“. . . and she said she wouldn’t let her hurt me again.”
I hear him weeping softly.
A minute passes, then another. I think of Jane, the real Jane; I think of that mother-lion instinct, the same impulse that possessed me in the gorge. She’d waited so long to have a child. She didn’t want someone else to take me.
When I open my eyes, his tears have subsided. Ethan is gasping now, as though he’s just sprinted. “She did it for me,” he says. “To protect me.”
Another minute passes.
He clears his throat. “They took her—they took her to our house upstate and buried her there.” He puts his hands in his lap.
“That’s where she is?” I say.
Deep, dense breaths. “Yes.”
“And what happened when the police came the next day to ask about it?”
“That was so scary,” he says. “I was in the kitchen, but I heard them talking in the living room. They said that someone had reported a disturbance the night before. My parents just denied it. And then when they found out it was you, they realized it was your word against theirs. Ours. No one else had seen her.”
“But David saw her. He spent . . .” I riffle through dates in my head. “Four nights with her.”
“We didn’t know that until after. When we went through her phone to see who she might have been talking to. And my dad said that no one was going to listen to a guy who lived in a basement, anyway. So it was them against you. And Dad said that you—” He stops.
“That I what?”
He swallows. “That you were unstable and you drank too much.”
I don’t respond. I can hear rain, a fusillade against the windows.
“We didn’t know about your family then.”
I close my eyes and begin to count. One. Two.
By three, Ethan is speaking again, his voice tight. “I feel like I’ve been keeping all these secrets from all these people. I can’t do it anymore.”
I open my eyes. In the dusk of the living room, in the fragile light of the lamp, he looks like an angel.
“We have to tell the police.”
Ethan bends forward, hugging his knees. Then he straightens up, looks at me for a moment, looks away.
“Ethan.”
“I know.” Barely audible.
A cry behind me. I twist in my seat. Punch sits behind us, head tilted to one side. He mews again.
“There he is.” Ethan reaches over the back of the sofa, but the cat pulls away. “I guess he doesn’t like me anymore,” says Ethan, softly.
“Look.” I clear my throat. “This is very, very serious. I’m going to call Detective Little and have him come here so that you can tell him what you’ve told me.”
“Can I tell them? First?”
I frown. “Tell who? Your—”
“My mom. And my dad.”
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “We—”
“Oh, please. Please.” His voice breaks like a dam.
“Ethan, we—”
“Please. Please.” Almost screaming now. I stare at him: His eyes are streaming, his skin is blotched. Half-wild with panic. Do I let him cry it out?
But already he’s talking again, a wet flood of words: “She did it for me.” His eyes are brimming. “She did it for me. I can’t—I can’t do that to her. After what she did for me.”
My breath is shallow. “I—”
“And won’t it be better for them if they turn themselves in?” he asks.
I consider this. Better for them, so better for him. Yet—
“They’ve been freaking out ever since it happened. They’re really going crazy.” His upper lip glistens—sweat and snot. He swipes at it. “My dad told my mom they should go to the police. They’ll listen to me.”
“I don’t—”
“They will.” Nodding firmly, breathing deeply. “If I say I talked to you and you’re going to tell the police if they don’t.”
“Are you sure . . .” That you can trust your mother? That Alistair won’t attack you? That neither one of them will come for me?
“Can you just wait to let me talk to them? I can’t— If I let the police come and get them now, I don’t . . .” His gaze travels to his hands. “I just can’t do that. I don’t know how I’d . . . live with myself.” His voice is swollen again. “Without giving them a chance first. To help themselves.” He can barely speak. “She’s my mother.”
He means Jane.
Nothing in my experience has prepared me for this. I think of Wesley, of what he’d advise. Think for yourself, Fox.