Emmett:????????They were close. I don’t know what else to say. People always seem to want me to uncover some big hidden secret, or say that I could tell they secretly hated each other, but I didn’t see any of that.
Ben:???????????????What did you think, when you heard that Lucy was the prime suspect in Savannah’s murder?
Emmett:????????I was shocked. Never in a million years did I think Lucy would hurt Savvy.
CHAPTER TEN
LUCY
Sunday evening, Grandma sends me to pick up dinner for the two of us at Plumpton Diner. On my way out, Mom informs me that their salads are disgusting and warns me against ordering one.
“Who orders salad at a diner?” I ask, one foot out the door, the sticky humidity and chilly air-conditioning mixing together in a weird, unpleasant way.
She sniffs. “Well, everything else there is dripping in grease.”
“Sounds delicious.”
I escape before she can invite herself along.
The diner has been around since I was a kid, and it looks exactly the same on the outside. On the inside, the seats have been upgraded from cracked red plastic to a much nicer shade of blue. It’s cleaner than I remember.
I walk to the counter and ask the red-haired teenager standing there about our order. Judging from the bored look on his face, he doesn’t appear to recognize me.
“It’s not ready yet.” He looks down at his phone, scratching at a pimple on his cheek. “You can sit wherever while you wait.”
I slide onto an unsteady stool at the counter, glancing around at the other diners. It’s early for dinner—five o’clock—and the place is pretty empty. There’s a couple in the corner. A mom with her two kids at a table nearby.
And a dark-haired man by himself in a booth by the window, staring at me.
I recognize him right away. Ben Owens. Smug podcaster.
He lifts one hand. He’s waving at me.
I almost laugh.
And then, I imagine getting back in my car and ramming it into the side of the diner. Straight through the window. Ben’s body sprawled out on my hood.
“Hitting him with your car is bo-ring,” the voice whispers in my ear. “Put your hands around his neck until you can feel the life drain out of him. That’d be fun, right? He probably deserves it. They always deserve it. Let’s kill—”
Shut up, I tell the voice calmly.
It can’t be a good sign that I’ve started talking back to it again.
Ben doesn’t move, but he tilts his head slightly, an expectant look on his face. It’s an invitation, maybe.
I imagine that he’ll just get up and walk over to me if I decline the invitation.
I slide off my stool and walk across the diner.
“Such a lovely throat you have there, sir,” the voice says. “It would be a shame if something happened to it.”
He smiles, flashing his perfect, white teeth. Braces and regular whitening. Those teeth did not happen by accident.
I suspect that nothing about Ben Owens is an accident.
He extends his hand. “Hi. Ben Owens.”
I ignore the hand. “I know who you are.”
He gestures to the seat across from him. There’s a half-eaten sandwich on the table next to a laptop, which he closes and pushes aside. He also flips over a small notebook so I can’t see what was written there.
“Please, sit.”
I’m still standing next to his booth like an idiot, and I guess I didn’t come over just to say hi.
I slide into the seat. He drops his pen on the floor and has to get out of his seat to retrieve it. He’s flustered.
I imagined him a lot smoother. Confident. Working a room.
He settles back into his booth. His dark eyes meet mine briefly, and then his gaze is anywhere but at me. I don’t know whether he’s nervous or embarrassed or just really high-strung.
“I’m speaking to you off the record right now,” I say. “I don’t want to have a conversation if any of this is going in the podcast.”
“Do you have something you want to tell me?” He plays with the edges of the notebook paper, like he’s itching to turn it over and write something down. His fingers are long, the nails neatly trimmed, and I quickly look away.
“No, nothing in particular. I just wanted to make it clear that this isn’t me consenting to an interview.”
“Okay. Off the record.”
“Okay.”
“I heard you were in town. How’s your mom?”
“She’s fine, thanks. I heard you were in town too. Why?”
“Because you’re here.”