Chapter 2: Four Words That Made My Stomach Drop
My husband sat up the second I touched his shoulder.
He knew from my face.
"What happened?"
"Maddie's home.
She came back in someone else's car.
No dress.
No Tyler."
He was already standing.
"Is she hurt?"
"I don't know.
She won't talk to me."
I told him about the phone.
The message I'd seen light up before it went dark.
He went very still.
"What did it say?"
I told him.
He didn't move for a long moment.
Then he reached for his own phone on the nightstand and dialed Tyler's number.
It rang six times.
No answer.
He tried again.
Same thing.
Then a text came back — not from Tyler.
From Tyler's dad, Dave Brennan, two doors down.
*We're trying to reach him too.
His car is still at the school.
We don't know where he is.*
My husband looked at me over the phone screen.
The shower had stopped.
Maddie's room was quiet.
Then we heard her door open — and her footsteps stop dead in the hallway when she saw both of us standing there waiting.
"Maddie," my husband said quietly.
"We need you to tell us what happened tonight."
She looked at me.
Then at him.
Then down at the floor.
And she said four words that made my stomach drop.
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What Maddie said next — and what really happened to Tyler — is in the full story.
Click the link below to read everything.
