all know it.”
“Don’t mind her,” Dana says. “She’s drunk.”
There’s a rustling in the grass behind me. I nearly jump out of my skin. Then Greg’s voice.
“Amy? There you are! I’ve been looking everywhere. The sitter called—”
My eyes widen. Surprise brings my hand flying toward my gaping mouth. Greg cocks his head and narrows his eyes. “What?”
After that, there’s just silence on both sides of the fence.
Chapter Ten
My phone startles me awake at 3:30 a.m. I don’t recognize the number, so I quickly silence the call, sending it to voicemail. I am not able to immediately fall asleep. I lie awake staring at the ceiling, counting sheep. Or trying to. Instead I hear everything, every little creak our house makes. The slightest movement of the tree outside, brushing against our bedroom window. Then there is a thud. Louder than anything I’ve heard so far. I shake Greg awake. “Did you hear that?”
He groans inaudibly and rolls to the other side of the bed. There’s more creaking, followed by silence.
“Greg!”
“What?” he huffs.
“I heard something.”
The phone rings again, forcing us both upright. He rubs at his eyes with the balls of his hand. “Who is it?” he asks groggily, swinging his feet over the side of the bed, suddenly wide awake and ready to pounce. “The alarm company?”
“Just says spam risk...”
“Jesus, Amy.” He flings himself backward and places his pillow over his head. “Why didn’t you put it on do not disturb?”
When I click the phone to search the setting, he complains about the light. It’s then that I see the texts. Three of them, all robotexts from the same five-digit number. When I tap the screen, the images load one after another. Rocky.
With a striking gasp, my hand flies to my mouth.
“What?” Greg bolts up. I hand him the phone.
He squints into the glare of the screen, and eventually he lets out a long, heavy sigh. “Fuck.”
Tears spring to my eyes. Words refuse to come. A new text comes in. Greg tosses the phone onto the bed and then quickly picks it back up. “I’m blocking the motherfucker.”
As I strain to see, he leans away. “What is it now?”
Greg shakes his head. “It just says ‘too bad, so sad.’ ”
“Who would do something like this?”
His eyes meet mine before he crosses the room. He glances back over his shoulder. “Someone very sick.”
“Do you think Jack Mooney did it?”
“I don’t know what to think.”
The images flash before my mind. Rocky with his tongue hanging out. Rocky looking at the camera, ears perked. Rocky in the dirt, a shovel lying next to his head. Rocky dead. “I don’t understand. Why? Why would he do this?”
He doesn’t offer a response. Not immediately, anyway. “You posted this all over social media, right? And the neighborhood app?”
I nod and then use the back of my hand to brush the tears off my face.
“It could be anybody. You posted your phone number.”
I purse my lips and look away. “I know it wasn’t just anybody.”
Obviously, this isn’t the way to handle this situation. But that doesn’t mean I can do anything about it. Just because you want to get out of bed and carry on as normal, doesn’t make it magically possible. How could I have been so stupid? Why hadn’t I just left Rocky inside?
Over the past twelve hours I’ve spent so much energy, an ungodly amount of energy, being concerned about the harm that people who call themselves friends caused at the barbecue. I’ve sulked over petty gossip and things that don’t matter, when all along I should have been concerned with the things that do. I should have thought about actual monsters. I should have put more effort into finding Rocky and bringing him home. I failed him, and now I have to tell the girls he’s never coming back.
I’d wanted to respond to the texts, but Greg wouldn’t allow it. He forwarded them to his phone and promised he’d find out their origin. He thinks it’s possible that Rocky is not actually dead. He thinks the sender wants reward money. He thinks this isn’t the end of it.
I think he’s grasping at straws. If that were the case, then why didn’t whoever sent them just say so?
I spend most of the morning in bed with my laptop propped up on my knees, Googling stalking terms, the laws against it, and what to do about it. It just makes me feel worse. So far, I can only prove Jack Mooney contacted me just the once. I have