“I don’t think he believes you.”
I laugh hollowly.
“Did something happen?” she asks.
“Well, I had sex with him,” I say, because I want to change the subject.
“Oh, hon.” She smiles, a bit sympathetically. “I know. It was obvious that night you two came over for dinner after going to the crime scene.”
“We hadn’t actually had sex yet at that point.”
“Obvious that there was tension, I mean. I don’t blame you. I would have done the same thing. He does look like an Avenger, after all.”
I laugh despite the crushing weight on my chest. “Thanks, Grandma.”
My phone dings, and I glance down at it as I slump into the couch next to her.
It’s an email from my agent, informing me that I shouldn’t worry about my books being sold out everywhere, because the publisher is already in the process of printing an additional fifty thousand copies of each of them. “So exciting!!”
I guess it is, but I can’t really feel anything but numb right now.
“Turns out people actually did want to buy romance novels from a suspected murderer,” I say as I lower my phone.
“Of course they do,” Grandma says. “Like I told you, better to be interesting than likable.”
She flips the TV off. “Ben told me you’re convinced that he thinks you did it.”
I frown. “That’s basically what he said. He wrote out a whole ending about how I did it.”
“He says that was just one rough draft, and you weren’t supposed to see it. Just him working through some thoughts. He sounded really frustrated, if you want to know the truth. I don’t think he has an ending.”
“He’ll decide I did it, just like everyone else did.” I swallow around the lump in my throat.
“Not everyone,” Grandma says softly, putting a hand on my shoulder.
I close my eyes and tilt my head back in an effort not to burst into tears, but I fail. They leak down my cheeks and suddenly I’m crying on my grandmother’s couch like I’m ten years old again. She scoots closer to me and wraps an arm around my shoulders.
“I think I did it,” I whisper, eyes still closed. “I think I killed her.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“You don’t know.”
“Neither do you! You just said you think you killed her. You still don’t remember, do you?”
I open my eyes and roughly wipe my hand across them. “No.”
“You didn’t do it.” Her mouth is set in a hard line, the wrinkles around her eyes more prominent as she frowns harder.
“Stop having so much faith in me.”
“No.”
“I don’t deserve it.”
“Horseshit.”
“I haven’t told you everything.” My hands are shaking, and she reaches over and clasps them both.
“I don’t need you to tell me everything.” She holds my gaze, her dark eyes serious. “I don’t need you to lay out every single secret and detail of your existence for me to judge. I know you.”
I dissolve into tears again, and she wraps her arms around me and pats my back.
“Don’t give up, sweetheart. Don’t give up.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
LUCY
I drive home slowly. It’s dark, and the streets of Plumpton are empty. I almost roll down the windows like I would on a quiet night in L.A., but the humidity is as thick as ever.
When I stop at a light downtown, I look out to see Emmett decorating the window of the art shop.
A guilty voice in the back of my head reminds me that I never answered his last two texts. I also haven’t told him I’m going back to California.
The light turns green. He’s noticed me staring at him. He lifts his hand in a hesitant wave.
Shit. I press lightly on the gas and park the car on the side of the road. I step out.
“Hey.” I point to the big yellow sunflower he’s painting on the window. “That’s pretty.”
“Oh. Thanks. Some kids wrote ‘vagina’ over the last one, so the owner asked me to do one that’s less erotic.”
I bark out a laugh. “Was your last flower erotic?”
A grin spreads across his face. “Well, I didn’t think so, but apparently some kids saw something I didn’t.”
I lean against the brick wall next to the art shop. “They could have at least been more creative. Vagina isn’t very clever graffiti.”
“I agree. Put some effort in, kids.” He turns back to the window, brush poised.