost made it to Canada before someone caught up with him. I can’t talk about what we found in his car, but it was enough to tie him to Brooke’s murder.”

“So this is just … a thing with him? Sleeping with teenage girls and killing them when they get in his way?” Malcolm had said that in the Nilssons’ house, while I stood silently beside him. Frozen and useless, like I hadn’t spent nearly half my life preparing for the moment when I’d be lured into a killer’s basement.

“Looks like it. Mind you, he hasn’t confessed to anything, and we don’t have hard evidence when it comes to Lacey. Not yet. We don’t know what the tipping point was with her. Profilers are analyzing Peter now, and they suspect that she likely wanted to take their affair public. That she threatened to tell his wife or something.”

“His second wife, right?”

“Yeah. She doesn’t live in Echo Ridge anymore, but she lost her husband and son in a car accident before she married Peter. I think that’s his particular brand of evil—acting like some kind of hero figure to vulnerable woman while preying on young girls behind their backs.” Ryan’s face twists with disgust. “I don’t know how else to explain why he’d marry the mother of Lacey’s boyfriend. It’s like he wanted to stay involved with Lacey, or something.”

I shudder, thinking back to Peter and Malcolm’s mom in their kitchen the first time I’d gone to Malcolm’s house. How charming he’d been, but also—now that I have the benefit of hindsight—how controlling. Not letting his wife talk and maneuvering her out of the room, but doing it all with a smile. He’d fooled me as much as anyone. “What a twisted creep. The only thing that would’ve been worse is if Melanie’s husband wasn’t around and he’d tried to hook up with her.”

“Agreed,” Ryan says. “Although Melanie never would’ve gone for it. She’s tough. Alicia—not so much.”

My heart aches for Malcolm, and what this is going to mean for his family. Declan is finally in the clear, at least, and maybe once people realize Lacey was under Peter’s influence, they won’t judge him and Daisy too harshly. On the other hand—his mom. I can’t even begin to imagine how she must feel, and how she’s going to pick up the pieces from being married to somebody like Peter.

Ryan inches forward in his chair, his elbows on his knees and his hands clasped together. “There’s something I wanted to check in with you about. When I spoke to Malcolm, he said you asked Peter if he’d done anything to Sarah, and that Peter whispered something he couldn’t hear. What did Peter say?”

My fingers find the worn edge of my blanket and pluck its loose threads. “I don’t know. I couldn’t hear him either.”

His face falls. “Ah, okay. He’s not answering any of our questions, including the ones about Sarah, but don’t worry. We’ll keep at it.”

“What about Katrin?” I ask abruptly. “Why was she doing all that anonymous threat stuff? Was she trying to point people toward her dad or something?”

“No. That’s another long story,” Ryan says. I lift my brows, and he adds, “Katrin wasn’t involved in the threats, at first. It was Vivian Cantrell who started them.”

“Viv? Why? What does she have to do with Peter? Were they having an affair too?” I almost gag at the thought.

Ryan huffs out a humorless laugh. “No. It was completely unrelated. She’s applying to journalism programs this fall, and I guess some high-profile alumni told her that her portfolio wasn’t strong enough to stand out. So she decided to manufacture a story she could report on.”