“Where’s your room?” he asked, and I nodded toward the closed door. I was surprised that the police hadn’t searched it. That couldn’t be far off, I thought as Sky led me along.
“She’s done this before, Mr. Miller,” I heard Langdon say gently to Frank.
“Not like this,” Frank answered. He shook his head vigorously, as if he was trying to shake something off. “This is different.”
Lynne was crying now, really sobbing, and the sound made me uncomfortable in the extreme. As Sky closed the door behind me, I lay down on my bed. I could hear the noise outside my window, the voices outside my door. I wished everyone would just go away.
“Is there anything I need to know?” he asked. He sat at my desk and took a pair of glasses from his pocket. “Of course, I’m not a criminal attorney. If it comes to that, I know someone.”
I liked his casual, practical nature, as if nothing would surprise him and as if there were a contingency plan for any outcome of this situation.
“No,” I said. “There’s nothing you need to know.”
He looked at me through his round, gold-framed spectacles. “There is the matter of some missing time. Two hours, right?”
“I was in the woods,” I said. “I go there a lot, to be alone.”
“Were you alone?”
“I need to sleep,” I said. “I’ve never been so tired.”
He regarded me a while longer, then stood with effort, picked up his briefcase.
“Get some rest,” he said. “But be prepared to talk in the morning.”
I pulled up the covers and curled myself up. I wondered where my aunt would sleep, how long Langdon would stay, what tomorrow would hold. I thought about Luke and the raging tantrum I’d left him in, his next clue. But most of all I thought about Beck, kept hearing over and over the last words she said to me: Why are you doing this to me?
It was about 2 A.M. when my phone woke me. I dug it out of my bag and answered it without looking at the caller ID.
“Beck,” I said. I was still half asleep, dreaming about her.
“No,” he said. His voice was mocking. “Still can’t find your friend?”
“Luke,” I said. What a little asshole. “Do you know what time it is?”
“What kind of a question is that?” he asked. “Of course I do.”
“What do you want?” I asked. I fell back against my pillow. Sleep had abandoned me completely; I was wide-awake now.
“Are you alone?”
“What do you want?” I asked again.
“I wondered how you were doing with our game.”
I got out of bed and walked to the window. The crowds outside had dissipated, and the room beyond my door was quiet. I heard the distant drumbeat of panic that I’d heard when I first discovered the next clue. I had so much else to worry about that it had quieted for a time. But now the rhythm was picking up again, a steady jungle beat.
“Do you know where the next clue is?” he asked. His voice sounded deeper, older than I knew it to be. Perhaps because he was talking softly. I thought about hanging up and calling his mother. But I stayed on the line. The truth was, I liked talking to him. At least he was interesting, something else to focus on besides my own misery.
“Maybe,” I said.
These clues, all to do with the tragic secrets and lies of tortured souls… well, let’s just say they spoke to something deep inside me. What did this boy know about me? And how? And why was he teasing me with it?
“If you know where it is, I suggest you go find the next clue,” he said. “There isn’t much time.” He sounded like a comic-book villain, which I guess was his only frame of reference.
“Tomorrow,” I said.
“How can you be so cold?”
It was a whisper, but he might as well have screamed it. Those words, Beck’s words, shot through me. I thought of the dirt on his bike tires, the form slipping into the shadows. He was there that night. He saw.
When he started laughing, I hung up. When he called back, I turned off my phone.
I got dressed swiftly and walked into the living area. What did he mean, time was running out? What had he seen that night? Who had he told? Did he know where Beck was?
I thought I was alone in the suite, then I saw my aunt’s suitcase and discovered her sleeping in Ainsley’s bed. I wanted to wake her, thank her for coming, and then ask her politely to go back to Florida. Things were about to get ugly, and she’d been through enough.
But I knew that it wouldn’t fly, and if I woke her up, she’d try to pull me into conversation. I just couldn’t talk anymore. The worst part about my aunt is that she knows me. That’s the problem with family. You can put on a mask and a costume for the rest of the world, but you can’t hide from the people who changed your diapers.
I pulled on my coat and slipped from the room, moved down the dim hallway, and took the fire stairs down to the laundry level in the basement. It was empty, but well lit. I followed the gray hallway, the scent of fabric softener heavy in the air, and wound up at the back door that let out near the bike racks.
As I rode through the night, my legs pumping, my heart racing with exertion, I thought about what Rachel had told me. Luke manipulated the other students in his class, teased certain behaviors out of them. Because he can, she said. Because he’s bored and needs constant stimulation. He’d hooked me. When I pulled on the line, he reeled me in. We pick our own predators.
It wasn’t long before I saw headlights come up behind me. I pulled over into the shoulder and turned, expecting to see Detective Ferrigno or a squad car. How was I going to explain this? Instead, it was Langdon’s Volkswagen. He pulled up ahead of me and climbed out of the car.
“What in the world are you doing now?” he asked. His voice bounced off the street, echoing strangely. His palms were open as he approached me. “Have you completely lost your shit? I mean, are you not in enough trouble?”
“Are you following me?”
“I was sleeping in my car outside your dorm,” he said. He looked embarrassed suddenly, ran a hand through his mass of hair, gazed down at the road between us. “I was worried about you. I had a feeling you were going to do something crazy.”
“I figured out the next clue,” I said. It sounded lame, even to me.
He closed his eyes and shook his head. “Are we talking about that stupid scavenger hunt? We’re not. Are we?”
I dropped the bike and walked over to him, handed him the second poem. If he remembered that I’d lied to him about finding it, he didn’t bring it up. He stood squinting at it.
“I can’t read this,” he said finally, handing it back. “Not in this light.”
I read it to him, and when I was done he was watching me with an expression that I couldn’t decipher.
“This is really getting fucking creepy,” he said. “Get in the car.”
I went to the car, and he retrieved my bike, hefting it into the trunk. I thought he was going to take me home. But instead, he kept driving ahead, heading toward The Hollows Wood.
20
Dear Diary,
It has been a while since I last visited with you. And a lot has happened since then. I think it’s funny how life is like that, forever dashing your expectations. You just start to accept the conditions of your world when everything around you changes again.
I am in love. There, I said it. It’s true, and it’s a magical feeling. I had forgotten what a head trip is a good love affair. And after years of just one shitty thing following the next, it feels like heaven. I go to sleep thinking about him. I wake up thinking about him. I am a teenager, giddy and nervous, waiting for the phone to ring. And it’s delicious.