Hastings walked primly to the phone in the den and answered. Wilden handed Melissa a tissue and stood up, thanking them for their cooperation throughout this ordeal. Melissa raised her head for a moment, noted Spencer confusedly, then set her head on Spencer’s shoulder and sobbed. Spencer plopped down at her sister’s side and threw her arms around Melissa’s shoulders. Melissa had made impressing their parents look so effortless that Spencer never realized that she agonized about it, too. She wondered if she and Melissa had been dealing with the exact same issues all this time. But they sat stock-still, judgmental looks on their faces. Spencer waited for her parents to rush over to console Melissa. She’d seen her sister cry plenty of times, but usually out of frustration, anger, rage, or a ploy to get her own way. And I didn’t say anything then because…because I thought I’d somehow get in trouble for concealing the truth. But I still didn’t think it was possible. “When you started asking questions this week about where Ian and I were, I started to wonder if maybe I should’ve said something years ago. I didn’t think Alison had given him an ultimatum.” Like everyone else, Melissa had learned of Ian’s motives. “I suspected they’d hooked up all those years ago, but I didn’t think it was serious. When I got back and everyone was frantic…well, I just never thought Ian would be capable of something like that.” She picked at the hem on her pale yellow Juicy hoodie. At that point, I’m not sure anyone really knew Alison was missing.
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