Larry looked at the list they had made. It had grown, with scribbled notes in the margins. He saw the noteFriends.
“That guy, Ike Tressler, outside the store. He mentioned a kid named Reggie.”
“You’re right. He did.” Amanda sat up now, awake. The image of her brother in a warm bear den disappeared.
“Reggie is usually short for Reginald, and that’s not the most common name. Maybe Patty can run it for us, in her system. How many boys named Reginald could there have been at Brightwood at the same time as Dennis?”
“Good idea. She can try plain old Reggie too.”
He picked up his phone, made the call. From her place in front of the fire, Amanda watched him. She was growing fond of Larry. It made her feel guilty because while she loved her parents intensely, she didn’t feel at ease with them like she did with Larry. They had always been her helpers. She had always felt they wanted her to be different.
It started to rain, hard. Amanda realized she should get back to the hotel before it got worse. She got up, stretching.
“Reggie Dupree,” Larry said, hanging up and writing down the name. “He was there with Dennis.”
“Can you find out where he is now?” Amanda asked, zipping up her parka. Larry looked out at the rain. “You’re going out in that?”
“It’s only going to get worse. Gertrude said another storm was coming in.”
“You walking?” he asked, looking at his computer.
“Yeah. My car is at the hotel.”
“Want a lift?”
“No, I’ll be fine. I like walking.”
“All right,” he said, looking up Reggie’s current address.
She left, the door swinging behind her.
Amanda walked back to the hotel, her shoes squishing in the rain. She was glad she had packed another pair. She would dry these out by the baseboard heater in her room. It smelled like an electrical fire when she turned it on.
She was glad she’d left Larry’s when she had. A strong wind was picking up, rattling the windows on the empty cabins and shaking the power lines. It reminded her of the storm her first day here. She could hear the whining power of the wind. It whistled as it came off the ocean, blasting up the dune road.
She strode down the steep hill, taking care on the wet pavement, and turned down the beach road. The howling wind blew the rain against her face. She sunk her head deeper into the hood of her jacket. Her face was so wet, she could barely see. She opened her mouth, tasted the rain. It tasted like salt, and life.
There was someone behind her.
She felt it suddenly, with a strange fever that rushed through her body—she whirled around, aware he was there.
The man was buried in a thick jacket. His hood was pulled all the way up, and he had wrapped something—a dark, wet bandanna, maybe—around his face to hide his features. Rain dripped off his arms. In one hand, Amanda took in with a shudder, he held a dark metal object that glinted under the rain.
A knife.
Amanda turned and ran. She felt the road under her feet and the slash of rain against her face, was conscious of her lungs burning in the salt air with her panicked intake of breath. She could feel him behind her, running, too, trying to catch her.
She knew if she went into the woods, all would be lost—she could feel intuitively that this man knew the woods. If she stayed on the road, he would catch her too. He would kill her and dispose of her body in the waves or over a cliff or in the woods. There were a dozen places to dispose of someone here. Wasn’t that what she and Larry had just been talking about?
Amanda was glad for her strong legs, for her healthy heart and young lungs conditioned by hard work shoveling shit and working with the polar bear. She sprinted hard, then took a sudden sharp turn across the road and began barreling over the wet dunes, directly toward the sea. She could feel him pause behind her, and then follow.
They were going to play chicken.
The man chased Amanda. He had thought he could surprise her—he had been right behind her, knife at the ready, when she had sensed him and turned around. She had an awareness, he thought, learned from working with the great bear.
Now she was running, flat out over the low dunes, stumbling and then righting herself. She found the packed sand and charged toward the sea. For a moment, he was flummoxed. Was she trying to kill herself, as her brother had done? She wouldn’t be able to see the waves in the dark. She might plunge right in.
No, he realized. She was daring him to follow her, and take the risk.
