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I swallow. Don’t do this. It won’t help. Nate is dead, and whatever we thought was happening here, it is so much worse.
Focus on Madison and getting her into the house, where it’s safe.
Safe?Trapped on an island in the middle of Lake Superior?
“It’s Nate,” I say, as calmly as I can. “Someone really did kill him, and they might still be on the island. Can you please make sure Kit or Jayla gets Madison into the house?”
“Jayla went to find them. Let me get you out, and we’ll all head inside.” His eyes meet mine. “If Madison comes here, I’ll make sure she doesn’t see him.”
“Thank you.”
“Now let me get you out of there.”
He climbs down until he’s looming over me, and all I see is him there, and I can’t breathe. My chest seizes, panic filling me, raw animal panic. The sight of him. The smell of him.
Breathe. Remember Madison. Breathe.
Inside, I am whirling and gibbering in panic. Garrett doesn’t notice anything amiss. Shocking, really. So shocking.
That thought calms me enough to catch my breath as he works on freeing my leg. It hurts like hell, but at least that’s a distraction. When it’s finally free, I push to my feet, balancing myself in the crevice. Garrett reaches to steady me, and it takes all my willpower not to shove him away.
“I’ve got it,” I say.
“Laney?”
Kit’s face appears over the edge. He sees Nate, and grief ripples across his face. Then he meets my gaze and reaches down. He doesn’t leap into the crevice to rescue me. I know that’s supposed to be the romantic move, but this is what has always done it for me. A helping hand extended, should I need it, while acknowledging that I might not.
I start to climb. Garrett’s hands close over my hips. He’s only bracing me, but the look on my face has Kit’s eyes hardening, his mouth opening to say something.
“I’m okay,” I say, and he understands what I mean and nods, though his expression stays hard.
As soon as I’m high enough, Kit hauls me out. He tries to get me to sit so he can check my leg, but I slip from his grasp.
“Nate,” I say. “Please. If we can get him out…”
Garrett looks at Kit. Kit tenses, ready to argue that yes, we need to get Nate out.
I shake my head. “It’s a crime scene, and I’ve messed it up enough. I wasn’t thinking.”
Kit takes my hand. I hesitate, and my brain issues the command to pull away, but not only doesn’t my traitorous body follow through, it falls against him when he tugs me into a hug. I bury my face in his shirt.
In a heartbeat, two years disappear, and I’m here, in this spot, scouting it before building begins. Kit’s hugging me as I break down in gibbering fear that I will lose my sister. A few months later, she’ll be in remission, and he’ll take me away for the weekend to celebrate,and we’ll spend most of it in bed, ordering takeout and drinking champagne and making love as if we’d been the ones granted a hall pass by Death. Then the cancer will return, and he won’t be there. I’ll get a couple “I’m here if you need me” texts that feel obligatory.
I need you, Kit. I needed you then, and I need you now, but I can’t fall into the trap of needing you again.
I pull away and wipe my eyes. Then I start toward the house. When my leg wobbles, Kit puts out his elbow and I pretend not to see it.
We walk in silence, with Garrett bringing up the rear. A sharp sound from the east makes me jump, but it’s only the whistle of the wind. That prods a memory, sliding past, and I make a half-hearted attempt to catch it, but when it evaporates, I don’t give chase.
We reach the fire pit, and I stop short. The house rises in front of us, a massive wall of unrelieved darkness.
“Madison and Jayla,” I whisper. “Didn’t they come—”
A light flickers deep inside the house, and I exhale. Kit opens the door, ushers us in, and locks it behind him. We continue on to find Jayla and Madison sitting on the floor, behind the couch, Madison leaning against Jayla. A lantern rests at their side.
Seeing me, Madison scrambles up, only to glance over her shoulder, as if she’s revealed herself to a killer beyond that bank of windows. I lower myself to the floor and sit with my back against the sofa, as if it’s a bunker of sandbags.
“I didn’t tell her,” Jayla says.
