Page 135 of Summer Love

“After Dad died, we didn’t have much left. A year of treatment, the chemo, the hospital, the meds, the drives… But my parents had set money aside for us, in case we wanted to go to college. For Noah, basically.”

“And he wanted to study medicine…”

“Since he was eight, yeah. Since Dad.”

“And after the shark…”

Jace lets out a bitter laugh.

“The chopper, the surgery, the transfusions, the hospital stay. And after that, eight months of rehab, physical therapy, a shrink.”

He recites the list, eyes fixed on the water. A bill he knows by heart.

“The chopper alone cost us thirty-five grand.”

“Where’d they take you?”

“Stanford Hospital, in Palo Alto. It’s a level-one trauma center. For serious cases, that’s usually where they send you.”

I freeze.

“The helicopter…” I murmur. “The day I left Coral Bay with my dad, we saw one from the road. Dad thought it was for the girl who’d gone missing at Star Park two days before.”

Jace shakes his head.

“At first it was for me. But when the rescue crew got to the base of the cliffs, they found her too. She was a few yards from where I’d jumped.”

“Was she… dead?”

“No. In a coma. That’s what they told me.”

The dark blurs his features, but not the hard line of his jaw or the tension in his shoulders.

“That’s horrible… did she survive?”

“I don’t think so. I mean… I don’t know. Nobody ever told me anything. And Star Park closed right after.”

Jace shrugs one shoulder.

“Some people say you can see her ghost on full-moon nights.”

I stare at him. His mouth wavers between a grimace and a smile.

“Stop it, Jace.”

“I swear. Ask Evan.”

A small laugh escapes me, almost painful after all the crying. Jace gives a faint smile, the first of the night.

I look at the cliffs in the distance.

“All of it… I had no idea, Jace.”

“I know.”

He squeezes my hand tighter.

“Noah and I,” he goes on, “we tried to reach you after the accident. We called, we left messages… You’d blocked our numbers?”