“First of all, I’m sorry. You were right all along about Nash. I’m sorry for not trusting both of you. I was an idiot.”
“Yes, you were,” said Audrey. “But I guess I probably shouldn’t have punched you in the stomach.”
“Yeah, you shouldn’t have.” I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. “I didn’t really deserve that because even though I was kind of an idiot, I wasn’t a mean idiot. I didn’t do anything out of hate or prejudice or anything. Sure, maybe I was a little jealous of you, Trix. After all, Audrey and I have been like the two musketeers for almost as long as I can remember. But that’s not why I showed up at the park that night throwing those stupid accusations around.”
“Then why did you do it, Dylan?” Trix asked.
“Because I was scared out of my head. I mean, someone just told me my best friend was hanging out with a girl whose dad might be some kind of hideous serial killer. Do you know what will run through your mind at a time like that? I was flipping out. I had to do something. Okay, yes, I should’ve thought it over more first, but it was hard to stay cool.”
Tears started to burn in my eyes, and I thought, Oh, great, now I look like a big wimp, but I was on a roll, so I kept going.
“Audrey, believe me, I want you to be happy. Never doubt that, okay? But if anything happened to you, like something bad—well, I don’t know what I’d do.”
Now we were all tearing up, Trix included, and Audrey’s like, “I’m sorry too, Dylan. I know you were just trying to look out for me, and you hadn’t even been around Trix enough to know what she’s really like. And the truth is, I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to you either.”
“You two can’t let anything get between you.” Trix patted us on the arms. “Your friendship’s too important.”
I guess we looked pretty pathetic, but I didn’t care.
“It was so stupid of me to believe Nash,” I said. “That guy’s such a dick. He makes Rowan Adams look like the Dalai Lama.”
“Well, at least you saw through him,” Audrey said. “I should’ve known you’d get around to it.”
“I don’t deserve much credit for that,” I admitted. “A sledgehammer pretty much had to pound it into me.” I went on to explain the whole ugly Gangland night, including all the humiliating details.
When I was done, Audrey’s like, “There was a dwarf stripper?”
And Trix goes, “Yeah, that’s the part I was wondering about too.”
“You’re missing the point,” I told them. “These Gangland idiots aren’t just creeps. They’re like real live criminals, and they’ll use anybody to get what they want. I should’ve known Nash was lying about Tres saying your dad was some kind of molester serial killer. I mean, that’s too far-fetched even for an episode of Andromeda Man.”
“Wait a minute,” Trix said. “Nash told you it was Tres who said that?”
“Yeah, I guess it sounded more believable that way.”
Trix leaned forward. “Maybe Nash wasn’t lying after all,” she said. “Maybe Tres is the one who made that story up.”
I’m like, “Tres? Why would he lie about something like that? I mean, it’s his own sister who’s missing. He wouldn’t have any reason to invent a story that would probably just make it harder to find her.”
“I’ll tell you why he’d lie,” Trix said. “Because he’s a little pimple. And because, when I first got to Hollister, he was always bugging me to go out with him, probably because every girl who already knew him had turned him down. But when I wasn’t interested, suddenly this rumor started going around school that I was having an affair with my English teacher, Mrs. Simpson.”
Audrey looked at her. “You never told me about that.”
Trix shrugged. “It’s not something that’s fun to talk about.”
But I’m like, “You know what? This shines a whole new light on things. I just assumed Nash made that story up because he’s such a phony liar—plus I never figured Tres would have enough imagination for something like that—but I’m starting to get a whole new picture of him, and it’s a twisted one.”
“Uh-oh,” Audrey said. “I don’t like that look on your face. You’re not thinking Tres was involved in his own sister’s disappearance, are you?”
“Maybe,” I said. “At least I’ve narrowed it down to two suspects. Of course, Nash is number one, but coming up hard on the outside is Tres Browning at number two.”
CHAPTER 39
That evening after dinner, I hopped onto my bed with my laptop to see what research I could do on Nash and Tres, only to find they and pretty much the rest of the Ganglanders had unfriended me on Facebook. About the only one who hadn’t was Rowan Adams.
Of course, I’d checked all his photos and posts plenty before, but now I was going over them to see if I could learn anything, not about him, but about my two top suspects. He still didn’t have any pictures of himself with Ashton, but Nash showed up in a handful of older photos with her and quite a few without her. Before last Saturday, I would’ve admired the confidence Nash put on display in every scene. Now, though, I couldn’t help wondering what scheme he had going on behind that big white smile.
Tres also appeared in a few pictures. The one that interested me most showed him and Rowan dressed up possibly for a night at Gangland. Rowan wore one of his gaudy blazers, and Tres wore a suede sport coat. The intriguing thing about it was—from the furniture, curtains, and wall hangings—I could tell they were in a girl’s room. Most likely Ashton’s. And most likely Ashton had taken the photo.