“She had a trophy or something on the dresser. I just reached out, and it felt like a heavy stone in my hand. And I swung. Just once.” Her eyes were wide, her hand cupped as though she was holding that heavy object again. “I knew it was bad. The sound it made. The way she fell. I knew.” She swallowed hard. “I took the letters and the trophy with me. That trophy . . . It was some kind of employee-of-the-month thing. . . .”

“Where is it?” I asked.

“In the river. And the letters are burned.”

“And the glove?” I asked.

“That could be a problem,” Sam said. “I didn’t even know the gloves were in my pocket. I hadn’t worn that coat recently, and they were in there. And one of them fell out, I guess. I didn’t want it to go that way, but it did. You would have done the same thing, wouldn’t you? Wouldn’t you, Amanda?”

Blake placed his hand on Sam’s arm, and she went along as he guided her toward the back door of the Barn. But before they went inside, I spoke and Blake stopped and looked back.

“Did you know the truth about this, Blake? Did you know Sam did this?”

“I had my suspicions. Sam wasn’t answering her phone during the time when all of that supposedly happened. When we talked about all of these things, about Jennifer’s death, she was evasive. And cold, really. And . . . her hand. Her nails on her right hand . . . They looked like . . . They looked like she’d been changing a tire. They were all broken and chipped. And she’d been chewing them again. Her hands never look like that. But I found out for sure that day I came over to get your computer. I wanted to see what was on there. I wanted to know how bad it was.”

“You’re willing to cover for Sam, knowing she did this.”

“I am,” Blake said. “That’s what you do for people you love.”

“But you’ll go to jail. The accident. The murder.”

“Maybe we won’t come back,” Blake said. “We’re getting married. We’re going on a trip. Sam has money from her parents. They’re going to cut us off, but we can make it on our own somewhere. That’s why we’re still getting married today. I think it’s clear there’s no need to tell the police about this. We all understand why Sam did what she did. Let’s just move on and have a wedding. The cops won’t know who Lily Rose is unless you tell them.”

I reached into my pocket and brought out my phone.

“You can’t do that,” Blake said, leaning forward. “We’re friends. We’ve been friends longer than you’ve been friends with anybody. Longer than you’ve known Amanda.”

I dialed 911.