If She Should Die by Carlene Thompson Page B

look at it,” Christine continued stridently. “It’s dirty. Put it down.”
    “It looks like a book,” Jeremy said.
    “A book?” Christine drew closer, curious in spite of herself.
    “It’s in one of those plastic bags you put in the freezer.” Jeremy wiped off the bag with his hand. “Got your flashlight, so we can see it better, Christy?”
    “I don’t want to see it better,” Christine snapped, nevertheless pulling a penlight from the pocket of her jacket. “I just want to go home and make sure you’re all right. And sleep might be nice. It’s nearly dawn and I am
so
tired—”
    “It isn’t nearly dawn,” Jeremy said testily, taking the penlight from her. “You sound like Patricia. Gripe, gripe, gripe.” He flipped on the instrument and shone a thin stream of light on a navy blue book cover bearing golden print. He read in a halting, hushed voice:
    “
Diary of Dara Marie Prince
.”

CHAPTER 5
1
    “What?” Streak sounded shocked. “Dara’s diary? You’ve found Dara’s diary?”
    “I remember this,” Christine said slowly. “Patricia gave it to Dara that last Christmas. I never saw the diary after Dara disappeared. I thought if she did leave Winston voluntarily, she must have taken it with her.”
    Streak frowned. “I used to see her writing in it when I’d stop by on a run. She was always quick to close the cover.”
    “I remember it, too,” Jeremy said, holding the plastic bag almost reverently. “She said I must never look in it, and I never did.”
    “Has this been here for three years?” Christine asked no one in particular. “Why wasn’t it found?”
    “The police searched this area after Dara went missing, but their search wasn’t too enthusiastic,” Streak said. “High water, lots of mud. It was a mess here. Besides, who would look in a vine-covered hole in an old tree?” Streak drew closer, peering down at the book. “She must have kept it here all the time, wrapped in this bag. Nodoubt she suspected that Patricia did regular searches of her room.”
    Christine quirked an eyebrow. “You mean she gave Dara a diary to encourage her to bare her soul so Patricia could read it?” Streak nodded. “I remember thinking when Dara opened the gift that a diary seemed like something for a young girl, not a nineteen-year-old. I thought Dara would sneer about it to me when Patricia wasn’t around, but Patricia must have known Dara better than I thought. Dara started writing in it immediately.”
    “Patricia didn’t know her very well if she thought Dara would leave it around for her to read,” Streak said.
    As Christine gazed at the dirty bag in Jeremy’s hands, she felt dread descend. “We have to take this to Ames. If he’s asleep, though, I don’t want to wake him.”
    Streak said thoughtfully, “Maybe it should just be left alone, like Dara wanted.”
    “You mean put it back in the tree? Streak, that’s absurd. Do you know what this would mean to Ames?”
    “Of course we won’t put it back in the tree. But I could take it and give it to Ames someday when the pain of all this is past. It seems almost cruel to give it to him now.”
    Christine hesitated. The diary was meant to be private. Privacy should be respected. Then she thought of Sheriff Teague’s conviction that Jeremy had done something to Dara. His conviction would only grow stronger if the body was identified as Dara’s, because she’d obviously been murdered. Add to the mix the things Jeremy was saying about knowing from where she vanished and her being in the water—things he would keep saying although she’d told him to stop—and the situation could prove disastrous for her brother.
    But the diary could contain information they’d never known, never guessed at—things going on in Dara’s life that could have led to her murder. And if they coulddiscover who killed Dara, the dangerous suspicions about Jeremy would be lifted. His freedom, his life, could depend on it.
    “You know, Streak,