Page 76 of Such a Quiet Place
I shook my head. She meant because I’d been seeing Mac. She had to. Or maybe because I’d taken the keys she’d hidden. Or because I’d yelled at her just then, at the party. She couldn’t mean what Chase was implying. But the others here could make it seem that way.
Mac had known and said nothing. But he’d told Chase. The boys’ club, making sure to keep one another safe.
“You’re all just protecting yourself,” I said, taking a step back. And Chase was no different. Trying to clear his name. So he could convince himself everything he’d done was worth it. I took another step back, and he stood there, watching.
“I told you from the start to be careful, Harper. Itoldyou she was dangerous.”
And I remembered that we were in the one place with no cameras. That someone had poisoned her, standing feet away from where we stood. That someone had seen Margo’s baby in the car and left him there, too.
That we were all dangerous people here.
EVERYTHING WAS SPINNING OUTSIDEmy control again. I could feel it, circling around me. Circlingtowardme.
I needed to know who had been inside my house the night the Truetts died. And how they’d gotten in.
My patio gate might’ve been left open—we didn’t lock it often back then, believing in our perceived safety—but the back door to the house should’ve been locked. Especially since Ruby appeared to leave from the front.
I stepped down onto the patio. Ruby had always had a key, of course. But I was starting to wonder if she’d left a spare out here. She’d already hidden the large key ring out here. But I couldn’t imagine she’d bury a spare.
There were only so many places it could be. There were no potted plants or doormats to conceal a key. I ran my fingers along the top of the doorframe but came away with only dirt and grime, damp moss clinging to my fingers. I tried lifting the bricks at the edge of the patio to see if anything was wedged underneath, but they were adhered firmly to the base.
The only furniture out here was an Adirondack chair and matching wooden footstool, the perfect spot for reading. I ran my hands under the armrests, checking the spaces between the slats. I came away with nothing but the debris left behind from weather and time.
Last, I flipped the wooden stool over, and my stomach dropped. A silver piece of duct tape ran across the bottom slat, the corners of the tape grimy and pulled away from the wood from repeated use.
Peeling back the tape, I felt like I was following a ghost across time.
Flecks of paint dislodged as I pulled, and there, adhered to the sticky side of the silver tape, was a single spare key.
I shivered, imagining how secure I’d felt behind my locked doors and my latched windows. How utterly unsafe I had been all along. There had always been a way in.
Ruby knew better than to trust such a thing as a lock or a door. Had slept with a knife under her bed to be sure.
That horrific night last spring, someone else knew this key was here. Someone who’d been told they were always welcome here.
Someone who’d let themselves in the night the Truetts were killed. Someone who’d crept up the steps and used the shower to rid themselves of any evidence.
To wash away everything she had done.
I HAD TO TALKto Charlotte. But how did one say to your neighbor: Is your daughter leaving me threatening messages? Is your daughter a criminal? Do you know where she was on the night Brandon and Fiona Truett were killed?
I didn’t understand what had happened that night. Why anyone would want the Truetts dead.
Ruby must’ve suspected something—must’ve uncovered something as she’d watched us. Something that had ultimately gotten her killed. And now I was following in her footsteps.
I didn’t know whom to trust. Not Chase, who had lied, pushed the facts onto Ruby, kept the investigation focused there. Not the police, who were the subject of an internal investigation relating to Ruby. Not this state agent, whom I barely knew. Because, just as my brother had warned, you had to be sure. Before a system churned you up.
Even innocent, you wouldn’t emerge the same.Hedidn’t. The past always following him, refusing to let him go.
The system wasn’t infallible. It was made of people and the rules we had established with moves we deemed fair—or not.
Once it turned on you, it was hard to find your way out of it. It followed you, became part of you, just as you became a part of it.
I COULDN’T TELL IFCharlotte was home. I’d been waiting all afternoon for some sign of life from her house. I’d texted her, even, something innocuous—Can we chat?—but there had been no response.
While I waited, I kept going through Ruby’s journal pages, her notes of Whitney passing by the house each night. I was assuming it had been her. Then and now.
Someone who had been told that they could always come to Ruby should they need her.
