“Oh, Robin,” Amber said, crouching down in front of him. She took one hand and rubbed his tears away. “I read your book. Without Her. And I understood. I understood something that I don’t think you even knew yourself. But it was obvious to me. I had to make you see. And now you do—you feel it.”

“What are you talking about?” Robin said, more tears coming to take the place of the ones wiped away.

“Look at all this,” Amber said, standing up again, stretching out her arms to indicate the whole scene. “Look at everything you’ve been through. All to find out what happened to Samantha Ferringham, your doting little wife. You’ve been running toward the truth for so long that you didn’t stop to realize that you don’t want to know it. You never actually wanted to find out what happened. Because then there would be nothing left—other than to have to face up to actually having to let her go.”

Robin said nothing. The tears were a steady stream now. And he gasped. He couldn’t believe it—but she was right. Sam’s story was over. And soon, his would be too. That was what Amber and Tim had wanted. They had wanted to break him. And he was broken.

There was just one thing he wanted to know.

“How are you here, Tim?” His voice was tiny now. “How can you be here?”

Amber looked at Tim and shrugged.

Tim sighed. “Fine. I’ll tell you. But you have to act impressed.”

Chapter Sixty-Six

Three days before the Incident...

“Can you believe how many texts Matt has sent?” Edmund said, laughing as he placed his phone on the table. “I mean, Jesus Christ, have some self-worth.”

They were in their usual place—the basement. The body beneath their feet had been there for just shy of three years. It remained unfound. The police had never come, never even so much as asked a single question. It was as if she just disappeared, and the world shrugged. But even so, their plan was not changing.

Robert finished his game of Solitaire by sweeping all the cards into his outstretched hand. “I’m starting to think he’s just doing it to piss us off.”

Sometimes Edmund caught himself. Sometimes he remembered that Matt used to be one of his best friends. But Matt had not been there that night, and Edmund had come to resent him for that. Even though it wasn’t Matt’s fault, everyone had come to resent him for that. What had first been protecting him from the truth had soon soured—he didn’t need protecting from anything. They did.

Amber was sitting in her usual seat at the back of the room, not engaging with any of them, except Tim. Over the years she hadn’t become any less crazy, and somehow she seemed to be able to sway Tim.