Page 91 of All the Missing Pieces

Colt kept right on spinning his web, the strands weaving tighter, building the perfect trap. “I was so fixated on those tiny details that I missed the big picture. It took someone else looking at it all for me to truly see.”

Kerr’s throat worked as he struggled to swallow.

“Bryan, do you know what the temperature was on May twenty-third, ten years ago?” Colt asked. His tone sounded like he was truly curious.

Kerr’s brow furrowed. His nerves didn’t lessen any, but there was genuine confusion in the mix now too. Careless little fly, not seeing where he was headed. “No…I?—”

“It was thirty-six degrees,” Colt said, cutting him off.

“Okay…”

Colt’s head turned slightly, just enough so that I could see the tiny slip of a smile that broke through. “I’ve lived in Shady Cove my whole life. Gotten pretty used to those cold snaps.” Any hint of a grin vanished in a flash. “But I still don’t stand around outside waiting for my tank to fill when it’s thirty-six degrees out. Especially when I’m wearing a fucking polo shirt and shorts. And I sure as hell would at least get the fleece out of my back seat.”

Kerr froze. No part of him moved other than the tiny flutter in his chest. The beat of those trapped wings against his ribs.

Colt leaned forward, forearms resting on the aged metal table with peeling corners. “So it would make a hell of a lot more sense if that video was actually from the night before. An evening when the temperature was sixty-two degrees at eight o’clock. That’s practically balmy, don’t you think, Bry?”

It was theBrythat did it to me. I couldn’t help the grin that spread across my face. God, Coltwasgood. I’d trapped an interviewee in a lie or two before. I’d even broken someone on record. But watching Colt work was a thing of beauty.

His voice dropped to what was almost a stage whisper. “So tell me. If I show that picture to everyone on the tennis team, what will they say? Was that the outfit you wore the night Emerson was abducted? Or were you wearing something else altogether?”

There were a few whispereddamns behind me, but to my left, Ryan didn’t make a sound. She was too riveted by the scene in front of us.

Sweat broke out across Kerr’s brow as his trembling intensified. For a moment I thought he might fall right out of the chair. And then he broke.

Big racking sobs. The kind that looked like waves overtaking the body. So brutal it almost seemed like they could break the man’s bones.

“I-I—I didn’t—it wasn’t me. I swear!” Kerr cried.

“You weren’t at the gas station the night Emerson was taken, were you?” Colt pressed.

The coach shook his head. “N-no. I wasn’t. I-I paid Lucian to lie. To switch the date on the tapes. Because he knew I didn’t do it. That I would never—couldn’t hurt Em?—”

“Don’t say her name,” Colt growled.

Kerr’s mouth snapped closed.

“Where were you that night?”

The sheer demand in Colt’s voice had me wrapping my arms around myself, squeezing hard as I waited. I stared at the man as a million questions flew through my head, but there was only one that stayed.

Was this the man who killed my sister?

As I stared at him, all I saw was weakness. The fear quaking through him. I couldn’t imagine someone like this doing the terrible things I’d linked together. But wasn’t that monster weak too? It was the ultimate weakness to dominate those less powerful than you. To sneak and drug and wound, to do so much worse. So maybe this was the exact face of the monster who’d been masked for so long.

“I was having an affair.” The words tumbled out of Kerr’s mouth so quickly it took a second for me to understand them.

Colt straightened, head turning just enough so that I could see the flutter of muscle along his jaw. “Bullshit. You would’ve said. No one would take a murder charge over their wife finding out they were fucking around.”

Kerr’s hands tightened in his lap, knuckles bleaching white as the blood drained from his face. “It was with a student.”

The room around me went deathly silent. No one even breathed. One beat. Then two. Three.

“Who?” Colt growled low.

“Tara Gibson,” Kerr whispered. “She was seventeen. It was legal in most states, but?—”

“Not in California, you sack of shit,” Colt snarled. “You knew your ass would be fired, and you’d be blacklisted from any future teaching or coaching jobs. Not to mention your ass would’ve ended up in jail, and they don’t take too kindly to men like you there.”

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