If She Should Die by Carlene Thompson

“Dara always brought that cat down here to the bridge at night. I used to take a break from my run to talk to her.”
    Christine was surprised. “I didn’t know you two were friends.”
    “Chats at the creek were about the only socializing Dara and I did,” Streak said quickly. “I don’t know if you’d call us real friends.”
    “Did you ever tell Ames about your visits with Dara?”
    “No. He’d forbidden her to come down here. I didn’t want to start a fight between them by ratting her out. But I understood his concern. This isn’t a good place for a girl to be hanging around by herself at night. So I always ran by, although I don’t think she ever guessed I was watching out for her. I always tried to make it seem casual, likeI was just hanging around and shooting the breeze while I took a breather.” He looked slightly melancholy. “We had a few good talks.”
    “About what?”
    “Oh . . . nothing really. What I’d thought of her mother when I met her. What her father had been like when he was young.”
    “And about Jeremy and me. Don’t try to tell me she didn’t have quite a few complaints about us.”
    Streak grinned. “Your name might have come up once or twice. She pretended not to like you, but I think deep down she admired your maturity and intelligence.”
    “You could have fooled me. What about the night she disappeared? Did you see her then?”
    “I didn’t run that night. I was working on a difficult piece of software—something to do with fuzzy logic—and decided to skip my run so I could get it done. You don’t know how much I’ve regretted that burst of diligence.”
    “You sound like Jeremy, as if you’re certain she disappeared from the creek area.”
    “No, but if I’d met her here, I would have gotten a chance to talk to her, seen what kind of mood she was in—rebellious, ready to leave home, or frightened. And if something
did
happen to her here at the creek, maybe I could have prevented it.”
    “I see what you mean,” Christine said slowly. “But don’t you think you should have told the police you saw her out here regularly?”
    “I did tell the police. I just didn’t tell Ames. He would have been furious with me for not telling him she came here all the time, although telling him wouldn’t have accomplished anything except to cause more trouble between him and Dara. Things were pretty tense back then, if you remember.”
    “Oh, I remember,” Christine said dryly. “I never understood why she didn’t just move out into a small apartment.”
    “A small apartment where she’d have to do her own cooking and cleaning?”
    “I’d rather cook and clean than fight with people all the time.”
    “But you’re not Dara,” Streak said. “She had a little bit of the princess syndrome.”
    “More than a little, and it bothered everyone except Ames and Jeremy.” She frowned. “I hope Jeremy doesn’t tell everyone he
knows
Dara disappeared from down here. Sheriff Teague has always been convinced Jeremy did something to her, even though he had the whole Torrance family and several other teenagers to confirm that he was at a party at their house, playing Ping-Pong, until after Ames and Patricia got home and Dara was gone. But Teague kept saying that with all the commotion, Jeremy could have slipped out of the party and no one would have noticed.”
    “I remember the grilling Teague put Jeremy through. It would have been worse if Jeremy hadn’t had Ames there to protect him.”
    “And now there’s this new guy, Winter, who seems pretty interested in the case.”
    “Winter?”
    “Michael Winter. He’s the deputy who came to the store and told Ames about the body. He came to Winston from LA. I’m sure there’s a story behind that move. He seems nice enough but tenacious. I just have a bad feeling. . . .”
    “Chris, you don’t think Jeremy hurt Dara, do you?”
    “No! Of course not!”
    “Well, if anyone else asks you that question, try to act like