Chapter 14

Jess

I'm in Killer's Grove, no more than a few hundred yards from the road, when my phone pings. Service has returned, however briefly.

Shane's sent through an email with a digital copy of the crime report attached. I skimmed the original report at the station the other day but haven't had time to properly read it, so I lean against a tree, hooking my cane over one arm as I take some weight off my leg, and read it now.

Peter, Laura, Alice, and Ella Harper were on their way home from a family Christmas celebration at the house of Laura's brother, Jack O'Brien. Alice told the detective that their normal route home was blocked by a ROAD CLOSED barricade, even though no work was scheduled for that night. The family had turned around and cut through Killer's Grove. She said they'd been traveling on the road for about five minutes when there was a flash of light and the minivan skidded on the icy road. It hit something and launched into the air.

At 12:49 a.m., an off-duty paramedic on his way home from a shift spotted the minivan. It was lying on its side, pointing west on the eastbound side of the road. The off-duty paramedic found Alice a little ways up the road, in shock. He called 911, but while they waited, she told him that she'd heard a beeping in the car, like a fire alarm when its battery is dying. She thought something was wrong with the minivan and had wanted to run, but someone was with her—a young girl who told her to stay quiet.

A tingle of adrenaline hits my spine as I read, a million bees swirling under my skin. Because the girl Alice said was in the car with her was about seven or eight, blue eyes, a pink satin Hello Kitty headband perched on messy blonde braids.

I hear a twig snap behind me and whirl.

"Isla." Twin emotions of guilt and relief spiral through me.

"Hi, Mommy."

" You were with Alice Harper," I say. "Why?"

"I didn't want her to die."

"The others? They're dead?"

Isla just stares at me, her face sad. A frigid wind bites at my face. Snow falls in little flurries, faster now.

"Are the others dead?" I press.

Isla still doesn't answer.

I don't know why, exactly, I still see Isla. My shrink says as long as I know she isn't really here, it's fine to talk to her. But she's wrong. Isla is here. She's as real to me as Shane or Will or my estranged husband, Mac. I've accepted that. She's real to me , and that's what I need right now. But is she real to Alice, too?

I stare out at the snow-blanketed forest, feeling unbalanced. I take a deep breath. I need to talk to Alice Harper. I turn to leave, but Isla calls out.

"Mommy!"

The sound of my daughter's voice, barbed, jagged, drags me back to the night she died, memories making my mouth go dry and sticky. The icy river water swirling around my cheeks. My leg stuck fast in the truck's mangled window. My blood watering the mud. The crack of thunder reverberating in my bones. And then ice-cold arms dragging me to the road.

Isla was eight years old when she died. She looks exactly the same now, standing in the gauzy light of Killer's Grove, wearing her blue-and-white dress, her pink Hello Kitty headband. The gap where her two front teeth fell out is still there.

I was in the hospital for nearly a week before Mac told me she died in the accident. I blamed myself, of course. I'd had a drink before I drove. One, but that was all it took. It was almost inconsequential that I'd hit a deer. I turned to booze, blocked Mac out, drove him away.

An ache blossoms in me. A yearning. For a long time after Mac left, I would call him. Not to talk or anything, just to hear him breathing down the line. I don't do that anymore. But it doesn't mean I don't want to.

I feel that familiar fire scratching at the back of my throat, and I yearn desperately for a drink, the hot fire of just one whiskey to bury this feeling.

"One little drink." It's a trick I learned in rehab. I used to say, One little drink won't hurt. Now I say, One little drink could send me back to where I was.

I think of what my dad said. You can't move forward if you're standing still.

I do honestly believe what I told him. That I've been left here for a reason. I help them. I'm their voice when they no longer have one. There's a connection here, a reason Alice saw Isla.

I've helped them before, those left behind. Maybe I can help Alice and her family, too.

So I squeeze my one-month chip, the edges pressing into my palm, and I carry on. Everything is temporary, love and pain. Soon, like everything else, this will crest and pass, just like an ocean wave.

Something prickles the skin at the back of my neck. There's a presence in the forest. Something heavy and dark. I can feel it moving closer to me in the dim light. Ominous clouds skitter like whispers, snow falling in little flurries. My body is alight, tingles tapping up and down my spine.

A snap behind me. The rustle of bushes. A man is walking toward me, maybe fifty feet away. It's the same man I saw in the field across from the house the day we found the body. His thick, dark hair bristles in the wind. He's wearing a dark suit, a tie with smiling Santas. A string of silver tinsel is wrapped around his neck.

Pete Harper.

My head, it's like it's filling with sand, an electric feeling washing over me, as if I've stuck my finger in an electrical socket.

"Where are they, Pete?" I raise my voice over the rising wind and the swirling snow. "Did you kill them?"

Pete keeps walking through the forest, passing me. He doesn't even look at me, doesn't seem to know I'm here.

"He wants to find them." It's Isla speaking from behind me. But when I turn, she isn't there. And neither is Pete Harper.

I'm alone in Killer's Grove.

There aren't even footprints in the snow to prove they were ever here.

I should head back to the police station to help Shane prepare for the press conference. The journalists are circling like sharks. They're going to eat him alive.

Instead, I pull up the address where Alice Harper now lives with her aunt and uncle. White flakes swirl around the streetlamps, pinging against my exposed cheeks. I'm grateful I had the foresight to switch to all-season tires last weekend. The weather's getting worse.

The O'Briens live in one of the luxury houses in a new, private, gated development set on a curve of Black Lake, all shimmering glass and blocky steel fixtures with an infinity pool overlooking a private beach. I have to pass through a gate in order to even get in, but flashing my badge at a sleek Jag that's pulling out as I arrive seems to do the trick.

I park in the half-moon drive, kill the engine, and unsnap my helmet. From here, I can see inside their glass house. The kitchen is all white, sleek handle-less cupboards and designer appliances. The living room, similarly designed in white, has a minimalist feel to it. It's like a show house, something for pretty people to brag about.

The walkway up to the front porch is pocked with footprints. Somebody is home.

An oversize Christmas wreath hangs on the front door. I ring the doorbell. It flies open almost instantly, a too-thin, frazzled-looking woman wearing yoga pants and a long-sleeve workout top standing in the doorway. The Christmassy scents of spiced candles and gingerbread cookies float into the chill night air.

"Melanie O'Brien?" I hold up my badge, smiling politely.

She stares at me, her face blanching very white, her eyes blinking rapidly as her mouth hangs open.

"What are you ... why are you here?" She sounds out of breath. I wonder if she's just run down the stairs. Or if I've frightened her. People don't exactly love seeing a cop on their front doorstep.

"I'm Detective Jess Lambert. There's nothing to worry about," I assure her. "Is your niece, Alice Harper, home from school yet?"

Melanie's eyes darken. She's about to shut the door in my face, so I start talking.

"I thought I'd pop by and chat with Alice. I know we're all eager to solve her family's disappearance, and I have some questions—"

"About the body over by Killer's Grove?"

I'm not surprised it's leaked already. It's a juicy story. A missing family. A teenage girl left behind. A body found with items that disappeared when the family did.

"Yes."

"Is it them?"

"I'm afraid we have no details about identification at this time. Could I speak with—"

But I don't have a chance to finish.

Because a sudden scream rips through the air.