13. Ava

AVA

S omething Liath’s parents said bugged me. About Liath being adopted.

One evening after classes, I walked through the towering ancient wood and brass cabinets of the public records section in the basement of the Dublin Public Library.

The air smelled of old parchment and ink. The wood paneled ceiling soared above, curling wrought-iron stairs leading to skinny wooden ledges so that one could access the higher drawers.

What would I find here? What secrets about the Byrnes, about Liath—about me— might I discover?

My skin hummed with a mix of anticipation and dread, each nerve on edge. Fear twisted in my gut, but turning back wasn’t an option. I needed to know the truth, no matter what it cost me.

Maybe it was because I was adopted, too.

Maybe that’s why I felt even more tied to my missing friend, that I just had to find out the truth, that somehow her fate and mine were inextricably tied.

Or maybe deep down I thought that perhaps if I could uncover Liath’s dark secrets, it would help me uncover my own.

Whatever the reason, I couldn’t let it go.

I couldn’t turn back.

Not even with my stalker’s threats weighing on me.

I had to keep digging.

I peered through the aisles, my fingertips brushing the grainy wood, the low lighting cast off from the ornate Victorian wall scones and hanging iron chandeliers, listening out for the creak of footsteps on the old wooden flooring.

I was in a public space. Surely, he wouldn’t be able to get to me here.

Ireland only transferred to a digital system recently and hadn’t gotten around to digitizing past records. So it was a slough pouring through all those manual records, pulling out drawer after drawer, thumbing through file after dusty file filled with loose pages of faded old records.

First, I found her official name change certificate before she became a Byrne, her name barely legible thanks to the faded ink over time.

Liath Daugherty.

I wonder if even she knew her real name.

I used that name to track down her birth certificate.

There she was… born Liath Daugherty to mother: Kathleen Daugherty; father: unknown.

I wonder what had happened to her mother to make her give Liath up ?

The woman from the desk upstairs informed me, adoption records were confidential to anyone other than the adoptee.

But, she said, birth and death records were public.

So I went searching for Kathleen’s records in an even older section of the library. Here it was darker thanks to some of the lights being broken and the musty smell was even thicker.

I found Kathleen Daughterty’s records and slipped them onto my growing pile of files to study. And I wondered about the other missing girls.

I looked up the birth records for Sarah Hickey and Keela Hawkins.

But to my utter surprise, neither of them had birth records.

At first, I’d thought that perhaps I’d made a mistake. That I’d somehow missed their records. So I double-checked them.

But their birth records didn’t exist.

How could that be possible?

They existed. Even if everyone stopped caring after they’d “run away.”

What if… a growing thought began to make my heart drum harder… what if they weren’t Sarah Hickey and Keela Hawkins when they were born?

What if they’d also had their names changed?

I practically ran through the aisles, my blood pumping with that familiar exhilaration. I was onto something.

My hands were shaking as I poured through record after record to find their names.

I ended up with several thin files in my hands .

They confirmed what I had suspected.

Sarah Hickey and Keela Hawkins had both had their names changed.

Three missing girls.

All students at Darkmoor college.

All deemed as “runaways.”

All of them had their names changed after their birth parents died.

All of them had been adopted .

A loud bang had me jumping, my heart banging in my ears like a warning bell.

Was that my stalker? Was he coming for me here?

Moments seemed to drag as I listened for creaking footsteps, for his heavy breathing, or the sing of a knife being unsheathed.

But moments later, I heard the rattle of a drawer being opened in a distant aisle.

I sagged against the cabinets, my growing pile of files at my feet. It must have been someone closing a drawer a little too enthusiastically.

I turned back to my findings, to the three certificates I’d laid out across the top of the open drawer.

All three missing girls were adopted.

That wasn’t the only connection though.

Liath had been stalked.

I’d spoken to Sarah and Keela’s friends. Sarah and Keela had both mentioned feeling like someone was watching them before they disappeared.

My skin prickled. Something was going on. Something sinister. Something no one else saw or perhaps pretended not to see .

Could the police be covering this up? Wouldn’t they need to be involved somehow to deem all these missing girls as “runaways” and their missing persons file closed.

Or was the person who took them all just so good at covering their tracks that they’d fooled Ireland’s law enforcement.

I scanned the missing girls’ public records, searching for another connection.

There wasn’t a link between the birth places, dates, or name changes between Liath, Sarah, and Keela.

All three girls had been born in different places to different parents and names changed at different dates and ages to different surnames.

But they’d all ended up at Darkmoor college.

This couldn’t be a coincidence.

Perhaps they would all be linked to something in their adoptions.

The monotone voice of the woman upstairs echoed in my head, “Adoption records are confidential to anyone other than the adoptee.”

I had no way to access their records.

Then something struck me.

I slammed against the help desk counter at the very front of the library, dumping my pile of files beside me, now all marked with my pink Post-it notes.

“I was adopted,” I said, my breath coming out in a rush.

The thin woman in a flouncy floral blouse behind the counter looked at me over her half-moon glasses. “Congratulations?”

“No, what I mean is,” I explained as I rooted around in my purse for my wallet, “I’d like to access my own adoption records. I can do that, right?”

I pulled out my ID and slapped it on the counter.

Then I pulled out a file from my pile and opened it up to show her my name change certificate.

The woman slid both items toward her and I got a whiff of her powdery scent.

Her eyes moved back and forth between me and the picture on my ID.

I found myself grinning, my heart beating wildly in my chest.

I knew from Ebony that my surname was Carey before she had it changed to McKinsey when she took me in.

She hadn’t been able to tell me anything about my life before she adopted me.

I’d been searching the blank spaces in my memory for so long and coming up empty, I’d never thought to investigate myself .

With a sigh, the woman pushed herself back away from her desk. “Wait here.”

Her heels clicked all the way into the bowels of the restricted section of the public library.

I drummed my fingers on the counter, my mind whirring.

What might I find in my own adoption records? I’d finally learn my mother’s name. My father’s.

I’d find out where I’d lived. Where I grew up.

I’d be able to fit some pieces in about who I was, even if they were just faded ink names on a stained certificate.

God, what was taking so long?

I began to pace across the wooden floor .

Not knowing my past for so long had made me feel brittle, like there was nothing real holding the pieces of me together. I yearned to feel whole, sturdy, strong . Perhaps these answers were at last my salvation.

Without warning the flickering light above me went out. Instead of being able to see only my own reflection in the windows, I could see out into the night.

There he was.

My shadowy stalker.

A streetlight cast his hooded features into shadows, disappearing and then reappearing behind a delivery truck accelerating as the intersection light turned green.

My breath caught in my throat, fear tightening its grip around me, but he seemed unperturbed by me seeing him.

Almost like he’d expected the lights to go out. Almost like he’d planned it all himself.

I was vaguely aware as I stood paralyzed, eyes unblinking on him, that he was growing more and more powerful in my mind.

That was stupid, Ava.

He couldn’t control the lights. I was turning him into a god. And I feared him like one.

Just as quickly as the lights had gone out, the light turned back on. His image was gone and in its place was me in the reflection of the glass, white-faced and clutching my coat tight around my neck.

But he was still out there.

He was out there and I would confront him.

I strode toward the door, accelerating with purpose.

“Got them here,” the receptionist called out before I could run out .

I hesitated, my hand on the door handle, peering through the glass as if I could somehow see him. My heart pounded and I ached to race after him.

“Do you still want it?” the woman said, waggling a file folder at me.

Dammit. I should take the answers while I had them. I’d get another chance to confront my shadowy figure.

I let go of the handle, feeling slightly disappointed.

“The light went out,” I told her, as if that was some sort of explanation.

“We’re a city building,” the woman said, handing me the file and my ID over the counter. “I’m more surprised the lights are on.”

I glanced up at the flickering bulb overhead, still not sure that my shadowy figure hadn’t had a hand in the lights going out.

Stop being paranoid, Ava.

I took the files to a desk in the empty study section at the far back of the giant library.

The Dublin Public Library was a sprawling labyrinth with several wings branching off the central hall.

During the day, the grand, arched windows spilled natural light onto the uneven wooden floors, but this late at night, the library was shrouded in a solemn darkness.

Flickering lamps illuminated the aisles that weaved through the space like a maze, leading to unexpected corners, alcoves, and disappearing into shadowy recesses.

Towering shelves stretching toward the Victorian chandeliers were crammed with leather-bound books, filling the air with the scent of old parchment and ink .

This late, I was the only one left here. So, the silence was even more palpable.

On the thick wooden table, under the light of the banker’s lamp, I laid out all the files I’d managed to collect, looking for threads.

I glanced at my own closed brown file sitting on the very top, a file I hadn’t had the courage to open yet.

Maybe I was linked to the missing girls somehow?

Was it only a matter of time before I too disappeared? Before I also became a missing girl?

And if I was linked, maybe the key to unlocking their cases was right there in my own file.

It was the closest I’d come to a breakthrough.

So why, when I reached out to open the file, did my hands shake so bad I had to clutch my fingers into the folds of my skirt to stop them trembling.

Come on, Ava. Just open the file. Learn the truth.

Even if it’s a terrible truth, isn’t it better to know?

The truth could be brutal, tearing through every wall I’d built, leaving nothing but raw wounds.

Once I uncovered it, there’d be no going back.

Ignorance, in some ways, was easier—cleaner.

Staying in the dark meant I wouldn’t have to face the ugly reality. I could keep living as I had, pretending that everything was fine, untouched by the mess waiting on the other side.

But then again, what if not knowing was worse?

The doubt, the constant questions eating away at me— what if —would it ever stop?

The darkness of not knowing could be just as suffocating, trapping me in an endless loop of uncertainty .

Maybe the truth, as painful as it might be, was the only way to break free, to finally understand.

Even if it hurt.

Even if it shattered me.

But was I ready for that? Did I really want to face the truth, knowing it could rip everything apart?

Or was it safer to stay in the dark, where at least I wouldn’t have to deal with the consequences?

My phone vibrated off the edge of the desk, making me jump. When I looked up after retrieving it from the wooden floor, I saw that I was alone. How late was it?

Checking my phone sent a chill down my spine.

UNKNOWN: Didn’t I warn you to stop investigating?

My stalker knew I was digging. He knew I was close to uncovering something big.

My eyes darted from empty table to empty table, abandoned aisle after abandoned aisle, my blood turning to ice. He wasn’t in sight. But neither was another living soul to come to my aid.

Me: Leave me alone. I’ll call the police.

My phone vibrated again. I checked the message as my heart thudded in my chest.

UNKNOWN: You won’t.

Me: And why not, asshole???

I barely had time to register the shock before another text appeared on the glowing screen.

UNKNOWN: Because you know not to trust them.

A panic gripped me as it felt like the ground gave way under my feet. What my stalker was suggesting was more terrifying than being threatened by him.

Somehow the police were involved in a cover-up .

If I took this information to them, they’d make sure I was silenced.

This wasn’t a game.

UNKNOWN: Return those files. Stop digging. Or else…

A surge of anger flooded me . How dare he threaten me? How dare he refuse me my right to know my past?

I stabbed out a response and regretted it the second I sent it.

Me: You don’t scare me.

Fuck. I shouldn’t be baiting him.

I began to tremble as I looked into all the dark corners surrounding me once more. My stalker was watching me.

I could feel him.

UNKNOWN: You won’t like what I’ll do to you if I catch you.

A sweat broke out across my brow as my phone vibrated on the table again. I glanced down at the illuminated screen.

UNKNOWN: Ready or not, here I come.

Fuck. I’d done it now.

My breathing grew harsher with every second that passed without his appearance.

It was like I wanted him to come get me. It was like I secretly ached for him to punish me again.

I stood, my weight in my toes as I scanned the dark aisles, the electricity in my limbs making me unable to sit still.

I searched around for something to use as a weapon. But I was surrounded by paper, files, and books.

I heard a creak and I spun, my heart jamming into my throat. He was coming for me, hunting me, stalking me. Circling me like I was prey.

A giddy feeling bubbled up inside me and I almost giggled, but I repressed it.

God, I liked being hunted by him. It made my nipples tighten to hard peaks. It made my panties sticky, the need to press my thighs together strong.

What the fuck did that say about me?

I was too much in the open here in the study area. I had to get cover in one of the aisles.

I moved as quickly and as silently as I could, only realizing too late that I was leaving my phone behind.

Which meant that I really couldn’t call the police if I needed to.

Would you really have called them though?

It was too late to turn back now. I slipped into an aisle, peering around the corner back out into the study area. I thought the creak had come from the other side.

So he’d have to come out into the study area to get to me. He would have to come out into the open, and then I would be the one stalking him.

A deep gravelly voice came from behind me.

“Run.”