Twenty-One

The injury to my shoulder really is as simple as a bad sliver. After they check it, Madison insists I have a hot bath, in case the cold rain… I don't know, triggered my hypothermia? Whatever her reasoning, I don't argue. I need to clean the wound, and I need to rest the leg I injured earlier, and I need to warm up. Afterward, Madison bandages my shoulder while Jayla takes a hot shower.

"What happened with you and Sadie?" Madison says as we throw our wet clothing in the dryer.

I shrug. "She's not thinking straight, and she grabbed me and then pushed me into a tree."

And accused me of breaking a promise. A pact. Not just that, but when she said it, her voice… it wasn't her voice.

Madison is watching me expectantly, and I realize she must have said something else.

I shake off my thoughts. "Sorry. I'm a little out of it myself."

"I said I didn't mean what happened just now. What happened to you guys as friends? I always figured it was just the normal thing, where you outgrow a friendship, like me and Catelyn. But with the way everyone's been acting, I started to figure there was more to it, and there seems to be something with her and Kit." She makes a face. "Or there was? In the past? That would explain the…" She searches for a word. "The tension. Awkward, right, if she had a thing with Kit and then you guys got married. But then Jayla's thinking Sadie might have blown up your boats and now she attacked you, and people don't do that over a guy."

Oh, they do, but I get what Madison is saying. She knows I wouldn't "steal" Sadie's boyfriend, and I wouldn't be jealous of Kit's past. If Sadie had been over the top with her own jealousy, I'd have steered clear and locked my doors.

"It's—" I begin.

"Don't you dare say ‘complicated.'"

I smile and lean against the washing machine. "Okay, I won't. But what I would have meant by that is that it's old history, and it's not really my place to discuss it."

Her cheeks pink. "Discuss it with me, you mean. Right. That makes sense."

I hug her. "It's grown-up drama that started as teen drama, and you know what that's like. I can say two things. One, Sadie has issues with me, and they have nothing—" I stop and veer around that land mine. "They aren't issues with you. If she did hurt you in her current state, it'd honestly be because she mistook you for me, which would take some seriously bad lighting."

She rolls her eyes, and then says, "And the other thing?"

I meet her gaze. "Don't hold it against her. Whatever she's done, it's between me and her. It's past history that Sadie can't quite let go of, but I wouldn't want that to turn you against her. When we find her, forget all that and focus on her as a person in need of help."

"Don't judge. Except with that Garrett guy. I can totally judge him."

When I hesitate, she frowns. "He's an asshole, Laney. Please don't tell me I need to give him the benefit of the doubt too, because that is not happening."

"There you two are," Jayla says, walking in as she gently towels off her braids. "I thought you'd be in the office showing your aunt what we found."

"Found?" I say. "In the office?"

"On your laptop."

"Your laptop is fine," Madison says quickly. "Don't freak her out like that. No one did anything to your laptop, Laney. But Jayla and I were talking while we searched. I wanted to check into this theory that whoever stages that stuff was trying to buy the island. I was thinking that if I wanted to buy an island, I'd want to see it first. Easiest way to do that?"

"Rent it," I say.

"Yep. So Jayla and I came up with a list of red flags to look for. We were going to give them to you, but since you were in the tub, and you don't lock your laptop, and I know you trust me not to look at your private stuff…"

She trails off with a sidelong look of uncertainty, waiting for me to say yes, it was fine. When I do, she relaxes.

"Good," she says. "So we went on a cyber-spy mission through your rental email folder. We started by looking at people who were here right before it all started. The first thing found was the hex circle under the crawlspace carpet, right?"

I nod. "The people who rented Hemlock Island before that were seniors with young grandkids. Unlikely suspects. However, no one would have moved the crawlspace carpet until I came for a visit, so it could have been two, three, even four renters before them."

"That's what I thought. So, like I said, we had a list of red flags we checked against. The suspect we found, though? They did something different."

Madison waves me from the laundry room into my tiny office, where my laptop is open on the desk. She sits and brings up a tab. On it is a message from a renter, and when I read it, I let out a string of profanity.

"Aunt Laney!" Madison says with a grin.

I pull over the stool and take the laptop. I can't believe I missed this one. Well, yes, I can, because when I'd been considering suspects for the staging, I'd had certain renters in mind. The trust-fund twentysomething couple who'd treated the island like a hotel room they could trash and have Mommy and Daddy pay the bill. The older couple who'd said they were renting it for themselves and instead let their college-aged son and his friends have it for a party weekend. Or the several groups of renters with teenagers.

The ones Madison and Jayla pinpointed were a couple in their early forties on a getaway. As unlikely to be staging occult nonsense as the elderly pair and their preteen grandchildren.

So what's in the message that has me swearing? Something that had seemed so innocuous at the time. They were the sort of renters who have a laundry list of questions before they commit, common questions that I have canned answers for.

One of their questions was about the security system. That's not unusual. I might stress how remote Hemlock Island is, but people still think of the lower Great Lakes in summer, with endless passing boaters who might decide my island looks like a good place to pull over and camp. They want to be certain they'll be safe from intruders.

I'd given the canned answer, and this guy came back wanting to know what type of system we had. He'd apologized for being a "pain in the ass," but he owned a security company, and there were plenty of rental properties that claimed to have good security, only for him to discover they'd bought some cheap system online. I'd sent back a link to our system and steeled myself for him to tell me it was trash in hopes of selling me his company's product. Instead, he'd said that was a great choice, and I never heard a word about it again.

This guy is a security professional. He knew what kind of system I had before he came out. If I'm wondering how someone could get access to my secured house? Here's my answer.

"That could be a coincidence," Jayla says. "If you brought this to me wanting to legally pursue damages, I'd laugh you out of my office. But then…"

She leans over and pulls up an email. It's from one of the companies that has tried buying Hemlock Island. This one bypassed Kit and came straight to me.

"Note the area code and first name."

I do—it's a Detroit area code, from a land-development company, the letter sent directly from the CEO, whose name is Rachel Rossi. Then Jayla flips to the rental agreement for the guy who asked about security. She points to the phone number. The area code is the same… and his wife's first name is Rachel.

I swear under my breath.

"Do you know how much I'd love to have internet access right now?" Jayla says. "It'd be an easy check to link that letter to that renter. Then we have our third piece of evidence."

She opens another tab, with a message from a person who rented the property shortly before the grotesque wind chimes were found.

Hello! I'm hoping to rent your lovely island for a fall getaway! You hosted friends of ours—John and Rachel—this summer, and they can't stop raving about the place!

John and Rachel. Security-company guy and his presumed land-developer wife. I don't remember much about this "friend" couple, and I zip through my messages to find the reason: they did nothing memorable. They had no questions and paid in full. They'd come for a weekend and left without so much as breaking a plate, giving me no reason to contact them later. They'd five-star-reviewed Hemlock Island, and so I'd mentally entered them onto my ideal guest list and returned the five-star rating for them… on their brand-new renters account.

They'd also paid by e-transfer, which came from a corporate account identified by a string of numbers.

John and Rachel's "friends" didn't rent Hemlock Island that weekend. John and Rachel did. They'd come on site, done whatever additional research they needed. They might have set up the wind chimes, or they might have just found a spot to moor a boat so they could access the island whenever they wanted.

I push back from the desk. Then I march into the great room and change my admin codes on the security system.

"You think they also took the gun?" Madison asks.

"Yes," I say. "If they can crack the security system, they could open the locker. I don't think they're prowling the island with my gun, though."

Jayla nods. "They took it so you don't shoot them while they're prowling the island."

"After we found that hand, we'd go straight for the gun. They couldn't take that chance, so they've removed it. Logical?"

"Yep. They rented the house the first time to check out the island, make sure it lived up to expectations. Which it would—it's exactly what you claim it is: the perfect luxury getaway. They drew the hex circle and figured out the security system while hoping they wouldn't need either."

"Because two weeks later, they sent a lowball offer through the wife's company. Being spooked, I'd naturally agree. Instead I refused to even negotiate. So they got serious. Came for another weekend and upped their game with the wind chimes and the boathouse staging. Oh, Kit and I found something else in the boathouse earlier, too. That'd be part three, along with scratches in the closet."

"Only when they staged part three, Nate was here," Jayla says. "They misjudged their timing, and he caught them. There's a fight. He dies… and they go full out. Use his body. Destroy the small watercraft. You show up with a team of friends to investigate, and they try to trap us here—making you realize how isolated and dangerous this place is. They set a bomb on the boat, except Sadie decided to abandon us, and was on the boat and is now badly injured." Jayla crosses her arms. "These bastards are going away for a very long time."

Is that the real story? Does it explain everything that's going on here? A couple of investors got in over their heads, intent on their prize, and the more things went wrong, the further they were willing to go? In for a penny, in for a pound.

There's more to this. You know there is.

Should I point out the parts that don't make sense? Like what I saw in Sadie's eyes? What she said to me? How the hell she's running with bone sticking out of her leg and do not tell me that's from brain trauma.

Jayla and Madison don't know any of that. I should tell them. Just casually say it and get their impressions.

Are you fucking kidding me, Laney? You're going to "casually" tell Madison about Sadie's leg? If you think that is at all appropriate, turn in your guardianship papers right now.

Jayla then. Take her aside and get her read on it.

I consider that. Then I see Madison's face as she looks at me. No, as she watches me. Watches for a sign that I doubt the story Jayla is telling.

Madison needs me to believe it. She trusts me, and she relies on me to keep her safe, and it doesn't matter what's actually happening out there. What matters is that she feels I have this under control.

I do have it under control. I've changed the security codes. We are safely in the house, and the guys will be back at any moment. With any luck, they'll have Sadie, and everyone can judge the situation for themselves.

"We need to get ready for Sadie," I say as I slap shut the security panel. "She's badly injured, and we have no immediate way off this island, so we need to care for her."

"What are her injuries?" Jayla says.

I hesitate. Then I plow on. "A dislocated shoulder. A cheek in need of stitches. A compound fracture on her leg."

"Compound?" Madison frowns.

"Badly broken," I say. "All the bathrooms have first-aid kits. Let's start gathering those. We also need clean clothing, towels, and hot water."

We divvy up the tasks and set to work.

I'm in the laundry room looking for my sewing kit. I know I have one here somewhere, and it might not be the best idea for stitching up Sadie, but we're going to need something. Sanitize the needles. Clean the thread. Pray it's better than leaving an open wound.

Now if only I could find the damned kit. The problem is that, well, I'm not a seamstress. I can barely thread a needle. But I am a bit of a squirrel when it comes to freebies. That's how I was raised. We were comfortably middle-class, but my parents had ascended there from childhoods where every penny counted. On vacation, if we opened a bottle of hotel shampoo, we took it home. And if it was a fancy hotel, we'd reason that the amenities were included in the price and take home the unopened ones, too. All this is to say that my "sewing kit" is actually a box of mini sewing kits from hotels. Because someday, I'm going to need to fix a button or whatever.

Now I need to stitch up my former friend's gaping wounds… and I have no idea where I stashed that box. I only know that it exists and it's in the laundry room. Somewhere.

I'm searching a cupboard when I catch a glimpse of movement out the window. I slap the door shut so I can look past it.

I'm hoping to see Kit, to know he's okay. Yes, after what he said in the forest, I… I'm not sure how I'll deal with that. But it doesn't change the fact that I'm worried about him out there with a woman who thinks he's responsible for her horrific injuries.

Let it be Kit, and let him have Sadie.

It's gotten dark again, and for a second, I think the day has passed into night. It certainly seems as if it's been that long. It's barely past noon, though. The darkness is the clouds reminding us that the storm hasn't dissipated yet.

I squint and lift my hand to shield the reflection from the laundry-room lights. Someone lurches from the forest. Even before I see a figure, that movement tells me who it is.

Sadie.

She's stumbling now, barely able to stay upright. She's at the west side of the house, where the forest comes up to the patio.

Where we found Nate's hand.

She takes three steps and collapses in a heap. I jolt, as if from a stupor.

Sadie is there. Right there. Collapsed from pain and exhaustion and God knows what else, and I'm just standing here watching.

I run from the laundry room. In the hall, I stop short, my bare feet squeaking on the polished hardwood.

Voices sound overhead. Jayla and Madison upstairs, down by Madison's bedroom. I pause for two seconds. Then I veer into my office on the way to the back door. I grab a pen and stickie pad from the desktop. As I run to the door, I write "Sadie is outside. Getting her. Stay in here!"

I slap the stickie note on the patio door. Then I set the alarm to rearm once I'm out. I yank on my drenched sneakers, open the door, dash through, and lock it behind me.

As I race across the patio, a voice whispers that it would only have taken a shout to bring Jayla and Madison. Less time than it took to write a note.

I can tell myself I didn't have time to explain, but the truth is that I don't want Madison out here with Sadie until I know it's safe. I am not being reckless. I am tipping the balance of risk from Madison to me.

I run over to where I saw Sadie.

She isn't there.

I'm in the wrong place. All I saw was that she came out of the forest over here somewhere. The angle is different. She must be on the other side of that bistro set—

She's not there, and once I'm standing in that spot, I see blood to my left, in the direction of the laundry-room window. More blood is smeared on the paving stones.

I turn, and it really seems like twilight here, in the gloom of the trees under a gunmetal-gray sky. I can't see—

There! I catch a glimpse of Sadie's white shirt, moving erratically into the forest.

I glance over my shoulder at the house.

I shouldn't go far.

I should have brought Jayla. Insisted Madison stay inside and brought Jayla.

Oh, hell no. I'm not leaving Madison alone anywhere on this island.

I look between the house and Sadie's retreating form.

I can do this. Sadie's lurching, barely mobile. No more running and climbing for her. I can catch up with her easily.

Should I? What if she attacks me again?

She's barely moving, remember?

I remember her face, twisted with rage.

You promised to look after me. I gave you everything, and you made an oath, and you broke it. Youbroke the pact.

I remember the feeling of her fingers digging in. I have bruises on my forearms from her grip. I have bruises on my back from hitting that tree. That wasn't normal strength.

Make up your damned mind. Are you going after her or getting the others?

My feet are answering for me, have been since I saw Sadie's retreating figure. I'm already at the edge of the forest. I can still see her lurching away. I take a deep breath… and then I run in after her.