“He’s coaching her track team,” I reminded him, “on a gap year before starting Harvard.”
He clicked through more photos and finally found a more recent one. There was no denying it was the same Logan.
“The coincidences keep piling up,” I said nervously, hoping my husband would agree with me.
But he didn’t. “I’m not sure it’s a coincidence,” he said somberly.
“You think he’s the one . . . ?” I couldn’t finish the sentence. It was just too horrifying to speak out loud.
“It would certainly explain Jack’s behavior that day,” Andy said. “And his need to make amends.”
“But why is Logan hanging around Savannah, then?” I asked. “You would think if he did something like this, he would stay as far away from her as possible.”
“Unless he wants something from her,” he replied. His expression was grim as he added, “But I can’t imagine what that could be.”
“We could be completely wrong about all of this,” I said. “I mean, we can’t just go accusing anyone.”
“If he’s stalking Savannah and we knew but didn’t warn her mom, how would you feel?”
I thought about Holly, how she’d taken all those pills, how vulnerable she was.
And I knew I had to tell her.
JACK
Three months ago
“I only looked down for a second,” Logan said. “One second. He came out of nowhere!”
I didn’t doubt my son was telling the truth. He was a good boy. He didn’t drink or smoke, certainly not during the day, and would never drive under the influence. He knew there was always another way to get home. He had his own Uber account, and worst-case scenario he could call me or his mom. We would always come get him, no questions asked.
“It wasn’t my fault,” he insisted, and maybe it wasn’t. Maybe the pedestrians he mowed down in broad daylight did “come out of nowhere.” It was possible. Something similar happened to me when I was a teenager. I was riding my bike down a hill, and someone in a parked car opened his driver’s-side door right in front of me. My front tire slammed into the inside of the car door, and my bike crumpled into itself. Whose fault was it? Technically I slammed into the car, but the driver opened the door without even looking—there was no way I could have avoided hitting it. But I was on a speeding bike. And nobody died.
So whose fault was it in Logan’s case? Just because the guy he hit was dead, didn’t mean my son was at fault. In all likelihood, they were both culpable, the dead man and my son. But only one of them lived to talk about it.
“Traffic was bad, so I cut down a side street,” Logan explained. “I looked down at the phone to see where to turn, one or two seconds max. When I looked up a guy was opening the door for some lady. I tried to swerve out of the way, but there was a moving truck blocking the middle lane, there was nowhere to go!” His whole body was shaking. I knew he wanted me to tell him everything was going to be OK, but I couldn’t. It was too late for that.
“I blew the door clean off,” he said, eyes wide with fear. “I know I should have stopped but, I just . . .” His voice crumbled into sobs. I spun his shoulders toward me and held him tight.
“You panicked,” I said. He was frantic, so I tried to reassure him. “That’s natural, anybody would.” Of course he should have stopped. Fleeing the scene was the worst thing he could have done, but now was not the time for should-haves.
“Don’t tell Mom!” he begged. “Please!” This was of course an absurd request. I would tell his mother, and we would both go with him to the police station so he could turn himself in. Just as soon as he calmed down.
“It was an accident,” I said, trying to reassure him. “We’ll stand by you when you go to explain—”
But he cut me off. “Dad, a man died. We can’t go to the police!” His eyes were wild with desperation. The thought of not telling the police was crazy talk. And the longer we waited, the worse things would get.
“Logan, don’t be stupid,” I said in my stern, parental voice. “We have to come clean here.”
“No one saw me,” he insisted. “The street was empty, and even if they did, there’s no plates on this car yet, there’s no way to ID it.”
It was true. The SUV was almost brand-new, the plates hadn’t arrived yet. It would be difficult to positively ID the vehicle. But just because he might get away with it, didn’t mean we should try. I shook my head, tried to show resolve. “Logan, we can’t—”