Page 168 of Property of Bob

“Because she worked for me,” Pearl answered. Pearl stared at the cut and sighed.

I looked at Anchor. “He wanted Bernice here.”

Anchor’s jaw tightened. “Yeah.”

“No.” I shook my head. “We’ve said that, but think about it. He didn’t wait for Bernice to show up. He made sure she showed up.”

“Through Ron,” Vin said.

“Through Pearl,” Skull added.

Pearl flinched. Anchor immediately shook his head. “Not because Pearl did anything.”

“I know,” she whispered.

I looked back at the cut. “He needed Bernice on Skull Island.”

“Why?” Shay asked.

I turned toward her. I knew the answer. Or at least I knew part of it.

The words I’d remembered had been stuck in my head ever since they came back. “Because she knew what happened.”

The room went dead quiet.

Ramona’s fingers tightened around mine. I looked at Anchor. “That’s what this has been about.”

Anchor’s eyes narrowed. “You sure?”

“No.” I wasn’t going to pretend I knew more than I did. “But it fits.”

Vin nodded slowly. “Bernice was there the night Caleb died.”

“She knew what happened to him,” I said. “Maybe she knew who killed him. Maybe she knew why. Maybe she knew what club was involved. I don’t fucking know. But she knew something.”

“And twenty-three years later somebody needed her back here,” Skull said.

“Yeah.”

Shay shook her head. “Why wait twenty-three years?”

“That’s the part we still don’t know,” Anchor said.

“But Bernice knew too much,” McKayla murmured.

I looked at her.

She pointed toward the hallway. “That’s what the note said.”

“Yeah.”

My throat tightened.

Not from healing this time, from remembering. “You should’ve kept your mouth shut,” I said.

Ramona looked up at me.

Anchor’s eyes hardened. “That’s what you heard.”