Page 125 of The Next Lie

Inside, Homer launches himself against the glass with a tiny, outraged thump. Delia glances toward him, and I shove her shoulder.

She shoves mine. We hit the low table in sync, sending a decorative bowl of lemons rolling across the patio. One drops into the pool with a soft plunk. The absurdity of it almost makes me laugh.

Then Delia says, “You should have stayed dead.”

Silence. Even she freezes. My whole body goes cold.

Her eyes widen a fraction. “Reva⁠—”

I hit her.

Not well. Not hard enough to do real damage. More of a slap than a punch, wild and open-handed, fueled by every dead year between us.

Her head turns with it. For half a second, I think she will cry.

Then she tackles me. I hear a rip, and realize it’s her dress.

We go down hard on the wet stone near the edge of the pool, rolling, grabbing, cursing. My elbow bangs against the coping. Pain shoots up my arm. Delia gets a knee under her and tries to pin me. I twist, shove, catch her sleeve and pull. Somehow we get back to our knees, and then our feet.

Somewhere behind the glass, Homer loses his mind.

The sliding door opens.

A man shouts my name.

I don’t know which one, and I don’t care. All I see is red. All I hear is rage. All I feel is pain.

Delia grabs my wrist. I grab the front of her dress. We are both breathing hard, both soaked with sweat, both too angry to stop now that stopping would mean feeling what we just said.

Her foot slips.

Mine follows.

There is one suspended second, our hands clutching each other’s arms, where we both realize what’s about to happen.

Her eyes meet mine.

We are seven years old.

We are twenty-two.

We are dead. Alive. Furious.

Then we go over the edge together.

The pool closes over my head with a cold blue shock, and my last thought before the water swallows us is that Delia still fights exactly like my sister used to fight.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

DEACON

The first thing I see is Reva going under.

The second is Delia’s hand still tangled in the front of her shirt.

I’m moving before either of them breaks the surface, Nash behind me.

Nash reaches the pool from the opposite side, coat already off, shoes hitting stone. He goes in without hesitation, one clean dive that sends water over the edge and across the patio. I hit the coping a second later, grab Delia by the back of her dress when she surfaces cursing, and haul her toward the shallow end before she can shove Reva under again.