Dead Before the Truth Revealed novel · Chapter 8 of 24

Chapter 8: Hold My Collar

The loft door opened and Anthony stood in the frame with the lamp from the stairwell behind him.

I did not run. There was nowhere to go.

I stood against the wall in my own hair and a black dress.

It smelled of the Kensington house, and I let him look.

He looked for a long time.

"Ciara," he said.

"Hello, Anthony."

His hand went out and found the door frame.

He did not touch me.

One hand was white-knuckled on the wood.

The other hung at his side, and I saw it shaking.

"They dragged the lake for you," he said.

"I know. I watched."

"I waded in."

"I saw that too."

His legs gave, and he sat down on the edge of the narrow bed.

The glasses were still in his jacket pocket. He took them out and put them on and took them off again.

"I need to hear it," he said. "Not Edmund's paper. You."

"Hear what?"

"What you said to me in the water."

My mouth was dry.

For six years I had told this to a mirror, to a charge nurse, to a ballroom. I had never told it to him in a room with the door open.

"The car was nose down in about eight feet of water," I said. "The doors were jammed from the crash. I got the driver's door open on the third try with my shoulder."

He had gone very still.

"You were awake. You couldn't see, the airbag powder had gone in your eyes. I said, 'Hold my collar.' You took hold of it and wouldn't let go."

"I'm a nurse," Anthony said quietly.

I stopped.

"You said that," he said. "You said, 'I'm a nurse. Hold my collar. I'm going to cut the belt. Don't kick.'"

"Yes."

"Camille never said that. For six years she told me she said, 'I've got you.'" He drew a long unsteady breath. "I have heard 'I've got you' every night since. It never matched. The voice was right. It never matched."

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