By then, all things that Jolene had known. Still, she’d thought that when she got the DNA results she would feel that bond with Dulcie that sisters were supposed to feel. She’d hoped she would. She hadn’t.

Maybe it was as simple as the fact that she didn’t want to be Angel, didn’t want to remember those first five years of her life or her mother’s murder or what she must have seen.

She sighed now, wishing she could quit thinking about it. She’d read most of the cruelly hot afternoon, but even a good book couldn’t distract her from her thoughts.

Putting down her book, she walked to the window, surprised it was getting dark. She felt restless, thought about going into town, but didn’t have the energy or any reason. It was still unbearably hot, but now the breeze coming in the open window felt muggy.

She dreaded tomorrow. There would be no ending to the murder story. She would grade her students’ assignments, then hand them all back, keeping copies for the promised anthology. School would let out early for the year. It would be over.

And yet it wouldn’t be over for her until she remembered.

She couldn’t bear to think about spending a long, hot summer here now. But where would she go? Dulcie had talked about her coming back to Chicago with her. Jolene wasn’t ready for that.

She turned away from the window. The house felt unbearably hot. Maybe she’d take a cool shower. She wandered into the bathroom and stripped down. As she stepped under the icy spray, she thought of Tinker and felt her stomach turn. He’d been the boy she’d played with at the creek, the friend who, according to the author of the murder story, tried to save her the night her mother was murdered.

As she shampooed her hair, she wondered if Tinker knew who she was, had known since the first time he’d asked her out at a Whitehorse Community Center dance.

The thought sent a chill through her. She turned up the hot water and stood under it for a few seconds.

Had Tinker known his father sneaked over to see Laura? He was nine, plenty old enough to know what was going on. Or had Ronda been telling the truth and Ben had never been Laura’s lover?

Turning off the shower, Jolene rubbed her temples, feeling a headache coming on, if she kept this up. But she had to know who’d been writing the murder story.

As she pulled on a tank top, shorts and sandals, she padded back into her living room and glanced at the computer sitting on the desk in the corner.

She hadn’t even turned it on since the one at the school was newer and had Internet service. But hadn’t Titus Cavanaugh mentioned that the two computers were networked together?