though. You need more solid proof. What about the blood on the car? That’s definitely Sutton’s, right?”
Emma rose from the bed and began pacing around the room. “Probably. Although the police aren’t done testing it yet. I’m guessing they’ll also be looking at the fingerprints on the steering wheel—maybe Thayer’s will come back a match.” Then she made a face. “But wouldn’t the person have to be in the criminal system for them to find a DNA match?”
“Thayer’s been in trouble before,” Ethan offered. “And they would have fingerprinted him when they arrested him.”
“And we already know he was in the car,” Emma went on. “Even if his prints are on the steering wheel, what does that prove?”
“True,” Ethan said, sounding deflated. “It just means we’ll have to dig deeper. Find out what his motive was. Find out something to really nail him to the wall.”
“Yeah,” Emma murmured, but she felt exhausted. She was so close … but so far away.
She closed her eyes, suddenly overwhelmed at the task ahead of her. A teenage soccer star didn’t become a murderer out of nowhere. Something made Thayer Vega break.
When she opened her eyes again, she noticed Ethan’s glowing laptop screen. A Safari window was open to Sutton’s Facebook page.
“You’re on Facebook?” Emma smirked. “You don’t seem like the type.”
Ethan shot off the bed and closed the laptop. “I’m not, really. I mean, I have a page, but I don’t really post on it or anything. I was just thinking about leaving you a message on your—well, Sutton’s wall. But I don’t know.” He peeked at her cagily. “Would that be weird? Your friends don’t really know about … how we talk.”
Emma felt a rush of pleasure that they were even discussing their potential relationship. But then a pit formed in her stomach. She recalled how the girls had giggled about the prank today. She considered telling Ethan about the plan to ruin his poetry reading, but the thought nauseated her. She would just have to thwart the plan, plain and simple.
“Actually, Laurel knows about us,” Emma said instead. She flushed instantly. Was what she said okay? Calling them us? It wasn’t like they were a couple yet.
“Does that bother you?” Ethan asked, a slight smile tugging the edge of his lips.
“Does it bother you?” Emma countered.
Ethan took small steps toward Emma and sat down on the bed beside her. “I don’t care who knows. I think you’re amazing. I’ve never met anyone like you.”
Emma’s heart squeezed. No one had ever said anything like that to her before.
Ethan leaned forward, running his fingers across the nape of her neck. He kissed her gently, his lips warm and soft, and Emma instantly forgot about everything that’d happened since she arrived in Tucson. She forgot about just how excited she’d been when she stepped off the bus to meet her sister. She forgot how quickly the hopes of her and Sutton’s reunion were dashed. She forgot about the note threatening her to be Sutton—or else. She forgot about the investigation into Thayer, or whoever had killed Sutton. In that moment, she was just Emma Paxton, a girl with a brand-new boyfriend.
And I was just her sister, happy that she had found someone she truly cared about.
14
IF THE KEY FITS
That night Emma’s body tangled among Sutton’s light blue bedsheets as she tossed from one side to the other. Sutton’s smattering of ratty stuffed animals were lined up at the foot of the bed and stared at Emma, their eyes glassy in the moonlight. They were so unlike Sutton, one of the only sentimental things Emma could find that her sister had kept from her past. They reminded her of the toys Emma had kept—a hand-knitted monster toy a piano teacher had given her for mastering a hard piece of music, and Socktopus, which Becky had bought for her on a trip to Four Corners. Sutton’s toys made Emma think of all of the time they’d missed, the memories they could have had of playing for hours together in a shared bedroom, making up secret worlds only the two of them understood. Hours they could never get back.
An owl called from the oak tree just outside Sutton’s window. Emma stared at the branches, noting that it was the same tree she’d used the night she snuck out with Ethan, and the same tree Thayer had used to break into Sutton’s bedroom. Suddenly, she jolted up with a start. The window was wide open. And a hulking