“Did you see Keme come back last night?”
“Nah, he wasn’t going to come back. He was too mad.”
“Let me guess: you don’t know what he was mad about.”
In an instant, Foster’s face was closed again, his arms tightening across his chest. He shook his head.
“All right,” I said. “If you think of anything, can you call Deputy Mai?” I looked around for something to write it down on, but there wasn’t anything—not even takeout napkins. “Will you remember that?”
“I’ll remember.”
When I stepped out of the camper, the fresh air was so sweet—full of the scent of dry autumn leaves and the water in the bay and the clean, cold chill of October—that my eyes stung. I hadn’t realized until that moment how claustrophobic the little camper had become. I moved to the end of the pad and looked back. The door was shut. The blinds were down. The aggressively taped-on sign that said COLLSON looked even sadder, somehow. AndI thought—even though I tried to convince myself that it was my imagination—that someone in that little camper was staring back at me. Watching me.
An excited shout made me whip around.
Deputy Dahlberg was standing at the edge of a line of trees behind the park’s office. She shouted, “Salk!” Then she waved her arms and did a little jump and shouted the other deputy’s name again.
I stared at her, taking in her visible excitement.
She found something, I thought.
The wind snapped a nearby Halloween banner, and I flinched.
She found something.
I should get in the car. I should call Bobby.
Instead, I hurried toward Dahlberg, cutting in a straight line across a stretch of lawn, and then, where the landscaping gave way, through knee-high grass and weeds. It wasn’t the kind of place adults would come. Kids, maybe—kids were drawn to wild places. But I didn’t think a lot of kids came to the Gull’s Nest. I wondered what was on the other side of the trees. My thoughts were like a needle skipping on an old record.
Dahlberg noticed me when I was still about thirty yards away. “What are you doing here?” she asked. And then she said, “You can’t come over here.”
Twenty yards.
“Dash, I’m serious. Turn around.”
Ten.
She started to move, putting herself in my path. She was saying something, and I recognized the tone—this wasn’t Deputy Dahlberg my friend, the one who let me in the side door at the station sometimes so I could sneak in a little present for Bobby. This was Deputy Dahlberg the deputy, and she was doing her job.
And then I saw it.
Among the trees, on a flat patch of pine duff, lay a pile of clothing. A pair of slides so worn the rubber was gone in places, exposing the fibrous backing. Well-loved (and well-worn) Rip Curl shorts with a familiar stitch along the side, repairing a tear from when a branch had snagged them. The T-shirt showed a cheery hamburger carrying a surf board, and the wordsTasty Waves. It should have been white, but instead, it was reddish brown. Rust, I thought. My brain was still skipping. Deputy Dahlberg was saying something. I was missing things, still staring at the shirt.
Not rust. Blood.
Chapter 5
The Hastings Rock sheriff’s office was located inside a concrete building with a flat roof and a bad attempt at a folksy stone veneer. Inside, it wasn’t much better—clean, yes, and well maintained, but it still felt like a public building. It had vinyl tiles and neutral paint, and the lobby was decorated with posters warning you about strangers and suspicious packages and crossing the street. What seemed to be a Muzak rendition of “Thriller” played overhead; it was probably meant to make everyone feel as calm and cozy as if they were stuffed in an elevator. From farther back came voices and then a microwave dinged. Next to me, Indira wrinkled her nose, and Fox stuck out their tongue. Millie and Louis didn’t react—they were too busy holding hands (both hands, as a matter of fact). Then I caught a whiff of something like warmed-up tuna casserole. Nobody asked me, but in my book, microwaving fish in a shared office was a bold move.
After I’d spotted the bloodstained clothes, Salk had arrived, and he’d escorted me back to the Pilot. (Which was a polite way of saying that Deputy Salkanovich, who was Hastings Rock’s former star quarterback, a total sweetheart, and who had once told me if Bobby broke my heart, he’d wrestle him—very confusing, as you might imagine—had dragged my sorry keister away from the evidence.) I hadn’t wasted any time before calling Bobby. But it didn’t matter; I was too late. Bobby told me they’d already found Keme and taken him to the station. So, I called Indira.
And now, here we were. The Last Picks.
Only, not all of us. Because Keme wasn’t here. And neither was Bobby.
Waiting looked different for each of us. Indira sat perfectly still, with a kind of preternatural calm that was actually more frightening than if she’d been screaming. Fox kept busy for a while punching holes in bottle caps and then stringing them on a shoelace, but they quickly settled into a doze. Millie cried. Like, a lot. Loudly. And Louis looked like he wanted her to let go of one of his hands so he could play on his phone.
How did I spend my time waiting? I’m so glad you asked. I did what I’m best at: I worried. I’m a great worrier. I worried about everything. I worried until my head ached, until my stomach was completely acidified, and until my neck throbbed like someone had closed a clamp around it. (If you ask me, I did a great job.)
