“I wasn’t in the apartment. You know he killed her. Look, I came here to say how sorry I am. I came because it’s my Healing Project, right?”

Stefan said, “How do you know about that?”

“I saw it on TV, like everybody else,” Esme said. “And I thought wow, you’re doing such a good thing. So I wanted to do something good, too. I wanted to admit it. It was partly my fault. I got him into a frenzy. I told him that Belinda was breaking up with him. And everything else, since he got out, that was my fault too. I just came to tell you that it wasn’t my idea. It wasn’t my idea to scare you, ever.”

“If it wasn’t your idea, whose idea was it?”

“It was Jill’s.”

“Why did you...why would you...” I stammered. “How do you even know Jill?”

“Jill is like a mother to me,” Esme said. “She doesn’t know about me and Belinda. Our relationship. She doesn’t know about me giving Belinda and Stefan drugs, I hope you never tell her. It would break her heart.”

“What?” I still couldn’t comprehend all this. Esme knew Jill, but Jill didn’t know who Esme was to Belinda?

“She just knows that I was one of the first volunteers,” Esme said, with a lilt of pride she couldn’t seem to suppress. “I helped her with it from the beginning.”

“Are you really from Chicago?” I asked her. “Did you come up here just to torment us?”

“I was born there. My dad is still in Chicago.”

“Do you live in Black Creek now?” I asked then.

“I did,” she said. “Not now. I live with Jill. Or I did, until tonight.”

Trying hard to get a good breath, I looked down at the phone. Then I thought, ten more minutes won’t matter.

I only wanted a moment to see the night Belinda was killed through the eyes of one who was there. I owed Stefan that much. I owed Belinda that much. I owed myself.

“Tell me how you knew Belinda,” I said.

“Why do I have to hear this?” Stefan said. “Why does this matter at all?”

“Stay here,” I told Stefan. “I am going to call the police. I still think that there’s a good chance she really did kill Belinda. She has every reason to lie. But I need you to be here too.”