The Good Daughter (The Good Daughter #1) - Karin Slaughter Page 0,185

not care.

Ben asked, “Why are you here? Did you think you could talk them out of turning you in?”

“I came to confess,” Mason said. “To tell you I’m sorry. That I have tried every day since then to make up for what I did. I’ve got medals.” He looked up at Sam. “I’ve got combat medals, a purple heart, a—”

“I don’t care,” Sam said. “You’ve had twenty-eight years of your life to plead guilty. You could have walked into any police station, confessed, and taken your punishment, but you were afraid you would end up with life in prison, or on death row, the same as Zachariah Culpepper.”

Mason did not answer, but the truth was self-evident.

Charlie said, “You knew we never told anybody about what really happened in the woods. That’s how you got my father on your side, isn’t it? You blackmailed him. My secret for yours.”

Mason wiped blood from his mouth. He still said nothing.

Charlie said, “You sat in that kitchen where my mother was murdered, and you told my father that you would use your family’s money to fight a murder conviction, no matter who it hurt, no matter what came out during the trial. Sam would’ve been dragged back down here. I would’ve been forced to testify. You knew Daddy wouldn’t let that happen to us.”

Mason only asked, “What are you going to do now?”

“It’s what you’re going to do,” Sam said. “You’ve got exactly twenty minutes to drive to the police station and confess on the record, without a lawyer, to lying to the police and taking Kelly Wilson’s gun from the scene of a double homicide or so help me I will take your written confession to attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder straight to the chief of police. This town doesn’t forget, Mason. Your excuse that you were just standing there, that it was an accident, still constitutes felony murder. If you don’t do exactly as I say right now, you’ll end up in a cell beside Zachariah Culpepper, where you should’ve been for the last twenty-eight years.”

Mason wiped his hands on his pants. He reached for his broken phone.

Ben kicked it away. He opened the back door. “Get out.”

Mason stood up. He did not speak. He turned and walked out of the house.

Ben slammed the door so hard that a new crack spread up the window.

Sam put her glasses back on. She asked Ben, “Where is the confession?”

“On the safe by the letters.”

“Thank you.” Sam did not go to the office.

She walked into the living room.

Charlie hesitated. She didn’t know whether or not to follow Sam. What could she say to her sister that could possibly make either of them feel better? The man who had shot Sam in the head, who had buried her alive, had just walked out their back door with nothing but a threat to make him do the right thing.

Ben turned the latch on the deadbolt.

Charlie asked him, “Are you all right?”

He took off his glasses, wiped the blood from the lenses. “I’ve never been in a real fight before. Not where I managed to hit anybody.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry that you were upset. I’m sorry that I lied. I’m sorry that you had to read about what happened instead of me telling you myself.”

“There’s nothing in the confession about what Zachariah did to you.” Ben slid his glasses back on. “Rusty told me.”

Charlie was speechless. Rusty had never betrayed a confidence.

Ben said, “Last weekend. He didn’t tell me Mason was involved, but he told me everything else. He said that the worst sin he had ever committed against anybody in his life was making you keep it a secret.”

Charlie rubbed her arms, unable to fight off a sudden chill.

Ben said, “What happened to you—I’m sorry, but I don’t care.”

Charlie felt his disregard as an almost physical pain.

“I said that wrong.” Ben tried to explain, “I’m sorry it happened, but it doesn’t matter. I don’t care that you lied. I don’t care, Chuck.”

“It’s why—” Charlie looked down at the floor. Fittingly, Mason Huckabee had left a trail of blood on his way out of the house.

“It’s why what?” Ben was standing in front of her. He tilted up her chin. “Chuck, just say it. Holding it in is killing you.”

He already knew. He knew everything. And still, she struggled to give voice to her own failures. “The miscarriages. They were because of what happened.”

Ben rested his hands on her shoulders. He waited for her to look