Chapter 14
I sat in my SUV in the driveway of our house, ignoring the reporters on the other side of the fence yelling at me.
After my conversation with Kayleigh, I knew I was on the right track, and that I would have to face the Hopely sisters next.
It felt like pulling teeth as I opened my phone and typed out a message to Cassandra.
It was our first contact in almost seven years, and ironically it was happening while I was back in our hometown, instead of in the city where we both now lived.
Cass, it’s Rose. I know you hate me but I need to talk to you. It’s about Hazel. She’s missing. Please call me?
I sent it before I could change my mind. While I waited for a response, I tried to cyberstalk Victoria. I knew she was still living in South Florida, but it was time to learn more. Her Instagram account was public but she had blocked me years ago, so I quickly made a burner account to view it.
I scrolled through her page, noting that she was the exact brand of generic girl I had expected.
Her feed was entirely composed of pictures of her doing Pilates in matching sets, her recently started real estate career, her labradoodle.
I had to scroll back years before I found a picture of her and Cassandra, and I didn’t see any of Sam. No photos of her parents.
But then I noticed the very familiar setting in many of her photos.
She was at her parents’ house in almost every one.
Including the most recent post, dated yesterday.
Which meant she must have moved back home.
Meaning she was living in the house right behind me and was potentially there now.
Meaning she had also lived right behind Hazel for some time.
It was a horrifying prospect, but if I wanted answers fast, there was only one way to get them.
My sister had been missing for almost two days now, and I could not let my reluctance to face the Hopelys distract me.
It was now after 5 p.m., so I figured Victoria would probably be home.
I ignored the shouting reporters as I exited the car and headed toward the back of my house.
Thankfully, the yard was too densely covered with trees for anyone to see me back here.
I was desperately craving a Xanax as I made my way toward the Hopelys’ house. My breath caught when I passed the spot where we’d found Alex’s body all those years ago. The sick, distorted image of her sprawled and lifeless on the ground had never left me.
I tried to summon my resolve as I approached the Hopelys’ front door. I really did not want to do this, but I owed it to Hazel.
I knocked loudly, and my acrylic nails jabbed into the palm of my hand. It took a full minute before the door opened, a full minute of me praying to anything I could think of that it wouldn’t be Mrs. Hopely who answered the door. When the door swung open, I gasped, my mouth instantly dry.
Alex stood in the doorway.
I couldn’t feel my hands. I was staring at a ghost, trying to process what I was looking at. Was I going insane?
After a beat of stunned silence, she spoke. “What do you want?” The familiar look of annoyance on her face made it click. Victoria.
I had forgotten how much she looked like her older sister.
Logically I knew. I had spent the years after Alex’s death watching Cassandra and Victoria from afar.
But the older Victoria had gotten, the more she had settled into Alex’s features.
Her hair was the same glossy shade, her nose a perfect ski slope.
“Seriously, Rose,” she said, her voice octaves higher than I remembered and dripping with vitriol, “why would you come here? To my parents’ house? Or I guess it’s just my mom’s now. Thanks to fucking you.”
“Believe me, I didn’t want to come here,” I snapped. I had sworn to myself I would never step into this house again. “But I need to talk to you.”
Victoria rolled her eyes. “You have a lot of nerve. Do you have any idea what you did to us? Your awful book was everywhere. I literally couldn’t escape it.” Her voice turned shrill. “Everywhere I went, people were talking about Alex, about us. I had to hear your lies repeated over and over.”
“I never lied,” I retorted.
Victoria’s eyes narrowed. “Are you kidding me? You told the world that my father killed Alex.”
I flinched. Okay, I had lied about that one thing, but the rest had been entirely true.
“I wanted to sue you,” Victoria continued.
“I would have, except my dad—” She choked a little on the word and shook her head.
Her long fingers moved to her temples as she tried to calm herself down.
This was not going to go well. I should just leave.
The only thing that kept me rooted in place was Hazel.
“Look, Victoria, I am sorry about your father.” This was both true and untrue. I was sorry for her, that she’d had to endure another loss, but I had my reasons for what I did. Reasons I just did not plan to share with Victoria now. “But I’m not here to get into my book, or any of that.”
“How convenient,” Victoria said darkly.
I tried to focus. “I’m here about Hazel. You know she’s missing right?”
Victoria’s face softened slightly, and I took it as a good sign. It was hard for anyone to hate Hazel.
“Yes, I heard,” Victoria said tentatively.
“We’re trying to figure out where she could be,” I said, seeing no reason to beat around the bush.
“Listen, I know you hate me. I get it. But I promise you, the only reason I’m here is because I think my sister came to see you.
I just need to know if that’s the case, and then you’ll never hear from me again. ”
Victoria’s lips parted and a small look of concern crossed her face. It was all I needed as a confirmation.
“I did talk to her,” Victoria said, letting her guard down.
“What about?” I pressed, and she sighed. She looked past me toward the empty driveway and closed the door behind her. She gestured to the two rocking chairs on their front patio. “Let’s sit.”
I was grateful that Victoria hadn’t suggested we go inside. I couldn’t even imagine the emotions that would surface. I sat stiffly in one of the rocking chairs while Victoria curled up like a pretzel in hers. She was barely looking at me.
“I talked to Hazel about a week ago,” she said, wrapping her arms around her knees.
“She came by and wanted to ask me about what happened back then. And honestly, I was a little harsh with her.” Victoria looked guilty.
“I don’t have anything against Hazel, obviously.
She is a nice girl …” With that she gave me a dirty look that said Unlike you.
“I asked her if this was some kind of fact-finding mission for you,” Victoria continued.
“The very last thing I wanted to do was give you any ammunition for another book. But she swore she hadn’t spoken to you about this.
She only wanted to know more about that guy at the mall.
Honestly, I didn’t even know who she was talking about at first, but then I told her what I knew: Alex gave Nick her number.
They texted. You know this too. It wasn’t that deep. They were literally eighteen.”
Easy for her to say. Her brother wasn’t in jail for a crime he didn’t commit.
“I couldn’t even tell why she wanted to know,” Victoria continued.
“Did you tell her anything else?”
“Just that Alex had said he lived in Palm Beach Gardens.” Victoria sighed. “I felt bad for Hazel. She was desperate for any scrap of information. My kindness got the better of me, I guess.”
I tried to keep my face even so Victoria couldn’t see the gears spinning in my mind. The last thing I needed was her interfering.
“Have you spoken to your brother about this at all?” Victoria asked suddenly, picking at her nail.
“Tommy?” I shook my head, even though I probably should have filled him in by now. He was the sibling who Hazel would have confided in. He lived here, knew the cast of characters Hazel was surrounded by.
Victoria’s eyes snapped up. “No. Will.”
Will? I was stunned, not understanding why she was asking and surprised to hear his name coming out of her mouth. With the Hopelys it was always your brother or the murderer. Jabs meant to dehumanize Will and hurt me further.
“A little … He knows Hazel was asking questions,” I said finally. “It seems they talked about it.”
“Yeah,” Victoria said darkly. “That I know.” I noticed that she was sitting very straight now, her body taut.
She looked nervous. We had been friends for years, and I knew her tells.
She was hiding something, but it looked like she was about to spill.
I waited patiently, letting the silence do the work for me, a tactic I’d learned in all of my research for The Smileys Next Door.
“Look, I’m only telling you this because you’re probably going to find out next time you talk to Will anyway and I am not going to have you making your own assumptions about it.” Victoria rolled her eyes. “And I hate that this is going to give you validation.”
I was getting impatient. Hazel was missing and every minute counted. “What is going on, Victoria? Spit it out.”
“I write to Will sometimes,” she said.
Of all the things I thought she could’ve said, that was not on the list. I felt like the wind had been knocked out of me. “Excuse me?”
“I write to him, like letters, and he writes back,” Victoria said, as if I didn’t understand what she had meant.
“Angry ones?” I asked, struggling to imagine Will being on the receiving end of anything other than her ire.
“Not exactly … We … catch up? We write back and forth most weeks,” Victoria said, looking at the floor.
I thought about how Victoria used to feel about Will.
The doe-eyed, girlish looks she used to give him when Alex was alive.
It was no secret that Victoria had a crush on him.
Alex had bullied her endlessly for it. But I had thought that crush had shriveled up and died when he’d been convicted of murder.