Abigail

"Jackpot!"

Sasha threw her cards down, her arms flailing in the air, nearly scattering the entire spread of food between us on the picnic mat.

"She has been holding that the whole time," Jade groaned, reaching forward to rescue her wine glass before it crashed to the mat and spilled everywhere. "I understand Annette being bad at this game, but not you, Cam."

The tips of my ears burned with a blush, but I ignored it, writing the score on the board. To say that I had been out of it would be an understatement.

Annette groaned. "Suspicious. I’m calling suspicious on the two of you."

"Dumb, dumb," Jade drawled. "You can’t call suspicious after we’ve already won,"

"I just did."

"It doesn’t count," Sasha argued.

The park was beautiful in the evening. The city noise felt faraway, and the cool air ruffling through my clothes was very comforting.

The girls and I had claimed a patch of grass near the fountain in the park. We had our blanket down, food spread out, Jade’s portable speaker playing music low in the background, and for approximately two hours, I had successfully not looked at my phone more than six times.

I glanced at the phone again making it seven times.

There was still no message from him. All I had gotten was an email yesterday evening reminding me of his schedule.

I picked up my cards and arranged them without seeing them because my mind was so deep in thought.

God, what the hell was wrong with me? Was I getting attached?

I had known for months that the first week of August was blank in his schedule. There was nothing on for that week. I had forgotten all about it until now.

"Jackpot!" Annette called, pointing at me, and my head whipped up.

"I don’t have a jackpot, Annie,"

"What? But you were giving the sign," she cried, throwing her cards to the mat.

"Abigail, you’re being a suckish partner today. We were always the dream team! How are we letting Jade and Sasha beat us?"

Jade snorted, reaching for a cracker. Sasha topped up her own wine, wiggling her brows at Annette.

"It’s our time to shine, baby."

"Sorry, Annie," I muttered sheepishly.

"Is something wrong, babe?" Jade asked, holding a cracker out to me.

"I’m fine,"

"Nah, you’re not, we know you, girl. You would have mopped the floor with our asses in this game if your head was in it," Sasha added.

All three of them fixed their gazes on me, adding to the pressure in my chest. Suddenly my phone rang out loud and I snatched it up quickly, my heart beating fast.

It crashed when I saw it wasn’t him but Meemaw.

"Sorry, girls, I have to take this," I mumbled, unfolding myself from the mat.

I found a bench near the fountain, far enough from the girls.

"Hi, Meemaw."

"My Abby!" Meemaw’s cheery voice had me smiling widely. "Gerald, it’s our Abigail...stop hogging the phone, Gerald, I called her,"

"I just want to say hello to my babygirl," Gramps argued. "Hello, love" He enthused, apparently having won the phone.

"Hi, Gramps." I giggled, relieved that they both sounded much better. The medicine and treatment for both of them had been so intense over the past few weeks. "How’s your chest?"

"Strong as a horse," I just knew Gramps was grinning.

Meemaw reclaimed the phone. "How are you, Abby? Are you eating, my darling? When are you coming over next? I’m sure you’ve lost some weight."

I leaned back against the bench, closing my eyes, relishing the sounds of their voices. "I’m doing fine, Meemaw. And no, I haven’t lost weight... I think. How are you both actually?"

"We’re well, we’re well." She replied.

"Except for that bloke who came here yesterday," Gramps grumbled, and I sat up slightly.

"What bloke?" 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

"Some policeman," Meemaw scoffed. "He said they were looking into reopening your parents’ case."

I frowned, barely managing to make sense of what I was hearing.

"He wants to reopen the case?" Another policeman, aside from Cole, wanted to reopen the case?

Because it couldn’t be Detective Cole, he was dead.

"He was asking questions," Meemaw continued. "About Hugo and Isabella, the accident, and most of his questions were about you."

An uneasy feeling gripped my stomach. "What was he asking about me?"

"Where you lived, where you worked, he was suspicious, wasn’t he, Gerald?"

"Mhmm," Gramps hummed in agreement. "Downright suspicious. We didn’t tell him anything, honey."

"Yeah, I told him we had requested the case be closed years ago, and if someone wanted to open it, they could do that without coming to our door asking about our granddaughter." Meemaw declared, sounding rather agitated. "Seriously, who does he think he is?"

"Abigail." Her voice grew concerned. "What’s going on? Are you in some kind of trouble?"

The laughter from my friends several meters away filled my ears, and I gripped the phone tighter.

"No," I said. "No trouble, Meemaw. Did you get the police man’s name?"

"Well, no, he couldn’t exactly drop it after I threatened to baptize him in bug spray."

"Meemaw!" I cackled, dropping my head back in laughter. "You did not,"

"I definitely did. Nobody goes around sniffing around our business. We’re the Kellermans!"

"We take shit from nobody," Gramps cheered along. My shoulders trembled with laughter as we chatted.

"We love you, baby."

"I love you both, bye, Meemaw. Bye, Gramps."

I ended the call and leaned back with a sigh, staring up at the evening sky.

A police officer was at my grandparents’ house asking questions about me. Why were they asking about me and not about the accident or my parents?

They knew I was looking, and they had gone to Meemaw and Gramps to find out how much I knew already.

My stomach dropped. Who was reopening this case? And were they doing it to find the truth...or to find me? How long would it take for him to track me down?