Page 155 of One Night with Number Nineteen

Stopping, I pull my phone away from my ear, look at the screen. The call’s still connected.

Put it back up to my ear.

“Hello?”

“Lainey?”

“I’m still here. Sorry if I lost you in the elevator.”

“No, that’s okay,” he says. “Are you somewhere you can talk privately now?”

“Yes.”

“Good, well I got your message and obviously I have some concerns.”

The words are right—but the tone is wrong.

But even as I’m frowning at that, he’s asking me to go over everything again. “I was coming out of my friend’s book event and he grabbed me and wouldn’t let me go.”

“Did you recognize him?”

Why did he ask it like that?

As though he’s really invested in the answer.

“No,” I say slowly. “I…it all happened really fast and it was dark. Then Sawyer got him away from me, and the police showed up and—” I rub at my forehead. “I was scared, but when Detective Roberts showed me his picture, I didn’t recognize him.”

“You didn’t?” he asks a little more sharply.

“Is there a problem?” I lean back against the wall. “Should I have recognized him?”

A blip of quiet. “No, of course not. I’m just getting my facts straight, making sure we’re on the right page.” There’s a rustle in the background, as though he’s muffling a conversation or maybe music…or cheering? “Tell me about the wine glass.”

“I, uh, is this not in the notes from Detective Roberts?”

“It is. I just like to hear it from the source, you know? I want to hear your perspective of the wine glass, the marriage certificate, and the stuffed, what was it? Penguin?”

“Yeah, I…” I fill him in on the glass and the marriage certificate and Gray finding the stuffed Ollie.

“You didn’t find it?”

Okay, now I know I’m not imagining the sharpness in his tone.

“No,” I murmur, “I didn’t.”

There’s a long pause. “And the ring? Did you find that?”

I still, a chill sliding through me, and hurry back toward the elevator, some instinct in me telling me that I need to get out of here and around people. Immediately. “I’m sorry?”

“The ring, Lainey. Did you find it?”

“I think I’ll just speak to Detective Roberts when she gets back,” I say.

I hang up…

Just as the elevator doors open and⁠—

He steps off.