“What does that have to do with me? Oh, no way.” His eyebrows go up. “You think I did something to her?”

“The day after I saw her here, you were leaving with big rolls of carpet. Big enough to hide a body. And you told me ‘killing someone isn’t easy.’ How would you know that?”

“It was an assumption,” Christian says. “I never fucking killed anyone, are you out of your mind?”

I think I might be.

“What did you do to Jen Tillis?” I am proud of the way my voice doesn’t shake when I demand this answer.

Christian’s brow knits. “What do you mean?”

“She killed herself. Or did she?”

“What the actual fuck are you trying to say, Jewelann? That I killed her and Beth? I mean … that’s ludicrous. That’s beyond messed up.” He puts a hand over his heart as though I’ve actually hurt him.

Good. I want to hurt him. “She overdosed. That’s what her mother told mine, and what my mother told me. Overdosed on tranquilizers.”

Soft laughter hisses out of him. “You think I gave her pills?”

“You gave me pills,” I remind him.

“I wasn’t even seeing her anymore. I broke it off with her when we went off to school. She kept trying to get back together with me, she’d send me letters, call me all the time. She showed up at my parents’ house to get them on her side. She even showed up at my dorm once. I might have broken her heart, but I did not kill her.”

“Might have?” I laugh, short and sharp and hard.

“Fine. I broke her heart. And Beth’s too, I guess. Just like I broke yours. Is that what you want me to say?”

I ignore that question. “You gave Beth drugs. And now she’s missing. And I think you do know something about it. Something you’re covering up.”

I am surprised to see that this seems to affect him. With a sullen expression, he puts his hands on his hips. Unlike all the other times, the posture doesn’t send me a single tingle.

Christian scrubs his hand through his hair, then over his face with a small groan before fixing his gaze on mine. “We partied. She wanted to stay the night, but I told her she couldn’t. I don’t know how she lost the earring, but I’m surprised she didn’t lose anything else. She was wasted. You saw that, right? As far as I know, she stumbled off home to her hubby. If she overdosed, she didn’t do it here, and I sure as shit didn’t roll her up in a damned carpet. If you’re really that worried about it, go to the police. I have nothing to hide.”

“That isn’t true.”

His smile is brittle. Fixed. Eyes, bright. “No?”

“Where did you say you went to med school?”

He pushes past me to grab two wineglasses and a bottle from the counter. He pops off the decorative stopper and pours quickly while I watch. I refuse the glass he tries to hand me. “It’s a school in the Caribbean called St. George’s.”