Page 33 of All the Missing Pieces

I shrugged. “Sometimes life teaches you lessons early.”

“Sometimes it does.”

Movement caught my eye as a sleek sedan pulled into the parking lot by the tennis courts. I hadn’t expected my interview subject to arrive in what looked like a top-of-the-line Mercedes, but maybe he had family money.

I glanced back at Celia. “I think that’s my interview. If you want to talk at any time, you’ve got my information.”

She nodded but her mouth had formed that tense line again. “I’ll think about it.”

“All I can ask,” I said, starting toward the sedan.

“Give Tater a snuggle for me,” Celia called.

I shot a grin back at her. “Will do.”

A door slammed, and I watched as my interview subject climbed out of his sedan. It seemed like the coach had kept up with his tennis practices or some other routine. He looked fit in his expensive-looking joggers and a polo shirt. But his smile was warm, accentuating the lines around his eyes. They were thekind of lines that told me he made the action often and that set my nerves at ease.

“Ridley Sawyer?” he asked as he crossed the parking lot toward me.

“Hi, Coach Kerr. Thanks for meeting me.”

“Not a problem.” He extended a hand. “And call me Bryan.”

I took his palm in a shake, appreciating the honesty of the calluses there, ones I was sure were courtesy of the hours he spent with a racket in his hand. “Nice to meet you. Would you like to sit?”

I gestured to the picnic table. It would give us a view of the courts for our conversation, points of reference for a better feel of that night.

Bryan shifted from one foot to the other, casting a quick glance over his shoulder. “Sure.”

I read his movements as nervousness but knew that a conversation like this would put anyone on edge. Lowering myself to the table, I reached into my backpack.

“I’d rather this not be on the record,” Bryan said quickly as he sat.

My eyes flared. He’d agreed to an interview, though I hadn’t specified whether that interview would be recorded. I slowly pulled my hand out of my pack. “Want to tell me why?”

His throat worked as he swallowed, his gaze pulling to the park and courts to his left. “There’s not a day that goes by I don’t kick myself for not staying around longer. For not waiting until Colt got here. But I’d had a long day, and all I was thinking about was myself.”

There was no denying the true guilt in Bryan’s voice and expression. It scraped at my skin, a reminder of all the lives that were affected by things like this, all the people who still bore the scars.

Bryan looked back to me. “I would love to help. Would love for the monster that took Emerson to finally be brought to justice. But I can’t put my family through all that attention being on us again. It nearly broke us the first time.”

It was my turn to feel the sucker punch of guilt. I knew that Bryan Kerr had been questioned twice before police retrieved footage from a local gas station that corroborated his alibi. But a lifetime could pass in the few days where people thought you might be capable of the worst.

“Off the record,” I promised. “Is it all right if I take notes?”

Bryan nodded. “That’s fine.”

I grabbed a notebook and pen from my pack. It would be better than tapping them out on my phone, because if I held the device, part of Bryan would always wonder if I was recording him somehow. Low tech or no tech was better.

“How long have you known Emerson?” I asked, starting us off easy.

A soft smile played at the coach’s mouth. “Around here you know just about everyone from birth. I went to school with Emerson’s mom, Julie. Remember when Julie brought her home from the hospital.”

“It must be nice, being a part of a community like that.”

“It is. Most of the time anyway.” Bryan took a deep breath. “Her being taken, it rocked us all. The kind of thing that makes you look at everyone with suspicion. But nothing like that has happened since, so I figure it must have been an outsider. Don’t you think?”

That was a reasonable assumption to make, but I couldn’t give him my certainty, no matter how badly he wanted it. “It’s definitely possible. I’m hoping I can find something that will point us in the right direction.”

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