Paul shakes his head. “That...that doesn’t make any sense. She stopped me because of my coffee, and she didn’t ask me anything that was even remotely personal. We certainly didn’t introduce ourselves, not until you came along. You’re the one who said the name Keller, remember.”

“Okay, but that’s not how Wade’s telling it. If he told Chet, he’s told everybody else, too, including the police. Sam was already asking where we were yesterday morning from 4:00 a.m. on.”

Paul pulls his toothbrush from a drawer, squirts it with toothpaste. “What did you tell him?”

“That your alarm went off at six.”

His gaze finds mine in the mirror. “You lied for me?”

His words set off an electrical storm in my chest, and the big ball of emotion I’ve been carrying around for two days bursts into flame. “What was I supposed to say, Paul? You left me here to deal with everything, and I didn’t know where you were. I didn’t know if you were alive or dead or what the hell was happening. And then somebody skinned that animal on the back deck and—”

“Wait. What?”

I nod. “An opossum on the back deck. It was disgusting. And when the snow melts tomorrow it’s going to really smell. They also wrote something awful in the snow.”

Paul dumps his toothbrush in the sink and turns to face me. “What did they write?”

“KILLER, in blood. Enough to have come from a cow, according to Micah. I’ve been living in lockdown, terrified whoever killed that poor woman is coming back for me.” I study Paul’s face, the tight skin around his mouth, the way the color has drained from his cheeks again. “What?”

“I’m just... Jesus, Charlotte, I’m so goddamn sorry. I didn’t want any of this to touch you.” He says it quietly, purposefully, like he’s been practicing the words in his head for days.

“Any of what, Paul? That woman was asking about you. You go on an early-morning run around the same time she slides into the lake, and you come back covered in mud and cuts. They pull her out from under our dock, you lie about knowing her, and then you disappear.”

“Hang on, hang on.” He steps closer, his bare feet swishing against the tile. “Do you think I had something to do with that woman’s death? Do you really think I would kill some stranger, then dump her under my own dock? Is that what’s going on here?”

I lift both hands from my sides. “You have to admit it looks bad.”

“That’s not an answer.”