Quinlan clasped his hands around one knee, jogging his loafer up and down. “I owe you an apology, Miss Paxton. You and Sutton both.” He sighed, opening a bristling file folder. “We’ve actually been interested in Ethan for a little while now. I’ve been going over the parking-lot surveillance photos from the last few months, and he shows up in dozens of them. He’s out there all the time. It seemed like . . .”

“Too much of a coincidence,” Emma said miserably. He nodded.

“Detectives don’t believe in coincidences,” he said. “So we started to look into him. At first I thought he was your accomplice. That you guys had hatched this plan together, maybe, or that he’d fallen for you and you’d roped him into it. But this morning we found out he had a sealed record. We put in a subpoena to open it, but it didn’t get finalized until tonight, after we’d already taken him into custody.”

Laurel stuck her chin up haughtily. “Then it’s a good thing Thayer and I were there, since you were taking your sweet time.”

Quinlan rolled his eyes. “Please don’t turn your little gang into a pack of vigilantes, Miss Mercer. That’s the last thing I need.” He turned back to Emma. “Of course, the investigation is ongoing. But between what happened tonight, and what I’ve seen of his medical records, we have probable cause to hold him. I’ve got a CSI team on their way to his house now, and another one at the storage facility. Ethan’s a smart kid—I’m guessing he’ll have done a good job hiding the evidence. But if it’s there, we’ll find it. We always do.”

Emma nodded, feeling as if she were miles away from the interrogation chamber, miles away from Quinlan and Laurel and Thayer. She felt hollow to the core. Ethan had been lying to her all along. She’d loved him, and the whole time, he’d just lied and lied.

But it was over. Ethan had been caught, and it was only a matter of time before the cops found all the evidence they needed to charge him. So I couldn’t help wondering—why was I still here? I hadn’t been sure what to expect, but I’d always pictured something happening right about now. Pearly gates, or a long tunnel with a bright light at the end, or a cosmic escalator leading to some heavenly mall where my halo would double as a platinum card. But I was still here, still my sister’s silent shadow. Would I be here forever, haunting her until she died and joined me in the afterlife?