The Last Time I Lied: A Novel

The detective writes Sasha, Krystal, and Miranda’s names in his notebook and then asks Emma to tell him what happened from the beginning. Emma feels like she has gone back in time and has a sense of unreality. She tells Detective Flynn that she woke up around five o’clock and looked for the girls when she saw they weren’t in the cabin. She checked the whole camp, but there was no sign of them. He asks her why she went to the lake and why she was screaming. Emma tells him she was scared. He asks if she could have been screaming because she felt guilty for “losing them when they were under [her] care” (258).

Emma insists she didn’t lose them and tells the detective everything she can about the girls. She remembers Miranda’s missing phone and tells Flynn that Miranda must have it with her. He asks if the girls might have been mad at her for any reason. Emma says no but thinks about how she was drunk and crying the night before. Flynn tells her that the girls most likely ran away, but Emma doesn’t believe it.

She senses Flynn’s skepticism when he asks about the girls who went missing 15 years ago.