Black SUVs were a staple of Southern California. There were literally thousands of them, and I couldn’t tell a Toyota from a Tesla.
But this car I knew.
Because it was exactly the same as one I had ridden in dozens of times.
“Oh my God, he has the same car as you,” I blurted, the shock of recognition prickling up my spine. I had no idea the danger this innocent admission had just put me in, how I would come to wish I had kept my mouth shut.
The brake lights went out. Sunlight illuminated the back of the SUV like a spotlight. That’s when I saw it, in that split second between the brake lights going dark and the SUV barreling away.
A bumper sticker that said DEVILS.
Except it didn’t say DEVILS. Because it was upside-down. Someone had drawn a vertical line through the upside-down V to make it look like the letter M, spelling the word SLIMED. It was so small in the frame, if it wasn’t so familiar to me, I might not have even noticed it.
But I did. And there was no denying it. That car was one of many, but that sticker was one of a kind.
And they both belonged to Logan.
He clicked off the phone. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t breathe. It was impossible that the car in the video was his. But it was more impossible that it wasn’t.
My hand holding Logan’s went limp. I wanted to cry out, but terror had a choke hold on my throat. I should have taken his advice. I should have looked away. I wished I hadn’t seen it. Because now I knew this boy who came out of nowhere to love me had worse secrets than mine.
“Well,” Logan said, “now you’ve seen it.”
I should have looked at him. I should have pretended that I didn’t recognize the car, or the sticker, or the double meaning in his words. I should have acted like I was so overwhelmed by seeing my dad get run over that I couldn’t possibly have noticed anything else.
But I didn’t. Because I was terrified. Not by the accident, or by seeing my dad’s dead body. I was terrified of the impossible coincidence that of course wasn’t a coincidence at all.
I was terrified of him.
“I need to go check on my mom,” I said, trying to keep my voice from cracking.
I slipped out the door and down the hall toward my mom’s room. I pushed open the door to see her sitting up in bed, reading on her phone. As she looked up at me, I put a finger over my lips.
“How are you feeling?” I asked her, careful to keep my voice calm and steady, even though I could feel my eyes bulging with fear. She furrowed her brow but answered the question.
“I’m good,” she said, trying to match the brightness in my voice, not the alarmed expression on my face. “I was just playing Scrabble.”
“Oh! Can I see?” I held out my hand, and she put her phone in it.
I closed the game and typed a note with shaking hands:
PUT ON YOUR SHOES WE NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE NOW
I passed her the phone. Her eyes flickered with surprise, but she didn’t flinch.
“I think I need to go out for a bit,” she announced. I nodded almost imperceptibly, but enough so she knew she was on the right track, and to say more. “I’d love your company.”
She swung her legs off the bed and leaned over to slip on her boots—steel-toed Timberlands I’d picked out for her online, perfect for the drizzly winter nights that would soon be upon us. But before she had the chance to put them on, Logan appeared in the doorway.
“How’s everybody feeling?” he asked. The question was meant for my mom, but he was staring at me.
“Hungry!” Mom responded without missing a beat. “I was just going to drag Savannah to the grocery store.”
“Yeah . . . ,” Logan replied. “I don’t think so.”
He stepped into the room and closed the door behind him. He had something in his hand. He saw me looking at it, so he raised his arm to show me.
It was a kitchen knife. The one meant for cleaving meat. The blade was wide and razor sharp.
“Logan, what are you doing with that?” I stammered. The sight of my boyfriend standing in the doorway flashing a knife as long and thick as my arm made my head spin. I tried to tell myself this wasn’t really happening, that it couldn’t be happening.
“Oh, come on!” he belted. He sounded annoyed, like wasn’t it obvious? “We all knew this charade wouldn’t last. You with my money, living in this house like you belong here.”
Mom looked at me. Her expression was a mix of bewilderment and terror. “I’m sorry,” I whispered, and she suddenly got it—why Logan had pursued me, that he was the one Evan was protecting, that we were in deep shit.