“Yes.”
“Does he know about all this?”
“Yes.”
“Will you please put him on the phone? And stay right there, okay?”
“Okay.” Then, I heard her call out, “Dad!”
Seconds later, a male voice said, “Yes?” We exchanged names and then I asked Mackenzie’s father to watch her closely and not to leave her alone. I’d talk to Mackenzie myself, in person, and try to get her to understand she shouldn’t blame herself for any of this. He promised to stay at her side day and night and said he’d get her to her therapist tomorrow.
If anyone understood survivor’s guilt, it was me, and thankfully, I could tell that Mackenzie’s father would do what had to be done. I didn’t know whether Mackenzie would do something crazy. I just knew I couldn’t take any chances. I wasn’t about to see yet another young life be destroyed by this nightmare of a case.
I pulled Bailey aside and told her what I’d just learned.
“So Hayley and Brian were definitely in on it together,” she said.
“And most likely were killed by the same person-”
“Or persons-”
“-who had to have known about their plan in time to grab the money and kill them,” I said. “No way any of Hayley’s buddies would’ve done it.”
“No. We’ve got to dig into Brian’s life-find out who he was hanging with.”
But whoever it was had deliberately laid a false trail for us. I decided two could play this game. “Do you think we could keep Brian’s death under wraps for a while?”
“And hope our mystery man keeps dropping false clues?” Bailey asked. I nodded. “Brian’s aunt will keep for a little while. And I can warn these guys”-she tilted her head toward the officers on the scene-“but I can’t promise how long-”
In a case like this, no secret was going to keep for long. And we couldn’t let Janice find out about her nephew from the press. “But it’s worth a try, right? With a little more time, our mystery man might poke his head above the radar-at least once more.” And with a little luck, he’d poke it up nice and high, where I could snap it off.
Bailey gathered all the unis together and gave them the word not to file any reports or talk about what they’d seen until she gave the okay. They all nodded their agreement, though I noticed a couple of skeptical expressions.
I was exhausted in a way that was as much emotional as physical. Bailey too seemed a lot worse for wear, which was unusual for her. Through many all-nighters, she was always the one who looked disgustingly fresh when the rest of us seemed ridden hard and put back wet. But now her eyes, her mouth, her shoulders, all sagged, as if pulled down by fifty-pound weights. She wrapped up with the remaining officers and we trudged down the muddy, rocky trail to her car.
