I shook my head, trying to process this information. It had been over twenty-five years since Hannah disappeared. Because her body was never found, everyone assumed that she’d been swept out with the tide. As difficult as it was to think about, I knew that bodies that had been swallowed up by the ocean didn’t suddenly wash back up a quarter of a century later.

“After all this time? How is that possible?”

James stared blankly at the space in front of him. “They’re building a new bathroom and shower facility for the campgrounds. The construction crew dug something up. She . . . she didn’t drown. Her body was buried in the state park, a half-mile away from where we made camp that weekend.”

“Buried,” I repeated. “But that means. . .” I trailed off, not wanting to finish the thought. I didn’t have to. James knew exactly what I was going to say.

“It means it wasn’t an accident,” he said, and then tipped his head back and drained the rest of his Scotch.

“But why were the police here?”

“Why do you think?” James set down the glass and looked at me.

People talk about freezing in moments of fear, but I’d never really experienced it until right then. My entire body felt like it had been dipped in an ice-cold pool. I couldn’t move. For a few long beats, I couldn’t even breathe.

I swallowed—with effort—and was finally able to speak. “They don’t think you were involved, do they? They cleared you, all of you, years ago.”

“Yes, but that’s when everyone assumed she’d drowned. She loved to swim, and the last time she was seen, she was walking toward the beach. But now . . .” James shrugged helplessly and took another gulp from his glass. “This changes things.”

“But why would that implicate you?”

“Isn’t it obvious? I was her boyfriend at the time. And I was with her right before she disappeared.” James stopped and poured more Scotch. He swirled the liquid and continued. “Of course I’m a suspect. I’m probably their top suspect. Or, what do they call it these days . . . a person of interest.”

I stared at my husband. This man, who for so long had been my rock, my place of comfort and solace. The person who took care of me, and whom I cared for in return. A doctor who had dedicated his life to helping people, to healing the wounded. The idea that he could hurt someone, much less take a life, was unthinkable.

And yet, I knew what he was saying was true. When a woman is killed under suspicious circumstances, her husband or boyfriend is always the main suspect.

“Do they know how she died?”

James shook his head briefly, and I could tell that he wanted me to drop the whole thing.