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Jayla looks around. “This is new. Why did you put the gazebohere?”
The gazebo sits atop a windswept hill looking out over endless water, the distant land hidden by a light mist. The hill is topped with sparse trees, all stunted from the lack of soil and gnarled from the wind exposure.
“Uh, ’cause it’s awesome,” Madison says, lifting her face to the wind.
“It’s dead-ass creepy, that’s what it is.”
“Like I said, awesome.”
Jayla looks between me and Madison, and her eyes pop wide. “Wait! Are you two, like, related or something?”
I lift my middle finger.
“It’s atmospheric,” Kit says. “Very Laney.”
“Dead-ass creepy?” Jayla says.
Kit’s right. It’s atmospheric. Jayla is also right. It’s dead-ass creepy, which might be why I love it. I’m loving it a whole lot less right now, remembering what I’d found here. Two macabre wind chimes—raven feathers threaded through hollow bones, with human hair tied at the ends.
Jayla says something, and I’m turning to her when a whisper floats up from below. I follow the sound. The others don’t notice when I step away from the group. They’re busy discussing the grotesque wind chimes.
The wind has picked up in the last hour, rustling the trees and whipping Jayla’s braids. The forest is below, and I shouldn’t be able to hear anyone in it, but I swear I catch whispers on the wind.
I’m about to turn away when another sound slithers up, and this time, there is no mistaking what I hear. A single word.
Laney…
I wheel toward it.
“Do you hear that, too?” Madison says, and I audibly exhale in relief. I’m not losing it. Someoneisout there.
“Oh, yeah,” Jayla says. “That’s a boat motor.” She shades her eyes and squints toward the dock as I pick up the distant sound of a motor. “We are about to have visitors.”
FOUR
By the time we reach the dock, it’s clear that the boat is heading in the other direction. I start to relax. My first thought had been that the Abbases were returning to finish out their stay, which could turn ugly. But obviously the boat wasn’t coming to the island…
No, wait. Two figures stand on the dock. A man and a woman… with luggage. Shit! The boat dropped them off. The Abbases—
“Sadie?” Jayla says. “What the hell are you doing here?”
I slow, and the seconds seem to drag into minutes as dread settles into my gut.
Jayla must be wrong. That can’t possibly be Sadie Emerson. Then the woman moves out of the shadows, revealing a willowy strawberry blonde with upswept hair and a model’s grace, tugging a bright pink carry-on after her.
Sadie Emerson.
Sadie and I had been friends in elementary school. Then I met Jayla, and the three of us formed our own little clique until…
My breathing quickens. I choke back the panic and slowly pivot to Kit. “What is going on?”
Kit blinks in surprise. “Why are you asking me?”
“Because she knows it’s your fault, Kit dear.” Sadie passes Kit, her fingers brushing along his arm.
“My—?” Kit says. “What?”
He looks genuinely baffled, and I want to seize on that. See? Ignore the scuttlebutt I read on our high school chat forum.
