Sara Shepard - Two Truths and a Lie - A Lying Game Novel

He slammed the door hard. Emma waited until he padded down the hall, then gazed down at the items he’d left on the table. The scarf, heavily perfumed with eau de Sutton. The sign-out sheet, Sutton’s signature in loopy swirls at the bottom. Then she stared hard at the cover of Little House in the Big Woods. A young girl in a red dress clutched a brunette doll. Emma had loved the books when she was younger, spending hours getting lost in the hardships of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s characters—for all of Emma’s shitty home situations, at least she didn’t have to live in a mud hut like the pioneers. But what was Sutton doing with a copy of this book in her car? Emma doubted it was something she would read at eighteen—if at all.

I had to agree. Just looking at the cover made me want to yawn.

Emma picked up the book and rifled through the pages. It smelled musty, as if it hadn’t been opened in a while. When she reached the middle, a postcard fell to the floor. She bent down and turned it over. The front was printed with a generic image of a sun setting over two multiarmed saguaro cacti. WELCOME TO TUCSON, it said in hot-pink bubble letters on the top.

Emma flipped it over to read the black ink printed on the back: Downtown bus station. 9:30 PM. 8/31. Meet me. —T.

Her heart began to pound. August thirty-first. That was the night Sutton died. And . . . T. There was only one person in Sutton’s life with that initial: Thayer. So was Thayer with Sutton the night she died? Wasn’t he supposed to be out of town?

Emma ran her fingers along the card. There was no postage stamp on it, meaning no date to signify when the postcard had been mailed—or from where. Perhaps Thayer had sent it in an envelope. Perhaps he’d slipped it under Sutton’s bedroom door or under her windshield wiper.

Footsteps pounded down the hallway. Emma froze, looking at the postcard in her hands. At first, she considered shoving it back into the book—it was probably wrong to tamper with evidence—but at the last minute she dropped it into her bag instead.

Quinlan walked through the door, and a second person followed. At first, Emma thought it was just going to be another cop, but then her eyes widened. It was Thayer. She gasped. His hazel eyes were lowered to the ground. His high cheekbones jutted as though he’d lost weight rapidly. Handcuffs circled his wrists, clasping his hands together like he was praying. A dingy rope bracelet was pushed up his forearm. It was so tight that it cut into his skin.

I stared at him, too. Just seeing him again made a strange tingle shoot through me. Those deep-set eyes. That dark, messy hair. That permanent smirk. There was something sexy and dangerous about him. Maybe I had fallen for him.

Quinlan made a grunting noise from behind Thayer and pushed him toward the table. “Sit,” he commanded.

But Thayer just stood there. Even though he wasn’t looking at Emma, she scooted her chair away, afraid he might lunge for her.

“I suppose you both are wondering why I brought you in here for a little reunion,” Quinlan said in an oily voice. “I thought that if I spoke to you both at the same time, we could clear some things up.”

He pulled another plastic bag from his pocket and held it in front of Thayer’s face. A long rectangular piece of paper was lodged within the plastic. “I believe this is yours, Thayer,” he said, shaking the bag under Thayer’s nose. “I found it in Miss Mercer’s car. Care to explain?”

Thayer glanced at it. He didn’t flinch—didn’t even blink.

Quinlan yanked the paper from the bag. “Don’t play dumb, kid. There’s your name, right there.”

He slammed the plastic bag on the table and pointed to the piece of paper. Emma leaned forward. It was a bus ticket with a Greyhound logo in the corner. The point of departure was Seattle, WA, and the destination was Tucson, AZ. The date was August thirty-first. And there, printed in small, neat letters at the bottom, was the passenger’s name: THAYER VEGA.

I drew in a breath the same time Emma did. So Thayer was in my car the night I died.

Quinlan eyed Thayer. A blue vein at his temple pulsed. “You were back in Tucson in August? Do you know what you put your parents through? What you put this community through? I spent a lot of time and money searching for you, and it turns out you were right here, under our noses!”

“That’s not quite true,” Thayer said in a quiet, steady, discomfiting voice.

Quinlan crossed his arms over his chest. “Then how about you tell me what is true?” When Thayer didn’t answer, he sighed. “Is there anything you can tell us about the blood on the hood of Ms. Mercer’s car? Or how your ticket ended up in her car?”

Thayer limped over to where Emma sat. He put both palms on the table, glancing from Emma to Quinlan. He opened his mouth like he was about to give a long speech, but then just shrugged. “Sorry,” he said, his voice creaking as though he hadn’t spoken for days. “But no. There’s nothing I can tell you.”

Quinlan shook his head. “So much for being cooperative,” he grumbled, then shot to his feet, grabbed Thayer by his muscular forearm, and dragged him from the room. Just before Thayer slipped out the door, he turned his head and gave Emma a long, eerie look. Emma stared back, her lips slightly parted. Her gaze fell from Thayer’s face to his shackled hands, and then to the rope bracelet around his wrist.

I looked at the bracelet, too, and was overcome with a strange snapping feeling. I’d seen that bracelet somewhere. All of a sudden, the pieces fell into place. I saw the bracelet, and then Thayer’s arm, and then his face . . . and then a setting. More and more dominoes fell over, more and more images flashed into my mind. And before I knew it, I was falling headlong into a full-blown memory . . .

CHAPTER 7

NIGHT HIKING

I pull up to the Greyhound station in Tucson just as a silver bus chugs into the parking lot. I roll down my window and the pungent smells of a hot-dog vendor’s cart waft into my British racing-green 1965 Volvo 122. Earlier this afternoon I rescued my car, my baby, from the impound. The paperwork flutters on the dash, my signature prominent at the bottom, a big, red-stamped AUGUST 31 at the top. It had taken me weeks to save up the money to pay cash to get the car off the impound lot—there was no way I was going to charge it on a credit card, since my parents always saw the statement.

The bus door sighs open, and I crane my neck to scan the exiting passengers. An overweight man with a fanny pack, a teenage girl bopping her head to an iPod, a family who looks shell-shocked from the long journey, all of them holding pillows. Finally, a boy tumbles down the stairs, black hair disheveled, shoelaces untied. My heart leaps. Thayer looks different, slightly scruffier and skinnier. There’s a tear in the knee of the Tsubi jeans I bought him before he left, and his face looks more angular, maybe even wiser. I watch as he scans the parking lot, looking for me. As soon as he spots my car he breaks into his trademark, soccer-star sprint.

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