"No!" I lied automatically. "No, of course not."
Was there any other way to answer that question? If he had, I didn't want him to know I suspected
him. If he hadn't... well, same deal. Besides, flat-out accusing him with no evidence to back it up
was no better than what everyone was doing to me.
"Yes, you do!" Marc leaned back against the metal bar railing in the
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center of the stairs. He stared at me for a second longer, then laughed. Laughed. Somehow, that
seemed inappropriate given the circumstances. "Well, I guess it would be hypocritical of me to be
mad."
"Why's that?" I asked. What was up with this guy?
Marc opened his bag and pulled out a yellow legal pad. He sighed before handing it over to me.
Scrawled across the top were the words Potential Suspects. My heart skipped a beat.
"You're investigating Cheyenne's murder?" I asked.
"Yeah. I figured it might make a good story," Marc said, his expression apologetic. He shrugged. "I
might even be able to sell it to a real paper."
I scanned the list quickly, hungrily, to see if he'd drawn any conclusions different from my own.
Unfortunately his list echoed mine. Even Astrid had made his suspect roster. But there were two
major differences between Marc's list and mine. My name and Noelle's name were written at the
bottom of the page. Noelle's name had been crossed out, but mine had not.
"Sorry. I couldn't play favorites." He grabbed a brown wool hat out of his bag and pulled it low
over his ears.
My eyes stung with heat and part of me felt like shoving the pad down his throat. But then I
realized he was right. That would have been totally hypocritical, considering I suspected him.
"It's fine," I forced myself to say, handing the legal pad back. "Actually, I've been kind of poking
around myself."
Marc's eyebrows shot up. "Really? Do you have a list?"
I dug in my bag until I found the folded piece of paper with my
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suspects on it. Marc looked it over and smirked. "Look at that. You're on mine and I'm on yours.
Twice, actually."