I Let Her Ruin Herself Chapter 07
Taylor looked up.
“Mrs. Bell, I…”
Carol stepped in front of her daughter.
“Adrian’s always liked her. Who’s to say he didn’t stop her on the way to school this morning and do something?”
“He’s been here all morning.” Mom held up my medical paperwork. “I have his admission paperwork and IV records. And the hallways have cameras.”
After checking the records, the officer said, “Taylor, the timeline doesn’t line up. We need the truth. Filing a false report is a crime.”
Taylor lowered her head again.
Then a middle-aged woman in the hallway spoke up.
“I saw that boy. He wasn’t the one.”
She said she’d been biking past the greenway that morning and saw several young men hanging around the entrance to the woods. Later, she heard shouting from deeper inside and stopped to call 911.
In my last life, Hannah and I were the first ones on the scene, so this woman never became the primary witness.
She’d seen Derek drag Taylor into the woods. She’d also seen his friends egging him on from the trail entrance. Taylor looked at me through her tears, as if waiting for me to save her.
I didn’t move.
“The hospital can prove I was here, and forensics can run a DNA comparison,” I said. “Are you prepared for that?”
Carol cut in immediately.
“Even if it wasn’t you, this is still your fault.”
“What?”
“You walk her to school every day. The one day you don’t, those boys target her. This is on you.”
“We’re neighbors,” I said. “I’m not her bodyguard, and you never hired me.”
Carol opened her mouth to argue.
“She’s eighteen. If the route isn’t safe, you can drive her or have her take the school bus. It’s not my job to protect her. You should be asking who was actually in those woods.”
The officer looked at Taylor.
“We still need the real name.”
Taylor bit her lip and said nothing.
I knew she’d rather let an innocent person take the fall than give up Derek.