“Matt saw him that night,” I continue. “You can ask him. Emmett was there, and he fucking killed her.”
Ben stares at me. His expression is unreadable.
“No,” Emmett says. He shakes his head desperately. “No. I never would have hurt Savvy. Or you, Lucy. You have to believe me.”
Ben cocks his head.
“You saw her!” Emmett points at me. “She was about to kill me! She would have, if you hadn’t come along!”
Ben looks down at the hammer in his hand.
“Let’s find out,” he says.
He tosses me the hammer.
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
LUCY
I sit in a hospital bed, staring at a police officer.
He’s standing just outside the curtain surrounding my bed, talking to Ben. I can see them both through the crack where the fabric isn’t closed all the way.
“You heard him say that?” the officer asks.
“Yeah,” Ben says. “Emmett yelled something about how he’d tried to kill Lucy once.”
I blink. My head is swimming and aching, but I’m pretty certain Emmett said nothing like that.
“And Matt Gardner saw Emmett that night,” Ben continues. “You should ask him about that.”
The officer nods, writing something down. He pushes the curtain aside and fixes me with a hard stare. “We’ll have more questions for you in a minute.”
I nod numbly.
He walks away, and Ben steps inside the curtain with me. His eyebrows are drawn together, the nerves and stress obvious in the way he keeps crossing and uncrossing his arms.
“She’s lying! Why aren’t any of you listening to me?” Emmett’s scream is distant from down the hall somewhere.
“I could have killed you both,” I say to Ben.
He looks startled. “Sorry?”
“When you tossed me the hammer. I could have killed him, and then you. Your sense of self-preservation is lacking.”
He lets out a breath of air that’s like a laugh. “Like you said before, that would have been a better ending. You kill the real killer and the host of the podcast trying to solve the crime. I think a lot of people would have liked that ending better.”
I side-eye him. “There’s something wrong with you.”
“I know.” He smiles. “I never thought you were going to kill me, Lucy.”
I don’t know whether I believe him.
I’d like to, though.
“Emmett didn’t say that,” I say after a brief silence.
“What?”
“You know what. He didn’t yell anything about killing me. He told you he was innocent.”
He shrugs.
I imitate his shrug. “That’s it?”
“Whatever. It’s close enough to the truth. People are going to believe whatever I say. Your word isn’t enough.”
“The truth doesn’t matter.”
Savvy’s words sound gentle this time. Less angry.
I shift my attention back to Ben. “The truth is whatever you say it is.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
LUCY
Matt is waiting for me outside the hospital.
I look like absolute shit—a black eye, three stitches in my eyebrow, a bruise starting to form on my chin. Luckily my nose isn’t broken, but my entire face is vibrating in pain.
“Oh my god.” Matt rushes over to me. I see my parents, not far behind him. Ben left a while ago, because I was tired of his hovering. I told him I didn’t need him to call anyone for me, but I can see that my request was ignored.
“I’m going to kill Emmett,” Matt says.
My parents stop not far behind him. Dad’s chest is rising and falling too quickly. Mom’s eyes are red, and she won’t look at me.
“You saw him that night,” I say. Matt has the decency to look embarrassed.
“After you,” he says. “You ran away, and then Emmett appeared a second later, crying and saying he’d seen you kill her.”
“And you just believed him.”
“You said—you said…” He clenches both fists in frustration, and I instinctively take a step back. “You were covered in blood, mumbling something about killing! And you said she deserved it, and ‘Savvy tried to.’ What was I supposed to think?”
“She tried to save me,” I say. “That was the end of that sentence. Savvy tried to save me, and he killed her.”
“Oh, Lucy,” Mom says, and moves like she’s going to hug me. I step back, shaking my head.
“The cops want to talk to you,” I say.