Chapter 24 #2
“So, tell me,” I said softly, as his lips moved to my neck. I reached my hand down and stroked his dick through his jeans. Bradley groaned, his eyelids fluttering. “What?” he asked, his lips pressed to my throat. His hand squeezed my breast again.
“How long were you going to lie to me about fucking Alex Hopely?” My grip on his penis tightened.
Bradley’s lips stopped moving on my neck. He pulled back to look at me.
“What did you just say?” he asked.
“You heard me.” I released my grip on his dick.
Bradley moved away from me quickly, taking several steps back. His face paled and his arms hung loosely at his sides. “I don’t …”
I felt anger coursing through me. I hated the terrified way he was looking at me. “Well? Were you sleeping with Alex or not?”
He stared at me silently. We both knew the answer. The veins in his neck were bulging and his mouth was pulled into a line.
“Who told you that?” he asked, avoiding the question.
I pushed myself off the counter, readjusting my top so that I was covered. Bradley was under no more delusions that he’d be getting me into bed tonight.
“I spoke to Victoria Hopely today,” I told him. “Did you know she caught you and Alex hooking up? It’s weird that you never told me that, or the police for that matter.”
Bradley held his hands out defensively. He looked nervous. “Listen, Rose—”
“Were you sleeping with her or not?”
“Yes, but listen, please—”
I cut him off. “Then why didn’t you tell the police? Or me?”
Bradley’s face shriveled with desperation. “Because it would have made me look guilty!” he said loudly, his hands knotting in his hair.
For the first time since I’d gotten here, I felt a flare of panic.
I didn’t like the way he was watching me.
I realized that I never actually thought he killed Alex, or Hazel.
I had been under the delusion that Bradley was disgusting, but not a murderer.
I had come here for a confrontation, because I was angry and I wanted answers, but what if he had actually done it?
What if I had come over here, alone, to the apartment of a murderer?
What if I had slept with their murderer?
I’d been with Bradley more times than I could count.
I’d thought I knew him, but I realized I didn’t know him at all.
I had been a teenager, and it had been years since I last saw him.
It was the first time I’d ever considered that I had put myself in actual danger.
There was nothing to do but double down.
“Where were you the night of Will and Alex’s graduation?” I asked gently, trying to find the most innocuous way of phrasing it. Bradley’s eyes narrowed in disbelief, understanding exactly where I was going with this. He ran his hands over his face, looking exasperated.
“Are you serious right now?”
“Answer the question.”
Bradley’s mouth hung open. “Holy shit, are you afraid of me? You’re shaking.” I didn’t realize that I had been, but I looked down and saw that my hands had started to quiver. “You are. Look at you!”
My jaw set. “You lied about sleeping with Alex. You had every reason to want her dead. And now with Hazel missing, it’s suspicious as fuck, Bradley. Did Hazel come asking about this too? Did you—”
“This is why you came over here?” Bradley asked, stepping toward me again, looking more emboldened. “To pretend you wanted to have sex so you could accuse me of murder?”
I crossed my arms and didn’t answer, and Bradley shook his head. “You’re fucking crazy … actually crazy.”
“At least I’m not a serial predator.” My rage was palpable. “How many girls came after Alex and me? How many were there before us?”
Bradley’s lip twitched and I knew I was right that there were more. There were always more. Men like him didn’t stop.
“I didn’t kill Alex,” Bradley said defensively, switching gears. “Or Hazel. I can prove it.”
“How?”
He wiped his face with his hands. “I cannot believe I have to explain myself to you, of all people.”
I crossed my arms.
“I wasn’t even in the state when Alexandria was killed, Rose. I went to the graduation and then I went to the Fort Lauderdale airport. I flew to Tennessee to see my parents. My grandfather’s funeral was the next day.”
He gave me a pointed look, and I knew why. An airport was an ironclad alibi. There was no way that was something he could lie about. There’d be flight information, manifests, and receipts. Things the cops could check.
“And you just happen to remember that?”
“My dead grandfather?” Bradley snapped. “Yeah, it stuck out. Especially when I found out what happened to Alex.”
“What about when Hazel went missing?” I pressed.
“Rose, seriously—”
“Where were you?”
Bradley groaned, slamming his hand against the fridge beside me. It rattled.
“It was a Monday,” he said, frustrated. “I had classes until three forty-five and then film club. We screened two of the Back to the Future films. I didn’t leave until almost nine.”
Hazel had gone missing sometime between 3:45 and 7:00. My father had already called the cops by eight. Bradley had another ironclad alibi. There’d be witnesses, students, and other staff.
“I didn’t kill Alex or Hazel,” Bradley repeated for emphasis. “And I can’t believe that you would spend even a single second thinking I did.”
“Anyone makes more sense than Will,” I said, both relieved and disappointed. I was glad that I hadn’t spent months sleeping with a murderer, but I was still no closer to figuring out what had happened to Alex and Hazel.
“I think you might need psychological help,” Bradley said, shaking his head as he reached for his seltzer.
As if Bradley, of all people, could be questioning my actions.
I scowled. “That would hold a lot more weight if it weren’t coming from a man who repeatedly fucked high school girls.”
Bradley narrowed his eyes at me, giving me a withering look that was cut short as someone knocked on his door.
He shook his head in irritation. I reached for my phone.
It was still thankfully recording, and I shut it off.
I’d decide what to do with it later. I had options.
So many ways to punish Bradley for what he had done.
He was finally going to face some consequences.
I followed behind him as he headed for the entrance. I was beyond ready to leave this apartment.
“Can I help you?” Bradley asked as he opened the door.
“Yeah,” a voice said firmly. “My name is Detective Dominick Pullman and I wanted to ask you some questions about the disappearance of Hazel Dearling.”
Pullman stopped short, his eyes widening as he looked from Bradley to where I stood behind him. Shit.
“Rose?” Pullman said, blinking in confusion. “What are you doing here?”
“I can explain,” I said.