“All of this is!” he shouted back, ripping off his pink hat and slamming it on the counter. “All of it! What am I even doing here?”
His phone rang and Tyler furiously ripped it from his apron pocket, then stormed off to the back. “What?” she heard him snarl, and then his voice became very quiet. Genevieve, her heart pounding, crept as close to the doorway as possible and held her breath, straining to hear.
“Can’t... get it?... not going back... Pinewood High... over...”
Genevieve’s mind was racing—Pinewood High—so he was involved in this somehow.
She ducked back quickly as Tyler’s footsteps approached, but he stopped short of rounding the corner. First came the sound of him punching out on the time clock, and then he appeared, yanking on his coat.
“Sorry, gotta go,” he mumbled, avoiding eye contact, and she watched speechlessly as he fled the shop.
An hour later, as she was mopping the floors, Genevieve’s mind still echoed with the strange one-sided conversation. Nothing made sense, and yet she sensed it was all there, the pieces laid out before her, if she could just fit them together properly. Who was Tyler Caivano really? Where did he go after work? Who did he spend time with? Why did it seem he was always hiding something? The fact that Principal Mattison had all but accused him of being guilty of the murders of two teachers at Pinewood High and the fact that Tyler was discussing Pinewood High with his mystery caller could not be a coincidence, yet Genevieve still had her doubts. Tyler was temperamental, volatile even, but a murderer?
She rolled the mop bucket back to the kitchen and, while turning the corner, felt her foot strike an object, sending it skittering across the floor.
It was Tyler’s phone. Genevieve bent to retrieve it, and at her touch, the screen lit up, displaying the last incoming message. Her blood went cold. The message, which was from a sender identified only as SG, read: I’m calling the police. The message had come through an hour earlier, around the time Tyler had left. She wished she could access the previous messages, but the phone was, of course, locked.
Genevieve didn’t think twice. She hurried to the small office located off the kitchen, found the employee file on Tyler, and flipped open the folder. Stapled to the inside cover was his job application. She scanned it quickly for his address, scribbled it on a Post-it note, and stuck the note on her phone. Something about the address felt vaguely familiar to her, but she shooed away the thought like a bothersome fly. There was no time left to lose.
The streets of Pinewood were winter dark, her beloved town quiet and serene. Genevieve drove past Haley Park and turned onto Grove Street, taking in the small brick houses, wondering at the fact that a killer might dwell in one, or be targeting his next victim.
Some houses were already decorated for Halloween—iridescent ghosts dancing over lawns, orange and purple bulbs strung across rooflines, glistening cobwebs spread thickly on hedges.
Genevieve found the address and parked on the street. She shut off her engine and clicked off her lights, suddenly awash in silence and darkness. Taking a deep breath, she opened the car door and grabbed Tyler’s phone from the dashboard. There had been no more messages.
She walked resolutely up the driveway, past a neglected garden, up to the house with peeling paint, and knocked firmly on the door. There was a series of loud thumps and then Tyler’s face appeared, looking even more clouded with tension than usual. His expression cleared at the sight of her, however, into something like actual fear.
“What are you doing here?” he asked quickly, stepping outside and straight into her personal space. He shut the door behind him, leaving her again in darkness. She did not back away but tipped her chin up defiantly.
“You left your phone,” she said, pressing it against his chest. She kept her eyes trained on his face, watching carefully for his reaction. At first he looked taken aback, and then his features settled into their usual hardness. He took the phone from her and met her gaze.
“I think you have a new message,” she said.
His eyes didn’t leave hers. From behind him, somewhere in the house, came a small crash. Genevieve’s gaze flickered to the door, but Tyler didn’t even flinch. “Thank you for returning my phone,” he said evenly. “But you need to leave now.”
“Is there someone—?”
“My roommate,” Tyler said, still in that slow, careful voice, “does not like visitors. Now please go.”
He turned and slipped back inside, slamming the door in her face.
CHAPTER TEN
IN DREAMS
“Pinewood Police Department.”
“Yes, I-I’d like to report... I think someone’s in trouble.” Genevieve picked at a string of loose rubber hanging from her steering wheel. She did not take her eyes off Tyler’s front porch. A quarter of an hour had passed yet she could still feel the rattle of the slamming door reverberating in her bones.
The officer on the phone sighed. “Care to be a little more specific?”
Genevieve hesitated. She’d been undecided whether to call the police in the first place. What should she say? That she suspected her coworker of foul play? Because he was moody and secretive and easily lost his temper? Obviously something strange was going on in that house, but whoever was in there did have a phone, she reasoned. She needed more to go on, she knew that, and yet...
She’d decided to call the non-emergency line and remain anonymous.
“Ma’am? Are you there?”
“I... I just wanted someone to check on a friend of mine. He seems distressed.”
“Distressed how?”
“I don’t know. Angry. Upset. Can you just check on him, please.”
“Can I ask with whom I’m speaking?”
“No,” Genevieve said. “I mean, yes, you can ask, but I’m not going to tell you my name. This is an anonymous call and... it’s not an emergency or anything.”
“Clearly. Address?”
She gave the officer Tyler’s address, again thinking how something about it seemed familiar, and then hung up before he could ask her any more questions.
Genevieve drove home and, once inside, headed straight for the kitchen. She was in desperate need of some comfort food. After rummaging around in the fridge for ideas, she pulled out a tub of butter and a bag of shredded cheese. She was going to make the fattest, gooiest grilled cheese sandwich in the history of grilled cheese sandwiches.
While waiting for the stove to warm up, she slathered butter on two slices of rye bread and tried not to think about the humiliation of Tyler slamming the door in her face or the way the police officer said, “Clearly” in his sneery voice. She slapped the bread into a frying pan where it sizzled satisfactorily and then scooped out a handful of cheese and layered it on the bread. The nerve of him! Both of them. Blowing her off like she was just some silly teenager, trying to make her feel as if she were overreacting. She hated that.
When the cheese began to ooze out and cook in the pan, Genevieve slid the monstrous sandwich onto a plate, added a generous helping of potato chips, and poured a tall glass of milk. Then she joined her dad in the living room where he was watching The Science Channel.
