Back Seven Minutes in Heaven
Chapters (45)
  1. Epigraph
  2. Prologue
  3. 1 - What a Tangled Web We Weave
  4. 2 - A Grave Matter
  5. 3 - Alone at Last
  6. 4 - Farewell, My Frenemy
  7. 5 - Her Cheating Heart
  8. 6 - The Canyon’s Secret
  9. 7 - A Hand in the Dark
  10. 8 - The Game’s Afoot
  11. 9 - Bad Cop, Bad Cop
  12. 10 - Stand by Your Man (and Vice Versa)
  13. 11 - Reality TV Bites
  14. 12 - Down the Drain(Pipe)
  15. 13 - Sister Act
  16. 14 - Eat Your Heart Out, Nancy Drew
  17. 15 - Behind Enemy Lines
  18. 16 - Law and Order: Long-Lost Twin Unit
  19. 17 - Body of Evidence
  20. 18 - What Goes Up . . .
  21. 19 - Face Off
  22. 20 - There’s No Place Like Home
  23. 21 - Shelter from the Storm
  24. 22 - Emma Non Grata
  25. 23 - A Walk in the Park
  26. 24 - Go Google Yourself
  27. 25 - Emma Paxton: Master of Disguise
  28. 26 - Show Us Your Texts
  29. 27 - Memento Mori
  30. 28 - A Message from Beyond the Grave
  31. 29 - The Last Memory
  32. 30 - The Envelope, Please
  33. 31 - Endgame
  34. 32 - Back in the Station
  35. 33 - Home
  36. 34 - The Queen is Dead (Long Live the Queen)
  37. 35 - Make New Friends, but Keep the Old
  38. 36 - Yours Forever
  39. 37 - Good-Bye
  40. Acknowledgments
  41. About the Author
  42. Also by Sara Shepard
  43. Back Ads
  44. Credits
  45. About the Publisher

Next she picked up a diagram of the crime scene, sketched from multiple angles, that showed both the body’s distance from the road and the spot the investigators thought she’d fallen from, high overhead. Her breath caught as she recognized the area on the map: Sutton had fallen from a precipice very close to the spot where the girls had held their fake séance just a few weeks earlier.

She thought back to the faint voice she’d heard in her head that night, so familiar in her ear. It had told her to run. It had sounded like it was coming from far, far away. But maybe it had been closer than she’d thought.

It had come from me.

Finally there was the coroner’s report. The medical examiner had enumerated Sutton’s injuries, and the list was long. On one page he’d sketched the locations of the wounds and fractures on a schematic outline of her body.

Victim has more than a dozen separate bruises and thirteen lacerations over her limbs and torso. Victim’s tibia and three ribs are fractured, and left shoulder is dislocated. Victim also suffered depressed skull fracture directly over right eye, causing subdural hematoma and massive hemorrhage.

Emma bit hard on the inside of her mouth, her blood salty and metallic on her tongue. Her sister had died in a lot of pain, and a side note mentioned that it looked like wild animals of some kind had “disturbed” the body. Emma didn’t want to think about that. She turned the page.

These injuries are all consistent with an accidental fall.

The words froze her in her seat. Accidental fall?

I froze, too. They thought it was an accident? How was that possible? I reached frantically through my memory to conjure up the last image I had of that night in the canyon. Once again I felt Garrett’s hand on my shoulder, his voice in my ear. I willed myself to turn around, to face him and find out what he had done to me—but the memory went dark. All I could pull up was that sickly sense of vertigo I’d had when Quinlan had first announced that I’d fallen. Garrett must have pushed me over the side—but there had to be a clue, some indication that he’d done it on purpose. What happened to me—what had happened to Emma and Nisha since—had been no accident.

Emma’s head spun wildly. It was just like Nisha’s death, covered up and made to look accidental.

Then, at the bottom of the report, two lines in bold type caught her eye.

CAUSE OF DEATH: CEREBRAL CONTUSION CAUSED BY BLUNT FORCE TRAUMA

MANNER OF DEATH: UNDETERMINED

She blinked. Undetermined. So maybe they weren’t so sure it had been an “accidental” fall, after all.