Chapter 8: Nothing on the Tape

I told him to meet me at a diner, not my condo.

It was the all-night place on Dunmore, four blocks from the intersection, with a counter, six booths and a waitress asleep on her elbow.

Dr. Kerrigan had driven me there and parked across the street. I had told him to wait in the car.

Derrick was already in the back booth with his laptop closed in front of him.

He had changed his shirt, and he had bitten his nails down to the quick.

"Thanks for coming," he said.

"You said you'd bring me the audio."

"I did. I pulled it." He put one hand flat on the laptop. "Abigail, there's nothing on it."

"Play it."

"It's wind. Rain. Static. That's all. The app glitched, that happens, it logged a connection that was really a dropped call."

"Then play it."

"There's no point."

"If there's nothing on it, there's no harm."

He didn't open the laptop.

The waitress woke up and came over, looked at us, and went away again without taking an order.

"Derrick," I said. "What did you hear?"

"I told you. Nothing."

"Did you hear me?"

His mouth moved.

"I told you, it's static."

"Did you hear me breathe?"

His eyes were wet.

He looked at the table, at the laptop, at his own bitten thumbs.

"Abigail, please," he said. "Please drop it."

"Drop what?"

"All of it. The report, the police. Heidi's twenty. Mom's already a wreck. If someone knocks on that door tomorrow, it'll destroy her."

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