Summer's Edge, page 8
“You don’t trust me,” she says, looking disappointed.
“Like you trusted me when I told you I heard Emily’s voice?”
She looks torn. “I do… but I can’t believe in something I don’t see. I just can’t. And when I think about everything that’s happening right now, it doesn’t say revenge from beyond the grave. It doesn’t even say random serial killer. It says guy with a grudge. Everything is too personal. The cards ending up in my purse. The words—one of us kissed a killer, one betrayed a friend, one killed a best friend. They’re each obviously meant to refer to one of us.”
“But there are four of us, and only three cards.”
“I thought of that. But then I thought of something else. Mila wasn’t invited.”
I look at her in surprise. “Then you did send out the invites.”
“No. But when we were discussing them at dinner, Mila said we all got one. But she also said maybe they were ordered off the internet or something, remember?”
I nod. I do remember her saying that.
“Mine was written out by hand,” Kennedy emphasizes. “So was yours. She didn’t realize her mistake until she saw your invitation.”
“Shit.” It was such a small moment, it flew right by me. But Kennedy’s right. Mila’s suggestion wouldn’t have made sense if she’d actually gotten an invitation.
“So Mila isn’t one of the three. And she’s not the one behind all of this. She’s the wild card—the one who wasn’t supposed to be here. That narrows down the three to you, me, and Chase. Traitor, kisser, killer. Of the group, I’ve only kissed you, and Chase has only kissed Mila, and we know Mila isn’t guilty. At least, it’s pretty unlikely since she isn’t connected to this whole clusterfuck. You, on the other hand, have kissed both me and Ryan.”
“You’re actually enjoying this, aren’t you?”
“No!” Kennedy blushes. “If they’re going to make us play games, at least let us choose the game, though. No one in this house is going to beat me in a logic puzzle. So look at the facts. None of the three of us has kissed Chase.”
“You’re going to argue that he’s not the killer based on a logic puzzle?”
“I’m going to argue that none of us killed Emily, but you’re not going to listen to that.”
“Fine.” I’m quiet for a moment. “Well, by that logic, Chase is the traitor and one of us is the killer.”
She slow-claps. “That’s what Ryan wants us to believe.”
I shoot her a look.
Kennedy sighs. “What someone wants us to believe.”
“Okay. Chase is the traitor. One step closer to the truth, I guess. The question is, what did he do?”
She pauses. “You don’t know?”
I shake my head. “Should I?”
“Emily and Chase hooked up.” Kennedy makes a lock-and-key symbol over her lips. “After he and Mila started dating.”
I stare at her, stunned. “So which friend did he betray? Emily or Mila?”
She looks thoughtful. “That’s a good question.”
“Especially when one of them is dead and the other turned up uninvited to the weekend from hell.” I pause. “If not both of them.” I eye the front door nervously. The mist is settling in more thickly, and I’m cold. “Chase and Mila have been gone a while. Do you think they’re okay?”
Kennedy pushes the door open cautiously. “Of course.” But she sounds uncertain. I haven’t heard a single sound from within the house while we’ve been outside talking. It’s unnerving.
“So what if Emily did return? Do you think she could possibly be the one behind all this?”
She glances back over her shoulder at me. “That assumes ghosts exist.”
“For once, can you just consider it?” I try not to think of the cellar. The door opening and slamming, the feeling of being trapped. That something was closing the door on me.
Kennedy steps inside the house and looks around slowly. “Okay. But even assuming ghosts exist, Emily hasn’t risen from the grave to avenge her own death. Flaw number one—and I will die on this hill—her death was an accident.”
“Okay, now I’ll assume you’re right. What if she thinks we did? Can’t a ghost be wrong? Why would crossing over make a person omniscient?”
She considers. “If it were me you all left behind that night, I’d need more to go on than the fact that you were all there. That’s just not enough to motivate me to concoct a psychological torture scheme against my own best friends. We were there to We killed her is a huge leap.”
“But you’d believe Ryan would do this.”
“Because he has a motive. He’s always wanted to get between us.”
“It would be seriously messed up to try to convince someone their girlfriend was a murderer just to win them back.”
“Ex-girlfriend,” Kennedy corrects. I think I hear sadness in her voice. But it might be wishful thinking. Our eyes connect for a moment, and it almost all comes rushing out. Even tonight, even in this house, there are a million things I need to say to her that have been kept beneath the surface for far too long.
She reaches for my shaking hand. “I wish we could go back in time.” She looks into my eyes, and my heart rips down the middle. Two asymmetrical pieces, the larger one for her. It’s automatic. We never had one of those fancy friendship necklaces with the charms. It’s impossible to make three equal and identical pieces of a heart that fit together. And it wouldn’t have been right to exclude Emily. She was the third. She mattered just as much. And it was everything in threes or nothing. When Kennedy and I were dating, for real this time, after the heirloom incident had been buried under six months of silence, I made her a secret heart. I spun it of yarn unwound from my favorite sweater, cotton candy from the carnival where she won me a purple elephant, starlight I scooped into a jar the night of our first kiss, and my own silver blood. I gave it to her on a scrap of paper and she swallowed it, and we shared that secret. Not that she and I were dating. Everyone knew that. But that I loved her. Love changes things. It redraws the map.
Kennedy never said it back. Now we stare into each other’s eyes, and I will her to tell me. Say it, Kennedy. But instead, she glances up the stairs. “Chase?”
“Mila?” he calls back in a muffled voice.
“It’s just us,” I say, a bad feeling settling over me. He should have found her by now.
Kennedy looks at me, worried. “We’ll finish this conversation later. I promise.” I nod and she heads upstairs.
I glance out the front window at the cars, feeling strange, like I’m being watched.
My eyes travel around the living room. The single candle on the table is burned almost halfway down, and wax is pooling on the antique wood. Kennedy and her mother are going to have twin heart attacks. I retrieve a wet paper towel from the kitchen and try to wipe up the melted wax, but only succeed in burning my fingertips and somehow melding the towel into the wax. Shit. I flatten it against the table and pick up a candlestick.
And then, something catches my eye that makes my breath hitch in my throat. A third tarot card placed face-out on the bookshelf next to one of the candles. It’s a dark-haired young man in a clearing, shadowed by a circle of foreboding pines, his hands folded around something that emits a bright, eerie glow. He has Chase’s broad shoulders and amber eyes, and below is written King of Wands: keeper of secrets and lies. I know with one glance what it’s supposed to be. Chase in the cell spot. I lunge for it and stuff it into my pocket, my hands shaking, as I hear Chase’s and Kennedy’s footsteps hurrying down the stairs. I could swear the card wasn’t there moments ago, before we went outside. I wasn’t looking for it, so I can’t be sure. But that sinking feeling is back, the sensation that I’m falling through the floor, through wood and dirt, through solid ground, into a dangerous nowhere, an infinite lucid in-between, and it’s more sinister than sleep because I am not alone. I turn to the others and try to make my voice work, to warn them, to let them know that something is stalking us, pushing us into the darkness, something enormous and heartless and real.
Kennedy tosses me a sweatshirt and pair of warm flannel pajama bottoms, and I take them gratefully. I’ve been shivering in Chase’s dress-sized T-shirt half the night. “Suit up,” she says, unsmiling.
“What’s wrong?” I look back and forth between them as I change.
“Her things are missing,” Chase says grimly. “Mila’s gone.”
“No one was supposed to leave,” Kennedy says, pacing back and forth, biting her nails. “This is not good.”
Chase shoots her a suspicious look. “What do you mean, ‘supposed to’?”
“I mean, splitting up is the worst possible thing we could do right now!” she shouts back, then composes herself. “No. Fighting is the worst thing. We need to stay calm. Stick together.”
“No,” I say suddenly. “We’ll never get anything accomplished unless we split up. We have to find Mila.”
Chase looks at me with relief. “Thank you.”
Kennedy turns to me desperately. “Chelsea, don’t.”
But I do. It’s time to trust me for once. To trust my plan. Because I think I know exactly where Mila went and why. “Kennedy, you stay here. In case she comes back.”
She stares at me for a moment and then slowly nods. “Fine. I should be the one to stay here.”
“Chase.” I turn to him. “You and I are going to the cell spot.”
Mila may not know what the cards are, but she’s smart enough to know that they mean something. She saw the Kennedy card, and the Mila card was within eyeshot as she ran out to the driveway. But the Chase card—that was the one that would have scared her into trying to leave without him. The keeper of secrets and lies.
Chase opens the door and steps out into the growing fog, but Kennedy grabs my arm before I can follow.
“Please be careful,” she whispers into my ear.
But it isn’t the world outside that really scares me. It’s what I’m walking away from.
22
Here are my rules:
1. You may run.
2. You may hide.
3. You may apologize.
Oh, who are we kidding? None of you think you’ve done anything wrong.
4. You may attempt to escape.
5. But you will not.
23
It’s like moving underwater. The gravel crunches like tiny shards of glass under my feet, but the air is thick, dense, a steamy fog coating the earth. We weave our way down the driveway, between the cars slick with condensation, feeling our way until we reach the end, where the gravel gives way to smooth pavement. Our cars are lined up neatly like they should be—all except for Ryan’s. I shouldn’t have questioned Kennedy. If she said he left, he either left or wanted her to think he did. But if he did fake a goodbye and stick around without telling even me, he had to have a very good reason. And I intend to find out why.
By now the fog has become so thick it’s hard to breathe, and it’s growing heavier by the minute. We need to cross the street before beginning the hike up the steep path through the trees to the cell spot. It’s a pretty rocky climb at times, and it can be tricky in slick conditions. It will be incredibly dangerous in the fog. The air hangs heavily on my skin, and the sensation that something large and dark and shapeless is going to emerge out of the fog and pounce on me is so palpable, every muscle in my body is tensed.
Chase and I link arms at the edge of the street. “Ready?” He peers out into the darkness.
“As ever.” We walk slowly and carefully, and I try not to let every horror movie I’ve ever seen play out in my mind. Only the expendables leave the cabin in the woods. The ones who didn’t bother to read the script. “It’s a good thing we never hooked up.”
He laughs uncomfortably. “You’re doing it again. Thought hopping. Help me out.”
“Because like, in a horror movie, we’d be so dead right now.”
He lets out a burst of laughter. “Touché. Thank god for the chastity of our friendship.”
“Or lack of active serial killers in the area,” I can’t help adding.
He winces as we reach the start of the trail and step into the darkness of the forest. “Did you have to add that?”
“I was thinking it.” I don’t like this fog. It reminds me of water, the feeling of big things with sharp jaws circling unseen. “Kennedy said she doesn’t think that’s it, though. I mean, she doesn’t think a random person hurt Emily or wants to mess with us.”
Chase climbs silently for a bit. “That makes sense.”
“I think so too. Why would a random person single us out? Wait so long in between attacks? It doesn’t feel right. Whatever is happening right now is personal. Someone knows how to turn us against each other.” We reach a steep rocky portion, and Chase nods for me to go first.
“I’ll spot you.”
I look around nervously for a foothold, beginning to second-guess my plan. I think Mila did head for the cell spot, and there’s a chance Ryan is out here too. But both of them are seasoned athletes, and I’m not. I boost myself up and begin to climb. I don’t talk, focusing on reaching the next flat spot in the trail. The surface is slick and muddy, and the fog is so thick at this level, I can’t see above and I can’t see below. But my hands eventually reach dirt, and I pull myself up and collapse onto the ground, my chest heaving in relief.
Chase easily joins me and stands and stretches, gazing up at the moon. The fog is thinner at this height. I wonder if we’ve clawed our way above the clouds. “Happy anniversary,” he says suddenly, with a dark laugh.
I pull myself to my feet slowly. “That’s not funny.”
“It had to have been around now, right? Give or take an hour?” He raises an invisible glass. “To the moment all of our lives were spectacularly destroyed.”
“How can you say that? Emily died. We’re still here.” My voice is swallowed up by the fog. It feels like cotton in my ears, dulling even Chase’s voice to a soft, muted sound.
He speaks in cloudy wisps. “Yeah. We are. But we’re not okay. You spent the year in a hospital, Chelsea. A year. That’s extreme. Kennedy obviously went through some kind of psychological trauma, and Mila took more than her fair share of the blame. We need to find a way to make things right and move on with our lives. That’s why I came back.” He shrugs helplessly. “I don’t think any of us can do another lap of last year. We all suffered.”
“Not all of us suffered in Rome.” I can’t help it slipping out.
“Fair enough.” His classic smile reappears, but something is a little off. It’s creepy.
“They run out of pizza or something?” I try to resent him, but it’s useless. Chase is the kind of guy who can spend a gap year in Europe, floating in a haze of hookah bars, sipping craft beers, and living on a steady diet of gourmet cheese and freshly baked bread, and the worst you can do is wish you were there with him. Even when he acts like it’s some kind of chore.
He tightens his jaw and slows as his eyes search through the thin velvet mist. “I wouldn’t know. I didn’t leave my room.” I try to imagine being whisked to a villa overlooking sparkling fountains and cobblestone streets. Designer shops and unbelievable food and buildings built on the ashes of a city that burned to dust.
After a brief moment of silence he darts a look at me. “My father would never risk a scandal, so there was no question of me sticking around. But every time I closed my eyes, I was back here in the burning house surrounded by everyone I let down.”
“You never let me down,” I say.
“Of course I did, Chelsea.” Chase looks at me with an expression that makes my stomach feel tight. His confident aura rarely wavers, but tonight it’s been flickering like a candle. “None of this would be happening if I’d been a little faster. Or smarter. I’m supposed to be so fucking smart. And I couldn’t figure out how to save a friend. And now I find out Ryan went back for Mila? The only time it mattered one bit, my brain decided to sit it out.” He pauses. “I failed. I deserve every last bit of the blame.” He stumbles and almost pulls me over with him, but we both right ourselves and keep going. The night is cloaked in silence, stillness. I wish we could just turn around. As much as I dread the house and whatever is within, I dread that something following me into the darkness even more. A house has walls and doors and locks. Out here we are helpless. I see nothing, hear nothing, but Chase, but I feel that it sees me.
It might not be Emily that’s been speaking to me all this time. Because it doesn’t feel like Emily now. It feels monstrous, as big as the lake and as silent as the fog, as angry as the fire and as corporeal as the house. It feels everywhere, inescapable, and suddenly I want to go back to the hospital, to the place I hated, because everything was so certain there. Half hours of certainty, menus of reliability, pills of predictability. I want the last thing I remember that was predictable and sure. It wasn’t good there. I was so glad to leave. But it didn’t ruin my life.
“Stop.” I look around uneasily. “I have no idea where we are.”
“The path only goes one place,” he says, his confidence returning a little.
“But the path branches.” I falter. A lookout here, a picnic spot there. Dozens of adventures that we wore into the dirt one summer at a time.
“Trust me,” he says, starting forward again. But even the words make me uneasy.
“Maybe you should trust yourself. About that night, I mean,” I say as casually as I can. “You tried to stop the fire. What else could you do?”
He glances at me briefly. “I wasn’t entirely fair to Emily, was I?” His voice is hollow, his expression flat.
“By choosing Mila over her? That didn’t kill her.”
“I certainly hope not.”
“You did sleep with her, though?” I ask abruptly.
“We were all so close,” he says in a quiet, very un-Chase-like voice. “Don’t you think it started to get weird?”
“How?”
“You and Kennedy. Ryan on the periphery. Emily. Me. For years we were all like family and then suddenly—” He snaps his fingers. “Boom goes the dynamite.” He pauses. “I loved Emily like a sister. Sometimes you confuse different types of love.”
