Say You're Sorry

Morgan lifted her daughter’s chin. “Back to school tomorrow.”

Ava nodded. “Grandpa got me a milkshake at McDonald’s.”

“That sounds yummy,” Morgan said. “I have to run to my room for a minute. I’ll be right back.”

After her mother left the room, Ava’s gaze landed on Lance. “What happened to your arm?”

He glanced down. He’d lost a Band-Aid. “Just a scratch.”

“Does it hurt?” Ava asked.

“Just a little,” Lance said.

“You need a Band-Aid.”

Lance pretended not to melt when she took him by the hand and tugged him into the kitchen.

She pointed at an upper cabinet. “The box is up there.”

He opened the cabinet and took down a white box with a red cross on the top. He handed it to her.

“You sit here.” She steered him to a chair, set the box on the table, and opened it. Then she carefully selected a pink princess bandage and applied it to his arm. Leaning over, she kissed the bandage. “All better.”

Lance felt his heart crack wide open. Some tough guy he was.

“I have to go play with Gianna.” She jumped off the chair.

“Thanks, Ava,” Lance called as the child skipped out of the kitchen, nearly colliding with Morgan as she walked in.

“I have to go. Love you, baby,” Morgan called after her daughter.

Morgan led the way out of the house, stopping to say good-bye to her grandfather on the way out.

As she reached for the Jeep’s door handle, Lance spotted a suspicious bulge just below her right kidney. “Is that your gun?”

“Yes.” She’d added a belt to her slacks, no doubt to accommodate her holster. “You can see it?”

“Just when your jacket tightened.” He’d known she had a weapon but had never seen her armed.

She adjusted the holster. “I haven’t carried in a very long time. I’ve only taken my gun out for the occasional trip to the range.”

“Do you practice regularly?”

She laughed. “As if Grandpa would allow me not to.” They settled into the front seats of the vehicle. “Felicity doesn’t live far from here.” Morgan gave him the address and Lance drove out of the neighborhood.

The Webers lived in a Cape Cod-style house. The blue-gray clapboards, white trim, and black shutters were freshly painted. A white picket fence enclosed a front yard full of lush grass. Lance parked at the curb, and they went to the door. Felicity opened the door before they knocked. Her long blonde hair fell in a long braid down the center of her back.

“Come on in.” Felicity stepped back.

The front door opened directly into the living room. Felicity led them straight through to a small, tidy kitchen. Behind it, a screened porch looked onto a tiny yard of well-kept grass. They went through the French doors onto the porch. Felicity sat in an Adirondack chair and hugged her knees. Morgan and Lance took a wicker love seat facing her.

Morgan started. “Thanks for talking to us.”

Tears filled Felicity’s eyes. “I can’t believe Tessa’s dead.”

“I know.” Morgan reached out and touched her knee. “I’m sorry.”

Felicity sniffed. “You don’t think Nick did it?”

“No.” Morgan said in a firm voice.

“Me either,” Felicity agreed.

“Why do you say that?” Lance asked.

Morgan had been concerned with Lance intimidating Felicity, but she didn’t seem the least bit nervous. Just sad.

The girl pulled her braid over her shoulder and stroked it. “First of all, Nick really liked Tessa, and he treated her real nice.”

“In what way?” Morgan asked.

“He was considerate, kind, gentle even.” She chewed on the end of her braid. “I can’t picture him ever hurting a girl.”

“He fought with Jacob,” Lance reminded her.

Anger flashed in the girl’s eyes. “Because Jacob was mean to Tessa. Nick was protecting her.”

Lance leaned his elbows on his knees. “You don’t like Jacob?”

“Jacob is an asshole.” Felicity scowled. “If I had to pick someone who would rape—” She paused for a second to press a hand to her mouth and compose herself. “—a girl, it would be Jacob.”

Morgan’s body tipped forward, as if the girl’s words pulled at her. “Why do you say that?”

“Because of other things he’s done.” Felicity surged to her feet and paced the gray-painted floorboards.

“Did he ever do anything to Tessa?” Morgan asked.

The girl stopped, nodding. “There was this party at the beginning of the summer. I wasn’t there, but apparently Tessa passed out. The next day, she said she’d only had two beers. She was in really bad shape, though, and she didn’t remember much about the party. Then Jacob sent her a picture on Snapchat.”

“What’s Snapchat?” Morgan asked.

“It’s an app that lets people share pictures and messages that self-destruct after they’re read.” Lance said. “It was designed to be a way for kids to share things without having to worry about their pictures or messages haunting them on the Internet for the rest of their lives.”

“So if they were drunk or someone took a photo of them smoking pot, there’s no proof,” Morgan said. “What kind of picture did Jacob send Tessa?”

A tear rolled down Felicity’s cheek. “She was naked, and he was doing things to her.”

Lance and Morgan shared a look.

“Do you know when this happened?” Morgan asked.

“Around the beginning of July.” Felicity wrapped her arms around her waist. “I don’t remember exactly.”

Right about the same time Tessa got pregnant.

“But the pictures on Snapchat are temporary, so they were wiped from Tessa’s phone.” Frustration bubbled in Lance’s chest. Jacob Emerson was a predator, and Lance wanted to nail him.

“Technically they disappear from your phone.” Felicity took her phone from the back pocket of her shorts and began scrolling. “But I made Tessa take a screenshot. I wanted her to keep a copy because Jacob is such an asshole that it wouldn’t surprise me if he pulled a stunt like this again. I didn’t want Tessa to regret not keeping the pics. But she didn’t want to keep them anywhere her grandparents could see them. She was so embarrassed.”

So embarrassed that she didn’t go to the police. Humiliation was one of the reasons that only a third of rape victims reported their assaults.

“I copied the pictures to my cloud account,” Felicity said.

The police wouldn’t have known they ever existed, even if they got a search warrant for Felicity’s phone. Plus, if Jacob ever got a hold of her phone, he couldn’t delete the pictures.

“Do you still have them?” Morgan perched on the very edge of her seat.

“Hold on a minute. I have to download them.” Felicity watched her phone, then handed it over. Then she turned away, as if unable to look.

Morgan held the phone toward Lance. Even knowing what to expect, the first photo made him suck wind. An unconscious and naked Tessa sprawled on a rug. A fully clothed Jacob knelt between her legs, both hands on her breasts.

“Hell.” Disgusted, Lance looked away.

There were four pictures, each worse than the last. Lance gave them a quick glance, then got up and paced to the window. Just viewing the images made him feel dirty, as if Tessa was being violated all over again. The anger that had been building throughout the case went from a simmer to a boil. Jacob Emerson was just seventeen, but Lance wanted to beat the hell out of him for what he’d done to Tessa.