This wasn’t random.This wasn’t sloppy.This wasn’t a coincidence.
Someone wanted us to dig.Someone wanted us to suffer.Someone wanted us to remember.
I clenched my jaw.“Whoever this guy is,” I said quietly, “he’s not going away.”
Vin nodded.“He wants to be found.”
Skull grunted.“Then let’s fucking find him.”
I stared down at the skeleton one last time.The empty eye sockets and the jaw still hanging open where the note had been hidden.
Playing games.Toying with us.Running around in shadows, he knew better than we did.
The worst part?
He was getting bolder.
And I had no doubt he was watching us even now, somewhere out there on the island, waiting for our next move.
Chapter Eighteen
Shay
Reopening day felt wrong.
Maybe it was nerves.Maybe it was the creeping awareness that someone had managed to plant askeletonon this island without a single camera catching him.Or maybe it was simply that the idea of letting hundreds of strangers wander onto Skull Island when a killer was clearly playing hide-and-seek in the shadows felt like a special brand of madness.
But Anchor said it was happening no matter what.
Because the club needed the money and because everything had already been advertised.Pulling out now would make the cops and the town even more suspicious.
So here we were.Saturday.Almost five in the evening and an hour until sunset.
Pearl and I were stuck in the clubhouse like a pair of grounded teenagers.
Prime called itsafety.Pearl called itbabysitting.I was secretly okay with it, even though I would have liked to go through the haunted house in the dark.
Pearl lay sprawled across the couch in yoga pants and an oversized sweatshirt with one hand clutching the remote like she was channel-surfing for answers to the universe.
I paced near the bar and chewed on my lip.“I was kind of hoping to go through the haunted house in the dark,” I admitted.
Pearl didn’t even look away from the TV.“Girl, they’d chain your ankles to this couch before letting that happen.”
“Yeah,” I sighed.“I know.Would’ve been crazy.”
Pearl tossed the remote onto the coffee table.“With a killer running around?Crazy doesn’t even cover it.”
Fair enough.
She stretched, groaned dramatically, and then sat up.“The guys hired a whole security team from Detroit.A dozen of them.Plus ten new actors for the haunted house so the club could keep their eyes open instead of pretending to be zombies.”
“Cameras too,” I said.“Prime told me they’re everywhere.”
“Mm-hmm.”Pearl nodded.“Which is adorable, considering our ghost psycho snuck onto this island, buried or unburied a skeleton, and placed it perfectly without being seen.”
A cold shiver ran straight down my spine.
“It’s like he’s a ghost,” I whispered.“How do you move like that without making any noise or leaving tracks?”
