I feel like I’ve spent the last few weeks trying to untangle lies from truth, games from reality. All I know for certain is that he watched me the night I dyed my hair, he placed the Polaroid, and he killed Lorna Banks. I should be focusing on that.

Clara knows something, and I need to keep pushing until she tells me. I have to be the one who decides if it’s important, not her.

He may have only just killed, but I don’t think we have another nine months before he strikes again. He was two months early this time, and I have a terrible feeling his pattern has changed forever.

I daydream all the way to English, telling myself over and over again that it’s working, and when I walk past Mr. Collins, I almost don’t feel it.

And yet it’s there, the tiniest brush of his skin on mine, and when I look down, his hand shoots behind his back, a flash of something black-and-white pulled away from my open bag. I stare at him, and I can see the fear on his face.

Danny almost crashes into me, and behind him, there are groans and shouts, the hallway quickly filling with people trying to get in and others wanting to get past.

I look over the camera, directly into Danny’s eyes, and ask, “Did you get that?”

He shrugs and mouths, “Get what?” and when I look back at Mr. Collins, I see sweat forming on his temples while ripples of panic cover his face.

I slowly breathe out, find my voice, and whisper, “It’s you.”

Chapter 120

All along the hallway, people are yelling, desperate to get past, and I’m so close to him, I reach behind his back and try to grab the article.

I hear it crunch in his fist as the force of everyone pushes me into the classroom. Then he steps in after me, the others following while the other students shout as they walk down the hall.

Danny stares at me, and I wonder how the hell he didn’t get that on-camera. But he was focusing on me, and I curse myself for not keeping the head cam faceup in my bag.

I’m standing in the middle of the classroom, and Mr. Collins doesn’t ask me to sit. He just stares at me. As I glare back, I see the lines on his face rearrange themselves, and I can’t tell if he’s scared or amused or angry.

My heart is pounding, and I wonder how I didn’t see this before.

The first article fell out of my bag in English class, seconds after I walked past him in the doorway. The second was in my suitcase at Mayfield Lodge, but he was there before we left. He gave us homework while we waited by the bus, our bags left unguarded on the ground.