“We’ve been trying to find you,” he says.

Dr. White straightens up, and his jaw sets firmly. “I was in a meeting in another building. And then I stopped here to help this student, who is obviously upset. We do have an obligation to help the students.”

“Sure,” the cop says. “But our lead, Detective Bowman, needs to talk to you as soon as possible. If you could . . .”

The cop waves his hand, as if to say: That means right now.

Dr. White sighs. He looks down at Rebecca and says, “We’ll be in touch, Rebecca. Just let me know if I can do anything to help.”

Rebecca just nods and watches him go with the cop.

And she realizes she feels relief once he’s gone.

CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT

CONNOR

PRESENT

A cop comes into the classroom where they’ve been talking to me.

Questioning me.

It’s not a room I’ve ever taught in before. Not in all my years here.

They must have brought me here because it’s empty and kind of out of the way.

The uniformed cop comes over to Bowman and whispers to her. I’m not meant to hear, but I do. He tells Bowman he’s found Dr. White, the department chair.

“Where was he?” she asks.

I’m wondering the same thing. He saw me come into Goodlaw, heading for Lance’s classroom. . . .

“He had a meeting in another building. And then I found him talking to a student over on the side. The kid looked kind of green around the gills.”

“No doubt,” Bowman says. “She just watched a professor take a header off the bell tower. Okay, I’ll talk to him in a minute.”

The cop leaves, and Bowman turns back to me. She has the story Madeline left in my house on the desk in front of her. Another uniformed cop stands to the side with a notebook in his hand, writing down what I say. And Diana stands near me, keeping an eye on the conversation. So far, she’s let me answer every question they’ve asked.

“Just to regroup, Dr. Nye,” Bowman says, “it’s Madeline O’Brien who actually wrote the book you published. My Best Friend’s Murder. The book is really, really good, by the way. She wrote it, and you passed it off as your own work. And the reason the details in that book line up so closely with the details of Sophia Greenfield’s murder is because Lance Hoffman coached Madeline while she wrote the book and gave her details about the murder weapon and the crime scene, which she included in the manuscript. The ones that were never made public. And he admitted all this on the roof before he stepped out into thin air.”

“Lance knew what happened to Sophia. He knew what happened in that car. He was motivated to silence Madeline and Sophia.”