Six

It's not until I'm outside, armed with my knife, that I realize what we're doing. Madison thinks she saw a shadowy figure on my private island, after someone left blood and scratches in the closet. Now we're venturing outside to investigate?

Coming out here had seemed sensible. Hell, I'd wondered if I was overreacting by getting a knife first. Now we're making our way through the darkness, the whistling wind drowning out all sound.

This is stupid. Really stupid. Go inside, get Kit and the gun—

Light floods the yard, and we all jump.

"Motion detector," I say with a half laugh.

The others nod, and we continue on.

"Wait," I say as I slow. "There's a motion-detecting light around the side, too. Under my window."

"Shit," Madison says. "I forgot about that. So if the light didn't activate, no one could have been there."

"Unless the bulb burned out."

"No, it came on earlier, when that Garrett guy wandered off to take a piss. Kit told him to go inside, but he pretended not to hear and went around the corner and yelped when the light flicked on." She glances over. "It was kind of funny."

"Well," Jayla says. "While this does seem to be a false alarm, at least we weren't idiots walking out of a security-armed house to confront an intruder."

"You realized that, too?" I say.

"Yep, about five seconds ago, when I wondered why this felt so familiar, and then I remembered I've seen this scene in every damn slasher movie you made me watch."

"Made you?" I say as we resume walking to the corner of the house. "That is not how I remember it."

"Totally how I remember it. You—"

Pain stabs through my foot, my gasp cutting her short. "And I just stepped on broken glass. Fucking renters."

"Ooh," Madison says. "You aren't supposed to use that word, Auntie Laney. They can revoke your guardian license."

"You okay?" Jayla asks me.

"I'm fine. Remind me to clean up the glass tomorrow."

I take a step, and the sharp jab tells me a sliver is embedded in my sole. I pause as Madison continues on, Jayla following.

"It better have been the renters," I mutter. "If Garrett dropped his beer bottle when the light came on—"

I stop as I pluck a shard from my foot. It's too fine to be bottle glass. I squint down at it, and then I realize I'm squinting. We've rounded the back corner, away from the first motion-detector light, and second one hasn't come on. It hasn't come on because…

I look up to see the empty socket and jagged remains of the bulb.

"In the house!" I shout. "Everyone in the house now!"

Jayla backs up fast. Madison is frozen there, her back to me as she stares down. I run to grab her. How did I let her get so far from me? Why the hell did I bring her out here? What was I thinking?

"Laney?" Her voice quavers, but she doesn't move.

"Get in the house. We—"

"That's fake, right? It's a decoration, right? Tell me that's—"

I grab her T-shirt and then stop as I see what she's looking at. It's a hand.

There is a hand. Coming out of the ground.

"It's fake," I blurt. "Halloween bullshit. Now get in the—"

She drops to her knees, shirt breaking from my hold. As I scramble to pull her up, I see the hand better. The white skin. The square shape. The garish high school ring. The chipped blue nail polish.

It's the nail polish that makes me freeze.

Nate.

I drop to my knees and claw at the ground around the hand. My fingers touch skin, and I know this is no prop, no decoration. I dig faster, praying I'm not too late to save him. I scoop out earth, my nails tearing, and then…

Then the hand falls over. It drops onto the dirt, ragged flesh and jutting bone where it's been cut—been cut—been cut—

That's where my brain stops. And that's when Madison starts to scream.

"In the house," I say, when I can find words. "We need to get in the house."

I gather up Madison. She collapses against me, shaking and gasping. Jayla helps get her inside, and then she slams and locks the door. I stammer out the security code, and she activates it.

"The motion detector," I whisper when Jayla comes back. "Someone smashed it. Smashed it and left that… left his…"

I double over, gagging, but only bile comes. Jayla reaches for me. I brush her off.

"Get the others. Please. We're leaving. Now."

She's gone before I can finish. As I hold Madison, I dimly hear Jayla's feet on the stairs, then her shouts and bangs on doors. Other voices join in, but they sound a mile away, muffled and indistinct.

"That—that was Nate, wasn't it?" Madison manages between sobs. "His… His…"

"I-I don't know."

Everything in me throws up ridiculous alternate explanations. Ridiculous yet somehow more reasonable than the truth, that someone has killed Nate and cut off his hand and put it in the ground like some kind of fucking Halloween decoration.

They murdered a kid, a good and sweet kid, and they mutilated his body and staged it, and in that moment, I'm no longer lost in shock and grief. I am enraged.

When arms close around me, I almost whip around with my knife. Then I see Kit's face. He hugs me and Madison together. His embrace feels so damn good, and right now I will allow myself that comfort.

"I don't know what's going on," he says, "but I'm getting you both the hell off this island."

"The gun," Madison whispers. "You have the gun?"

"The what?" Kit says.

I tell him, and he swears he didn't even open the gun safe. That makes no sense, but it doesn't matter now. We just need to leave.

Still gripping Madison's hand, I slip from Kit's grasp and stand as Jayla walks in.

"Ready to go?" I say, and there's an odd croak to my voice, as if I'm fighting to sound calm when I'm anything but.

"We can't find Sadie," she says.

"What?" I glance at Kit. "Wasn't she with you?"

"Why would Sadie…?" He trails off and then his eyes widen as they meet mine. "No, Laney. Absolutely not."

"I heard her in your room."

"Believe me, she didn't stay long. She was upset about—" He shakes his head. "It doesn't matter. Sadie and I aren't—"

"Where the hell is my sister?" Garrett storms in and bears down on Kit.

"Why is everyone asking me?" Kit says.

Jayla marches off, shouting Sadie's name at the top of her lungs. No answer comes.

"Check for her shoes," I say. "In case she went outside for a walk."

"At three in the morning?" Garrett says.

"We need to go," Kit says. "Laney? Where's your laptop bag?"

Garrett spins on him. "My sister is missing, and some kid has been murdered. No one gives a shit about Laney's precious laptop."

Jayla runs back in. "Sadie's not in the house."

"Okay," Kit says. "Can you go with Laney and Madison to the boathouse—"

"We are not abandoning my sister," Garrett says.

"We won't," Kit continues. "I'll help you look outside. Laney? Jayla? Take Madison to the boat and get it running. We'll be there soon."

"No one is leaving this island until I say so," Garrett snaps. "I'm a fucking cop, and this is a fucking murder scene."

"And the fucking killer is still fucking here!" Jayla snarls at him.

"So is my sister!"

"Someone needs to get Madison off the island," I say. "I'll stay and help search but—"

"I've got this," Jayla says. "Kit, go with Laney and Madison. Garrett and I will find Sadie."

We go. The longer we argue, the worse things will be, and I absolutely must get Madison off this island. What the hell was I thinking, bringing her here?

I barely process leaving the house or running to the boathouse. I dimly feel pain throbbing through my injured foot, dimly hear the slap of our bare feet on the rocks and feel the bite of the rising wind. We run. We just run.

When Kit pulls the boathouse door, it stays closed.

Did I lock it earlier? Did he? I can't remember. I can't care. I only care that it takes five precious seconds for Kit to get the code in. His fingers are shaking, and he mumbles "Sorry, sorry" when he fails the first time. Then he's yanking open the door and shining the flashlight on—

On the empty berth.

"Where's the boat?" Madison says. Her voice rises. "Where the hell is the boat?"

The exit door is wide open, and the boat is gone.

"Kit!" a voice shouts outside. It's Jayla, and I run to the doorway, knife gripped in my hand. She's running, Garrett behind her.

"Sadie's gone." She stops, heaving to catch her breath. "Her shoes are gone. Her purse is gone. Her bag is gone. I don't know where—" Her gaze moves to the empty berth. "What the—? Shit!"

Sadie is gone. She argued with me. She argued with Kit and god knows who else, and she stormed off in a snit, stranding us on the island… with a killer.