I glanced over at Tristan, whose face looked a bit pink, too.
“What’s up, guys?”
Olive slid onto the stool next to mine, filling the void between me and Darcy. “Can you believe this place?” Olive asked, smirking as a guy at the other end of the bar did a spit-take with his drink and everyone laughed. “It’s like spring break on steroids.”
As if on cue, a group of girls near the windows let out a resounding “Wooo-wooo!”
Olive and I locked eyes and cracked up.
“Hey, Olive.”
My heart warmed at the sound of Tristan’s voice.
“Hey, T,” she replied in a familiar way, adjusting the sleeve of her flowy black top.
“Hello,” I said pointedly, trying to highlight the fact that he hadn’t greeted me or Darcy yet.
He turned to gaze at me but said nothing. The blue of his eyes was a deep, almost Caribbean Ocean color, solid and flat, unmarked by variation or flecks. He wore a light blue Thirsty Swan T-shirt that showed off his chest muscles and brought out his dark tan.
“Can I get you anything, Olive?” he asked, still looking at me.
“You know me, T,” she replied, fiddling with a cocktail napkin. “Diet Coke, straight up.”
He gave her a small smile, the first I’d seen on him, and it changed his face completely. If possible, it made him even handsomer.
“On it.”
He turned away and grabbed a clean glass.
Olive nudged me. “So I’ve been thinking about this whole running thing, and I’ve decided to give it a try,” she said, standing up on the rung of her stool and reaching over the bar for a swizzle stick. She placed it between her lips and chewed on the end. “You wanna go with me tomorrow?”
“I’d love to go for a run!” Krista enthused.
“You don’t run,” Tristan said, placing Olive’s Diet Coke in front of her.
“But I—”
“Aren’t you working tomorrow anyway?” he asked.
Krista’s face fell, and she pouted again. “Fine,” she said through her teeth as Tristan moved away to fill a glass for another customer.
I gnawed at my bottom lip, considering. I hadn’t been out for a run since we’d gotten here, and I knew I’d never go by myself, not with the specter of Steven Nell hovering over me.
Still, beneath my stool, my feet bounced crazily, itching at the idea of a good workout. “Why not?” I said finally. “There’s safety in numbers, right?”
“Safety?” Joaquin asked, rejoining us. “What’re you worried about?”
My face flushed. Dammit. Why had I said that out loud? I shot Darcy a save me glance, but she was frozen, her lips on the rim of her glass. Tristan came over and slapped Joaquin on the back, but he paused when he noticed the tableau of me and Darcy in suspended oops mode and Olive, Krista, and Joaquin waiting for my response.
“Okay. What did I just walk in on?” Tristan asked.
“We were just going to find out why Rory’s worried about her safety,” Krista said as Joaquin leaned his elbows on the counter.
Darcy placed her glass down and cleared her throat.
“Oh,” Tristan said, a shadow passing through his eyes. “That sounds ominous.”
My heart pounded horribly.
And when you get where you’re going, you can’t tell anyone who you really are or where you’re from or why you’re there, Agent Messenger’s voice said in my ear. For your safety and theirs.
“It’s not. I just…I don’t like to run by myself,” I improvised, taking another gulp of water. “It’s always better to go out with a buddy.”
“But you said you liked to be Zen,” Olive told me. “You said that was what you loved about it.”
“I did say that, didn’t I?” I said. I returned the glass to the counter with a clatter. “I just—I don’t know.” My whole body burned as everyone around me stared. God, I hated this. “Um, running around a strange place…not knowing where you’re going…it just seems smarter to have someone with you, right? I just…I…I just—”
“Rory, there’s nothing to worry about.” Out of nowhere, Tristan reached for my hand, placing his fingers on top of mine. I instantly went rigid. Darcy, Olive, Krista, and Joaquin all stared down at our hands, but Tristan didn’t seem to notice. His skin was impossibly warm, his fingertips comfortingly calloused, and his touch sent goose bumps up my arm. “Juniper Landing is practically the safest place in the universe. Honestly. Nothing bad ever happens here.”
I gazed into his eyes, breathless, and believed every word he said. Or at least, I believed that he believed it. My heart rate began to slow. When Tristan broke contact and swiped some lime rinds and napkins into a small garbage can, my fingers tingled where his hand had been. I had a sudden mental image of melting into him and was so startled by it I actually had to shake my head to clear it away.
Tristan grabbed up the garbage can and shoved it back under the counter. I got a clear look inside as he did so and felt a snap in my brain, like whiplash. Even though he’d just tossed debris in there, the garbage can was empty.
Olive narrowed her eyes at me. “Are you okay? Your face is bright red.”
Tristan wiped his hands on his half apron, like nothing was amiss.
“Oh, um. I’m fine. I’m just going to…run to the bathroom,” I fumbled, pushing off my stool. What I needed was a minute to collect myself. Not only was I the worst liar on the planet, but now, it seemed, I couldn’t even trust my own eyes.
I sidestepped a drunken staggerer and was weaving my way through the tables toward the screen wall, when abruptly the music on the jukebox changed. The dance tune that had been playing cut off abruptly, and suddenly a familiar, reedy tune filled the bar. “The Long and Winding Road.” I stopped moving. Stopped breathing.
“Rory Miller,” someone whispered.
My heart turned to stone. I turned around. And around. And around.
“Rory Miller,” the same voice whispered again.
Someone was saying my name. Except no one in Juniper Landing knew that name. To them I was Rory Thayer.
Suddenly, I was running through the woods, my neck wet with sweat, my heart pounding in panic. Darkness everywhere. A snap of a twig. A laugh. A horrible, horrible laugh.
Someone slammed into my shoulder.
“Ow!” I said aloud, crashing back to the present.
“Sorry,” some dude in a flannel shirt said sarcastically, looking me up and down like I was a freak.
My eyes darted across the room. Darcy still sat eyeing Joaquin longingly. Olive was making some kind of artwork on the bar with swizzle sticks and pretzels while Tristan stood with his back to me behind the counter, gazing intently at something I couldn’t see. Fisher and Kevin were leaning into the counter, whispering something to Joaquin. All at once, the three of them turned to look over at me, their expressions blank, and I quickly glanced away. There were kids in baseball caps, girls in tight skirts, a couple arguing near the bathroom. But nowhere, nowhere, nowhere was Steven Nell.
I stood there for a moment longer, listening. There was nothing. Nothing other than shouting, laughter, and that awful music. But when I glanced one last time at the bar, I saw Tristan watching me again as well, his eyes bluer than ever, staring at me like he knew every detail of my life.
Even my real name.
“I think Joaquin is the hottest guy I’ve ever met,” Darcy said as we stepped onto the boardwalk outside the Thirsty Swan. “Way hotter than Christopher, don’t you think?”
I shot her a quick glance, but she was too busy tipping her head back to gaze at the stars. Christopher. I hadn’t thought about him all day. I guess between Aaron and Tristan and Olive and Joaquin, plus all the potentially-losing-my-mind fun, I’d been kind of distracted.
“Sure. I guess,” I said carefully, listening to the sound of the bay water gently lapping against the pylons as we walked. It was a relief to be out of the bar and away from the noise. Away from that crowd and the jukeb
ox with its oddly disconcerting selections.
Every time I thought about that song coming on, about that whisper, about the humming I’d heard the other day, the laughter in the fog, and the scrap of fabric in the park, my heart seized up painfully and I felt like I wanted to scream. If I didn’t talk it out with someone, I was going to go crazy.
“Darcy, I have something to tell you, but please don’t freak out,” I said.
She stopped walking and eyed me with interest. “What?”
“I thought I heard Steven Nell in the bar tonight,” I said.
My sister’s jaw dropped. It was almost like she’d expected me to say one thing, and I’d done a one-eighty on her. “What?”
“Someone whispered my name. And not Rory Thayer, Rory Miller,” I said. “Didn’t you hear ‘The Long and Winding Road’ on the jukebox?”
Darcy blinked. “Yeah, but the Beatles are the most popular band ever,” she pointed out.
“And I heard someone humming it outside our house the other morning, too,” I persisted. “Then this morning, I found this scrap of fabric in the park that looked just like that tan jacket he always wore.”
For a long moment, she just stared at me, like she was waiting for more. “That’s it?”
“What do you mean, that’s it?” I squeaked. “That’s not enough?”
“Rory,” she said, clucking her tongue impatiently. “Did you ever stop to think that maybe you’re just hearing things?”
“Hearing things?” I repeated.
She lifted her shoulders. “I don’t know. Maybe it’s like your flashes—a symptom of post-traumatic stress. It totally makes sense that it’s happening again, right? I mean, you were almost killed.”
I gritted my teeth. “This wasn’t like the flashes, Darcy,” I told her. “I can tell the difference between the flashes and reality. I know what I saw! I know what I heard!”
Darcy rolled her eyes and groaned. “Can we please just go? It’s getting cold out here.”
I should have known she’d never take me seriously. In Darcy’s world, nothing bad ever happened. And if it did, she just ignored it or never talked about it. Like after my mom died. All Darcy did was make more friends, buy more clothes at the mall, go to more parties. She never got depressed or nostalgic; she never wanted to reminisce. She was too busy having fun. Too busy moving forward.
“Fine,” I said tightly. “Let’s go.”
We were just about to turn off the boardwalk and head toward town when I saw something shift out on the water. The air seemed to be moving. I grabbed Darcy’s arm, my throat going dry. It was the fog again, and it was rolling in quickly.
“Darcy, look!” I whispered.
“What? Is Steven Nell hanging out on one of the boats?”
By the time she turned her head, the mist was already swirling around us. The odd hissing sound started my pulse pounding in my ears. Darcy was so tense I could practically feel it coming off of her in bursts.
“Come on. It’s getting late.” Darcy started up the hill and completely disappeared. The fog swallowed her whole. Heart in my throat, I lunged forward and sprinted a few steps until I caught sight of her calves—two white stripes flashing in the grayness as she speed-walked ahead of me.
“Darcy!” I whispered. “Slow down.”
“Why don’t you keep up, track star?” she shot back.
I tried, but the fog was too disorienting. At the top of the hill, my foot hit an uneven crack in the sidewalk, and my ankle twisted. By the time I’d righted myself, my sister had vanished again entirely.
“Darcy!” I hissed, turning around in the mist. “Darcy! Where are you?”
No answer. Nothing but the hiss of the undulating mist.
“Darcy?” I whimpered.
“I’m right here!” Her voice was practically in my ear.
“You scared the crap out of me,” I whispered, flinging my arm out. My hand hit her shoulder. I’d had no clue she was standing that close.
“Ow!” she said.
I reached to take her hand so we wouldn’t get separated again. “Is that really necessary?” she griped, trying to pull away.
“Yes. Yes, it is,” I replied, crushing her fingers.
“God! Fine! Just loosen it up, would you?”
I did. But only slightly.
Matching our steps, we cut diagonally across the wet grass of the park and headed down the hill toward our house. I could hear the surf rolling into the shore up ahead and started to relax. We were almost there. Almost safe.
Then, somewhere deep inside the fog, someone laughed.
Darcy and I both froze. She squeezed my hand so hard I felt a pop.
“Did you hear that?” she said.
“Yes,” I breathed.
It came again. Another laugh. A low, menacing sort of chuckle. “Darcy?” I whispered hoarsely.
“Run,” she ordered.
We turned and tore off down the street, tripping off the unseen edge of the sidewalk and stumbling across the wide road. The fog tugged at my hair as I ran, pulling it from my cheeks and leaving its warm, moist trail along my skin. My toe hit the opposite curb, and I flew forward, going weightless, but Darcy stopped my fall with a stiff yank on my arm.
“The gate is up here!” she whispered.
We whirled around and screamed as we ran headfirst into someone’s chest. A strong hand clamped around my upper arm. I was about to start begging for our lives when I recognized the evergreen scent of my dad’s shower gel.
“Girls! Get inside! Now!” my father demanded.
I felt like my heart was going to burst. Darcy clung to my side, and we staggered through the open gate, up the steps, and into our house. The bright lights stung my eyes after the darkness of the street, and it took me a second to focus. My father slammed the door behind us, and I lunged to double lock it.
“What were you thinking?” my father fumed, whirling on us. “You leave the house without telling me? Stay out past midnight? What do you think this is, some kind of vacation?”
Darcy crossed her arms over her chest. “What do you expect us to do? Stay locked up in here all the time?”
“Yes!” he screamed, shaking as his face turned fuchsia. “That’s exactly what I expect you to do! We don’t know anyone in this town. You two could have been hurt! Or killed!”
“But we weren’t!” Darcy pointed out angrily. “We’re fine!”
But my dad didn’t seem to hear her. “From now on, you two are grounded. No leaving the house at night. And during the day you’re to tell me exactly where you’re going and who you’re going with. No discussions.”
He turned and started to stomp up the stairs.
“But, Dad,” Darcy whined.
“Don’t talk back to me!” he roared. “It’s for your own safety.”
Darcy’s eyes flashed. “When was the last time you asked me where I was going at night? When I was coming home after school? Who my friends were? Who my boyfriend was?” she ranted, tears spilling over onto her dark red cheeks. “You never ask me anything! You never listen to anything I say! And now all of a sudden you want to tell me what to do, who I can see, where I can go? No! No way! You can’t just suddenly decide to be a father again after five years of complete silence!”
She shoved past him and barreled up the stairs.
“Darcy!” he shouted after her.
“No!” she screamed back. And then her door slammed.
I stood against the wall, staring at our family photo on the table with blurry eyes, trying to catch my breath. Darcy had talked back to my father before, but never like that. She’d never screamed at him. Never laid out all his faults. And now here we were, the two of us, standing amid the destruction of her nuclear bomb.
After a long moment, I heard my dad sigh. I looked up, one tear spilling free, and he gazed back at me. His eyes were heavy and sad. His posture curled. For the first time in a long time, he looked sorry.
“I’m just gonna go to bed,” I said quietl
y.
He sank down on the stairs, as if the air had been let out of him. By the time I slipped past him, he had his face buried in his hands. I thought of what I’d heard last night, him sobbing alone in his room, and my heart went out to him.
“G’night, Dad,” I said, realizing I hadn’t said it in an impossibly long time.
He didn’t reply at first, but when I got to the top of the stairs, he turned and looked up at me, tears shining in his eyes.
“Good night, Rory.”
This island was not stingy with its gifts. The fog. The fantastic fog. Its blinding quality was so complete. So utterly encompassing. It was like nothing he’d ever seen or heard of or read about, but it was lovely. It was empowering.
He’d been so close to her tonight. So very, very close. He’d tasted her fear again, so sweet and salty. It was all he could do to keep from reaching out and plucking a strand of that hair for himself. To taste it again. To own it. The possibility was almost too much to bear.
But now was not the time. He had already set his plot in motion and could not risk it now. This time, everything was going to happen as planned. This time, nothing and no one would stop him. This time, she would be his.
My thigh muscles were on fire, and my calves were cramping. There was a blister forming on the side of my big toe, and sweat soaked the back of my gray T-shirt. My lungs burned, my eyes watered, and my neck itched whenever my hair brushed against it.
I was in heaven. Why had I waited so long to do this?
As I came around a bend in the trail, the top of the bluff loomed into view. For the first mile, Olive had kept pace with me, panting at my side. After that, she’d dropped back, and now there was nothing but the crashing surf and whipping wind. I hoped she was okay, because I was not about to stop. This was way too much fun. Imagining the finish line up ahead, I turned on the heat and pushed myself into a sprint for the last incline. As soon as I reached the top, I let out a triumphant, euphoric laugh. I slowed my steps to a walk and held my fingers to my neck to check my pulse.