“I’m not.” I narrowed my eyes. “Why do you care, anyway? Why do you have my chat logs from a whole year ago?”
He went silent again, for a long moment. “Because you were talking to Lindsay,” he finally said.
My brows shot up. “Wait, what? It was her?”
He nodded, lips set in a thin line. “Yeah.”
“Oh my god.” I leaned back, holding my palms up. “I had no idea it was her. I swear.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Yes.”
“I thought you might’ve met her through your mom, seeing as she works here.”
“No. We met online, and I never saw her in person. I had no idea she was my mom’s boss’s daughter.”
Hunter was silent for another moment. “Laney… you were one of the last people to see or speak to her,” he finally said, voice dangerously soft.
“I told you, I didn’t see her or speak to her that night!” I could feel my blood pressure rising, and I leapt to my feet again. “Wait a minute… is that what you thought about me? You thought I came here and killed Lindsay?”
“Yes.”
I shook my head, heartbeat pounding. “Why?”
Hunter rose to his feet too. “Like I said, you were the last person to see or speak to her. I checked the call records, and I know you’re lying about her not picking up that night. She answered your call, and you spoke for forty-seven seconds.”
“Hold on,” I said, lifting a hand again. “I never said she didn’t pick up. I said she didn’t answer. And she didn’t!”
“What the fuck is the difference?”
“You know when you accidentally call someone? Like a butt-dial?”
“Yes.”
“I think it was like that, except it was an accidental pick-up. The call went through, but she didn’t actually answer it. I just heard—” I paused and racked my brains, trying to recall that evening. “Breathing, I think. And maybe some wind in the background. That’s all. I figured she sat on her phone and accidentally answered my call, so after a while of saying ‘hello?’ over and over, I hung up and waited for her to call back. But she never did.”
“It’s not just the call. You have her necklace too.” Hunter’s eyes were trained on my throat now. His neck and face had turned an even deeper shade of red.
I fingered the pendant around my neck. “Thisnecklace?”
“Yes.”
“This was hers?” I said in a small voice.
He gritted his teeth and reached out to touch the pendant too. “I had it made for her. For her birthday. She said she loved it, and I could’ve sworn she was wearing it that night. Before she….” He stopped and cleared his throat. “It went missing after she died. Someone stole it.”
My eyes widened, and I dropped my hand as if the pendant had burned me. “My mom found it in a pawn shop in Silvercreek last year, and she bought it for me as a late birthday gift. I honestly had no idea who it belonged to before me. I swear.”
Hunter’s eyes snapped to mine. He held my gaze for a full thirty seconds before speaking up again. “You’re not lying,” he said, voice barely above a mutter.
“No, I’m not.”
“So… it wasn’t you,” he said. Every muscle in his body had tensed up. “I was wrong.”
A rush of anger hit me then. “Yes, you were fucking wrong!” I said, chest heaving as heat flooded my body. I reached out and slapped his chest as hard as I could. “God, you stupid fucking asshole! Why didn’t you tell me from the start that you thought I killed your sister?”
I was furious. No, beyond furious. He stalked me for months. Tormented me. Hurt me. All because he thought he knew something about me which turned out to be totally wrong.