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“I thought they’d make this place look less like a shithole,” Colt defends sharply. “And when did it become a crime to buy windchimes off Etsy!”
“It’s not one,” Babette says with a smile. “But you bought mine and you know me.”
“So what?” Colt mutters. “I’m supporting a local artist.”
“And I thank you for your contribution.”
“Relentless contribution,” October teases.
He glares. “Thank you, OB.”
“Oh no, the pleasure is all Babette’s.”
Colt is blushing, and I’m trying so hard not to laugh. He pins his disgruntled glare onto me. “Zoey.”
I hold up my hands. “I think it’s cute.”
He groans, then slides out his chair. About to leave—probably to grab another bottle of rum—but Babette’s phone suddenly lights up in the dark.
Colt freezes.
We all go quiet.
She picks up her cell. “I can air-drop the photos to everyone, but I only have Colt and October’s numbers.”
I’ve already started taking out my phone. Fuck, it’s dead. With the power outage, I can’t exactly charge it.
“You can pass the phone around,” Parry suggests, but color has started draining from Babette’s face.
“What?” Colt asks, shifting his weight impatiently. “Is the handwriting a match?”
She lifts her terrified eyes right to her sister. “October.”
We all turn.
October is solid ice. She’s unmoving. Stoic. “Let me see.”
Babette slides the phone across the table.
And I peer at the photo with October. The front of a colorful postcard reads: Greetings from Michigan! The Great Lakes State!
The back has a short, handwritten note in blue ink.
Weather has been great! Might stay out here for longer. I’m falling in love with Michigan.
xoxo, Augustine
Nothing seems strange to me. “I don’t understand. Kenobi?”
She’s barely moving.
I squeeze her lifeless, limp hand. My pulse is racing. “Kenobi.”
“This isn’t Augustine’s handwriting.” She speaks flat. No emotion.
“How do you know?” My voice pitches in fear. “We haven’t even seen the other photo of her real handwriting. We haven’t compared anything yet.”
Babette has her hands to her mouth. “I…” She’s unable to speak. “October.”
“We don’t have to match them,” October says. “I already know the postcard wasn’t written by Augustine.” She shoves Babette’s phone away. “It’s Aunt Effie’s handwriting.”
Her aunt?
Parry rubs his eyes. He was right to believe the town council could pin this on Colt. October was right too, but I don’t think she ever suspected her aunt.
“She covered this up?” Colt croaks, eyes reddening. “To turn me into the madman in the lighthouse?”
Babette’s face contorts. “Aunt Effie can be rude, among other things…but I never thought she was capable of that kind of cruelty.”
“I realize I never asked you,” October says to Colt, “but what was the exact day of the mayday call?”
Did Colt ever tell me? I think he just said “around December”—something vague.
“December 23rd,” Colt recalls easily. “The day before Christmas Eve.”
October intakes a sharp breath. She looks sick.
“October?” She lets go of my hand like she’s arsenic and she’ll poison me. I try to recapture her hand, but she’s pulling back and standing from the table.
She can’t meet my eyes. Rarely has she ever looked away. But she’s looking everywhere but at me and at them. “I know everything.”
“What?” we all seem to say at different times.
“I know what happened to Augustine Anders.”
“How?” I ask the loudest, rising to my feet. For a moment, it feels like it’s just me and her in the darkened bar. The two of us in a stand-off. Wanting, aching, yearning to be close, but a squall and riptide are drawing us so far apart.
“Because,” October breathes, “I was with her.”
CHAPTER 26
October Brambilla
I’m cursed. I’ve been cursed, and the past is swelling up underneath me, suffocating me all over again, and I default to numbness. To the endless nothingness that crawls over my body and blankets me in cold sheets.
Everyone is on their feet. Candles do little to light the darkened crevices of the bar and the distressed features of the five people around me.
“Have you known the truth this entire time?” Parry questions like I’m the enemy. Like I’ve purposefully fooled the Durands along with the rest of the town.
“She didn’t,” Zoey butts in, not for one second doubting me. “She’s been trying to help me—us.”
I feel…
I love…
My eyes sting, and I blink a few times. “I didn’t realize she was the same girl until right now. If I’d known…” What would I have done?
I look up at Colt. He’s breathing hard.
My curse is twisted around his curse. One of us was always going to go down. Self-preservation has been all I’ve known. Rise to the top of the food chain.
No matter who you hurt.
Stand your ground.
No matter the cost.
Thunder resounds and shakes the floor beneath our feet. The ceiling leaks where I stand and drips onto my pink sweater. I don’t move.
“I didn’t know,” I say more forcefully. “She never told me her last name, and when I met her, she said her name was Katie.”
