He didn’t answer. “I didn’t have evidence. Just that Taylor and Candace had lunch with Adele the day she left campus. And then their reaction to me when I started asking questions. Taylor was angry and Candace was sad. That’s it. She shut me out, but I just sensed she knew more. I didn’t know how or why. Adele didn’t belong to Sigma Rho or any sorority. But based on her schedule and digging around social media, I learned that the three of them had shared a class, then Adele and Taylor had had another class together. They’d all had lunch the last day of finals. It reasoned that they had done other things together. In the back of my mind, I thought that if I could figure out where Candace had been when she was missing, I might find out where Adele was—that maybe she’d gone missing for the same reason.”

“Do you think she’s alive?”

He shook his head. “She would never do that to her family. And if she was in an accident with a head injury or something, eventually authorities would have traced her to her family. And I realized my initial hypothesis just didn’t work. It was based on some conspiracy theory that there was a serial killer who kept his victims alive before he killed them, or something stupid like that. None of the physical evidence held with anything bizarre like that. I think Adele’s dead. And the troopers’ theory—that someone created an accident and grabbed her—makes sense. It’s plausible. But then why was Candace acting so odd, so sad, when I talked to her about Adele? Which led me to believe she knew more about Adele’s disappearance.”

Everything Lucas said answered Regan’s questions and concerns. And opened up far more. According to both Candace’s roommate Annie and Richie Traverton, she had changed at the end of her fall semester—just when Lucas was pushing her for more about information about Adele. She had acted out of character, like quitting the writing lab.

“I’m really sorry.”

Guilt? Understanding? Empathy? What was Candace feeling at the time?

Regan wouldn’t think twice about her reaction if Candace was simply empathetic about what Lucas was going through. Lucas overreacted. But Candace was now dead, Taylor was dead, and they were the last two people known to have seen Adele Overton before she left campus.

“I have some evidence,” Lucas said and pulled something out of his pocket. He handed her a photo.

She recognized Taylor and Candace. “Is this Adele in the middle?”

“Yes.”

She turned over the photo. On the back was written Me with my BFFs, last day of classes before finals!

“Where did you get this?”

“Taylor’s house.”

“You said you didn’t go in the house.”

“I went back.”

“Dammit, Lucas.”

“This was all I took, I swear.” He paused. “I wore gloves.”