body was on edge, practically thrumming. She could probably hear it in my voice.
Nina stepped to the side at the entrance, like she was waiting for me. But she pushed the door farther open with her foot, shining the flashlight inside. Her shoulders were tense, and for a moment I flashed to all the things that could be waiting here, in the dark.
My hand brushed against the light switches inside, until the living room lit up in an eerie glow. I breathed slowly, taking it in. The couch and the cushions, just as I’d left them. No evidence of someone else who had been here with me. But the air was cooler, from the front door left open. “Okay if I take a quick look around first?” she asked, and I nodded. Maybe she’d come back with me to make sure no one was hiding out here. To make sure it was safe.
Nina walked slowly around me, her footsteps echoing on the hardwood. I followed behind to each room, still barefoot and dirty, my toes curling on the cool floor. She flicked another light in the hallway. Then the kitchen light, with the faucet left dripping. Next, the office, messy and barely used.
The only place she didn’t search was upstairs, the steps hidden away behind the door in the hall that looked like a coat closet.
She stopped at the entrance to my bedroom, flicking on the last light. “You heard the phone from here? From inside?”
It was colder in here, and I felt a gust before I saw the reason: The window beside the bed was ajar, the sheer shades billowing in. Nina strode across the room, pushing apart the shades—ignoring the unmade bed next to the window, and my phone, faceup on the bedside table.
I didn’t remember opening the window. But I didn’t remember making it out of the house, either. Maybe it was that familiar dream, pushing back against the four walls . . . maybe I wanted to see a way out.
She leaned closer, her head to the place where a screen should be. “I can hear them talking,” she said, half to herself.
Now that she mentioned it, I could hear it, too, the voices at the crime scene carrying in the wind. I could’ve heard a phone.
My own phone buzzed on the nightstand. Nina saw it first and frowned. “Kind of late for a text,” she said.
And then, just as she reached for it, it started ringing. She picked it up, held it out for me, and I knew from the photo lighting up the display—the call was coming from Jonah’s cell.
I froze, and it rang a second time. Was it one of the officers outside, calling back the last-known number? Would I have to face it right now, with Nina watching?
“Gonna take it?” she asked, practically placing it in my hand. The skin around my knee pulled as I sat on the edge of the bed.
I fumbled the buttons twice before answering, and held the phone to my ear. “Hello?” I held my breath, could hear my heartbeat inside my head.
“Liv, I know it’s late and you were probably sleeping, but I have to say this—”
My breath escaped in a rush, everything unspooling inside me. “Jonah?” I looked up at Nina, who was frowning. His name was on the display. Of course it was Jonah. “Where are you?”
“That’s what I’m trying to say, if you would give me a minute.” His voice was slurred, the words tripping over one another. “In my office, trying to make sense of this shit schedule I’ve been given. Trying to see how I could make it work.”
“Make what work?”
“You. Us. I was stupid to let you go, so stupid, and—”
“Jonah, don’t do this. It was a mistake. I have to go.” I ended the call, my fingers faintly trembling.
I looked to the window again. It wasn’t Jonah out there in the bushes. This had absolutely nothing to do with me.
It was entirely plausible that I heard the phone, and it woke me. It was entirely plausible that I heard it in my sleep, and that was what brought me out there.
I decided something right then. The story was true, and I could believe it. It was as true a story as any: I heard the phone, I woke up, I saw the man, I ran.
The truest stories are the simplest ones.
Nina was still watching me. “What was a mistake?” she asked.
“Responding to a message from my ex last night.”
She