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Back The Sorority Murder Save as PDF
Chapters (61)
  1. Cover
  2. Praise
  3. Dedication
  4. One
  5. Two
  6. Three
  7. Four
  8. Five
  9. From the Missing Journal of Candace Swain
  10. Six
  11. Seven
  12. Eight
  13. Nine
  14. Ten
  15. Eleven
  16. Twelve
  17. From the Missing Journal of Candace Swain
  18. Thirteen
  19. Fourteen
  20. Fifteen
  21. From the Missing Journal of Candace Swain
  22. Sixteen
  23. Seventeen
  24. Eighteen
  25. Nineteen
  26. Twenty
  27. Twenty-One
  28. From the Missing Journal of Candace Swain
  29. Twenty-Two
  30. Twenty-Three
  31. Twenty-Four
  32. Twenty-Five
  33. Twenty-Six
  34. Twenty-Seven
  35. Twenty-Eight
  36. Twenty-Nine
  37. Thirty
  38. Thirty-One
  39. Thirty-Two
  40. Thirty-Three
  41. Thirty-Four
  42. From the Missing Journal of Candace Swain
  43. Thirty-Five
  44. Thirty-Six
  45. Thirty-Seven
  46. Thirty-Eight
  47. From the Journal of Candace Swain
  48. Thirty-Nine
  49. Forty
  50. Forty-One
  51. Forty-Two
  52. Forty-Three
  53. Forty-Four
  54. Forty-Five
  55. Forty-Six
  56. Forty-Seven
  57. Letter Found in the Journal of Candace Swain
  58. Forty-Eight
  59. Acknowledgments
  60. Booklist
  61. Excerpt

“If she was, she didn’t tell me. There was one odd thing, though. Candace was in an off mood one day after tutoring, and then she quit the writing lab suddenly. She liked tutoring there because it gave her a break from the hard sciences she was studying. She was very creative and a really good writer. I asked her why. She got paid for it, and I know she was saving up so she could go on a trip with Chrissy over the summer, after her graduation. She said she needed to focus on school for the last semester.”

“Makes sense.”

“Not for Candace. She had outstanding grades. She didn’t struggle academically. And—well, I thought she was lying. I don’t know why, but it sounded like an excuse to me. Not what she said, but how she said it.”

“I really appreciate you talking about this, Richie,” she said. “If you can think of anything else—especially where Candace might have gone that week—I’d encourage you to call in to the podcast.”

“I really don’t know where she went. I’ve thought about it all week since I listened to it, and her disappearance just doesn’t make any sense. Are you sure that this Abernathy guy didn’t kidnap her? Hold her captive somewhere? I mean, I know that she wasn’t assaulted, you know, like that, but maybe it was something else.”

“I suppose anything is possible, but I think Abernathy is way down on the list. He was a barely functioning alcoholic.” She paid her bill and said, “Oh, one more thing. Do you know about Candace’s journal?”

“I know she had one, but I never saw it. She told me she’d been keeping it since she was thirteen, when her parents were going through their divorce. Candace said journaling helped her more than talking to the psychologist they sent her to. That I understood. I’ve always preferred writing out my problems than talking about them. Why do you ask?”

Regan had been hoping Richie had the journal or knew where it was.

“The police never found it in her room or car.”

“That’s weird,” he said. “That journal was important to her. I had a feeling that she wrote down things she wouldn’t say out loud.”

He was right. Weird. And suspicious.

Because now Regan thought her killer took it. And maybe the reason Candace was killed in the first place was because of something in her journal.

Twenty-Six

After his morning class, Lucas grabbed a sandwich and went to his office in the communications building. He propped the door open with his garbage can because the small window didn’t open and the room was stuffy.