by B. T. Alive
Anyway, whatever alternate dimension I got trapped in, Tina brought me back. Her light knock broke my reverie.
“Hey,” she said gently, coming in without asking. Behind her, the hallway sconces seemed to fill the passage with the light of another world. She closed the door, sealing herself in the semi-darkness, and then she hesitated, blinking.
“It’s cold in here,” she said at last.
“Is it?” I said.
She crossed around my bed and slid the window closed. “Cover your eyes,” she said, and the Tiffany lamp beside my bed exploded with color and light.
I groaned, flailing an arm over my face.
“It’s impossible, you know,” I said. “I checked out his alibi with Grandma before I crashed. Kelvin couldn’t have done it either.”
“It was just a theory,” Tina said. My arm was blocking my face, but I could hear and glimpse her moving back around the bed. There was a muted meow, and then the warm, soft body of Mr. Charm was purring against my side.
I sighed and lowered my arm, stroking his soft fur. “You are a wonderful human being,” I told Tina. “But this isn’t any attack here. This one’s all me.”
“It’s okay to get discouraged.” Tina sat on the edge of the bed, and though her mouth was solemn, her eyes twinkled. “Technically, we’ve only been at this for less than a day.”
“It feels like we’ve been ‘at this’ for months,” I said. “And all we ever do is screw it up.”
“Cade texted,” she said quietly.
“Great,” I said. “Why didn’t my stupid touch knock out his memory?”
Tina shrugged. “He’s a Tuner. He probably picked up extra memories.”
“Please don’t explain that. I don’t want to know,” I said. “At least Kelvin didn’t remember when he woke up.”
“That was nice of you,” Tina said. “To make sure he was okay.”
“Come on, Tina, really?” I snapped. “Don’t you think that’s reaching? Am I failing at everything so spectacularly that when you have to say Something Nice About Summer, you have to resort to—”
“No,” she said. “You also made sure Keegan had enough water. Even though he says you hate him.”
“Oh, I do,” I said. I laughed, but then it soured into a shaky pre-cry. “Tina, I blew it,” I said. “It’s done. He saw. We broke up.”
“Maybe,” she said. “He’s not mad.”
“Of course he’s not! Because I don’t deserve him! I wouldn’t deserve a Ten-Percent Cade!”
“I don’t really follow the math on that,” Tina said, “but no one deserves anyone.”
“Then fine. I must not really care about him,” I said. “It’s over.”
“It’s not over unless you choose that,” Tina said. “You guys can talk.”
“Apparently not!”
“So write him a letter,” she said.
I snorted.
“So what’s your plan? Wallowing?” she said. “There’s always something you can do.”
“Besides making him shift without even touching him?” I said. “I kissed some random dude!”
“Sure, that part was stupid.” Tina shrugged. “Look at all the stupid stuff I’ve done from how I felt in the moment. Exhibit A: High School Engagement. Exhibit B… hmm, where to start…”
“That’s fine for you,” I snapped.
Tina flinched. Her eyebrows hunched together, and she studied me with surprise and pain.
“I just mean, you’re an empath,” I said. I sat up, trying to persuade her, but the movement made my head ache and we both winced. “See?” I said. “You’re uniquely vulnerable.”
“That’s not what you meant,” she said quietly. Her voice held no accusation, only compassion… and that really stung. “You really do walk around thinking you’re better.”
“I think I’m worse,” I said.
“Same difference,” she said.
“What? No!” I said. “It’s the opposite!”
She shook her head. “In the end, we’re either all equal or else you think you’re better than a lot of people. I mean, of course, people have different talents and skills, and they make different choices and mistakes. But still, at the core, you’re either living in a world where you’re on this vast vertical ladder, always trying to claw your way a little higher over the body of the next person in your way, always terrified that the people at your feet are going to drag you down… or else you’re at a vast horizontal banquet, genuinely equal with whoever you meet.”
“I said I’m worse,” I snapped.
“Than who? Why?” she said. “Even if you were the ‘worst’ in the world, you’d still be the best at being the worst.”
“I didn’t say I was the worst in the world,” I said.
“So there you go. You must be ‘better’ than millions—”
“I’m not a murderer!”
“Even murder is a choice,” she said. “Not an identity. I’m not saying it’s not horrific, only that they’re still human. Sometimes they even find their way back.”
“What are you trying to say?” I said. “We’ve got to catch this killer so we can take her out for coffee and talk about her feelings?”
“I won’t have to ask,” Tina said mildly. “Look, if you need to feel superior to murderers as people, as fundamental human beings, even though you were both once loving little babies, and you could both make new choices tomorrow, you could save the world or kill it… I get it, it feels like at least we’re somehow better than a freaky crazy murderer. But then where does it end? When does equality start?”
“Murder seems like a pretty low bar,” I said.
“It does,” she said. “But I don’t walk around feeling like everyone else is in this nonstop festival of equality and community feeling. It feels like every tiny thing can be a torture device… every innocent conversation can be this festering secret drama where people feel better or worse, higher or lower… safe or under threat.”
“Is that what you’re getting at?” I said. “I can’t help zapping people because I always think I’m better? And I’m afraid they’ll drag me down?”
Tina slid off her shoes and pulled her feet up onto the bed. She tucked her knees under her chin, and looked out the window, at my view down onto Main Street.
“There was this psychologist guy, I think his name was… Adler?” she said. “He had this image of humanity that I really love. He said we were all like water lilies… this vast plain of water lilies blooming on the plane of the water. Side by side.”
She looked peaceful, and happy, and pretty… but somehow it all made me sick. Maybe Tina could really feel like that, but the whole idea filled me with disgust. There were a lot of messed-up people in the world; what was I supposed to do, walk around with a benevolent grin like the Dalai Lama, letting down my guard so I could get punched in the teeth? Even Tina was setting my teeth on edge; she was trying to help, but I couldn’t help it if, just now, she filled me with aversion.
A spasm of disgust tightened Tina’s face. Still looking out the window, she spoke low.
“That’s intense,” she said. “Are you going to break up with me too?”
“I didn’t say anything!” I said. “How come you can go rogue for days on end, but I can’t even have an hour of space?”
“Maybe I messed up,” she said.
“No, maybe ‘connection’ is a crock,” I said. “You can talk all you want about love, but in the end, we might just all be a bunch of fleshbots trying to feel more good and less terrible, and the least we can do is be freaking honest.”
And I stormed out, heading for the outside cold, alone.
Chapter 32
I told myself I was being kind to Tina (if kindness existed). She didn’t need me dragging her down; everything I touched lately was turning into failure. Sometimes even if I didn’t actually touch it.
If I could just get a break on this murder case, at least I’d have something. Something to help me feel a little less t
errible.
Even though Dante had only been really, truly dead for less than a day, it honestly did feel like I’d been mulling over these same suspects for weeks. The whole thing was a dreary, chilling, smothering miasma, and I longed to escape… and when I walked out into the gray, wet, lowering awfulness, the weather felt pretty much the same way. I seemed to be sliding sideways into another bleak eternity. We’d never find this killer, this storm would never come, and I’d never again laugh in the sun.
Or maybe I was just getting a cold.
I decided to walk over to Haven Island and have another go at the crime scene. Several hours had passed since the sheriff had rebuffed us this morning; maybe all the law enforcement had left, and I could get a closer look that would inspire some breakthrough. Who knows? I might spot some detail they’d missed.
The plan was simple, but it put a slight spring in my step. Doing something felt good. A lot better than moping.
But it totally fizzled. I didn’t even get halfway across the concrete bridge to Haven Island before I could see multiple figures clustered around the grape mound in the fog. Even worse: as I crossed onto the island, that same dour medical examiner lady had spotted me, and she stood with arms akimbo, facing me down the slope, her distant face unreadable and silent.
I gave her a cheeky wave, and then I turned and sauntered along the island bank. No need to mind me, law enforcement lady. Just another local here, out for a stroll, taking in the lovely views of the pea soup fog and the thrashing river, black and sullen and choking up tree limbs ripped by the wind.
I looked up along the concrete bridge toward the north side of Wonder Springs. The fog hid almost the entire town slope, and I imagined the dump truck rattling off in the darkness, the killer making their escape in the night.
But then I remembered what Elaine had pointed out. Wouldn’t someone have heard all that ruckus? We didn’t get that many trucks in Wonder Springs. Not after dark.
I frowned. Of course, maybe somebody had. I could go around knocking on doors, but one, that would take forever, honestly, and two, what would I hope to find? It wouldn’t be much help to confirm that, yes, the truck had torn through town and vanished down the highway. The only break would be if somehow the truck hadn’t left town; if I could retrace its path to some hidden garage. That would be a massive find; who knew what clue the killer might have accidentally left behind?
Even as I thought all this, I realized I was eyeing the grass along the bank.
It was a mess, shortish but still long enough to be autumn shaggy; the season’s last pass of a riding mower must have been weeks ago. To my untrained eye, it looked like any other patch of wild grass… except for one crushed bit about the width of a truck tire.
My pulse picked up. I knew absolutely nothing about tracking, but that looked like a truck track. And it looked fresh.
You’re delusional, I thought. Where would you hide a truck on this island? Why not drive the heck out of town?
But I started to walk along the bank. Scrutinizing everything I passed.
If Tina had been there, she could have found a blazing clear path in two seconds, and probably caught a unicorn while she was at it. But I blundered around, constantly unsure whether the truck might have veered away from the bank and up the slope between the trees into the forest. Even after days of intermittent rain, the soil was hard under my shoes, almost bedrock, which seemed to mess with whatever track the truck would have left. Plus, there were fresh fallen leaves everywhere, with more fluttering down in the biting wind.
Okay, I was pretty terrible at this.
Also freezing, since I’d drama queened out here without deigning to grab a decent jacket. Not smart. I was just deciding to come back and do this another time, like never, when I spotted something.
It was a wide stretch between the trees, just the right width and slope for a truck. It wound up the slope about thirty or forty feet, and around a hilly bend, and right near that bend was a rut that looked fresh.
I hustled up the path, my shoes troughing through the wet leaves, and when I rounded the bend, I yipped with delight.
A tunnel opened into the side of the hill. A cave.
Even to my untrained eye, the opening looked fresh and recently dug.
Tina had showed me other cave openings where they looked like small sinkholes in the side of the slope, but if you dug them open, you might discover a wide old mineshaft behind a pile of dirt. This opening looked like it might have been fairly large to begin with, but there were still fresh cuts in the dirt from a shovel. Or backhoe. Hadn’t Frannie said that the barn here had a backhoe? But why would the thief… no, killer… have gone to such trouble to prep a hiding place in a cave?
Then my mind flashed back a few months, to the last time I’d descended into the old mining tunnels beneath Wonder Springs. Not a great memory; I’d almost gotten killed.
Those had been on the main island, beneath Cade’s orchard. But now I wondered… did all these tunnels connect? Could the killer have used this tunnel to escape?
I had to at least peek.
Before I could change my mind, I ran up to the entrance and slipped into its dark maw.
It occurred to me that if I ever did resolve whatever insidious personal issues prevented me from seeing all humanity as my water lily brothers and sisters and joining hands to sing Kumbaya together, zap-free, then I might be able to start carrying a flashlight. I was going into a cave. A flashlight would have been good.
But for once, it was easy. Only a few feet past the reaching gray light, barely hidden in shadow, the thing was parked in plain sight. A massive dump truck. Not the huge kind you see on the highway, but farm-size, like Frannie had said, like a really big pickup with a back that could lift and empty.
It was just sitting there. The murder weapon. And I’d found it.
With a surge of elation, I pumped my fists and whooped.
The cry echoed down the tunnel, and I instantly freaked. What if the killer was hiding right there?
I crouched behind the truck, panting and listening for footsteps. But as my heart rate slowed, I realized there was no way the killer had stuck around here. This would be pretty much the worst possible hiding place ever. From what Frannie had said, the killer must have seen her and known there’d be cops coming pronto. If it were me, I’d have ditched the truck here and taken off through the tunnels, hopefully already knowing a route that would take me out to safety in the forest on the main island.
So I cautiously got up, and I worked my way around to the truck cab. I still felt on edge, like I was raiding someone’s garage. It was too strange to have this huge truck parked here and not feel like it was under surveillance.
I peered ahead, hoping my eyes would adjust to the darkness, but the tunnel rapidly shadowed to black.
Something moved.
I freaked, flattening myself against the cab. I was breathing hard all over again… and then I heard the sound a second time, and I realized it was just some mouse or something. Stupid.
And then I missed Tina, with a pang so sudden that I teared up. If Tina were here, we’d both be excited together, instead of me flipping out at commando mice. We’d be happy.
Plus, Tina would have a phone light.
But it was just me. Sure, I’d found this huge truck, but what good was it? I could tell the sheriff, and he could look for prints, I guess, but we were clearly dealing with a person who relished planning ahead. Still, maybe the sheriff could work some kind of forensics magic… that was about all I knew about forensics, the actual word, forensics. But on TV, it was freaking amazing.
With a sigh, I pressed my face against the glass of the driver side window. Not that I expected to see anything in the near pitch-dark, but a tiny bit of light might be reflecting in from the mirrors…
I gasped, in both joy and queasy disbelief.
On the driver’s seat, a lone earring glinted in the dark.
A brilliant gold teardrop, with a red stone carved a
s a heart.
Chapter 33
I found Tina working in the dining room at the Inn, smiling behind the greeter stand with eyes that were sad. As I rushed up, she tensed.
“You were right, I’m a jerk, sorry,” I panted. I had run all the way back.
Tina brightened and relaxed. “That wasn’t what I was trying to—”
“I found the dump truck,” I panted. “And this.”
I held up the earring, gleaming in my palm.
Tina’s eyes widened. “Do you recognize it?” she said. “I feel like I’ve seen it—”
“Adora,” I said. “Where is she?”
Now Tina’s eyes were nearly bulging. “Adora?” she said. “But… I know how she feels…”
“Where is she?” I said.
“Right there.” Tina nodded over my shoulder.
At a distant table, in a far corner of the dining room with its own deep-silled window with a wide view of the valley and sky, sat Adora. She was staring out at the view, her hands cupped around a steaming mug, bathed in a gray, pensive light that seemed to fuse her sad stillness with the infinite gray-white sky behind the glass. She could have been a painting.
“She’s still there?” I said. “She said she was coming down here ages ago. When I saw Kelvin.”
Tina shrugged. “She’d already eaten when I got here. Just sitting there thinking.”
“She’s got plenty to think about,” I said. “Come on.”
“Now?” Tina said. But I was already striding away.
When Adora looked up to see us, her nose gave a tiny little crinkle of contempt. “I don’t need anything just now, thank you,” she said. “Oh. Perhaps another coffee.”
“No problem,” Tina said.
“Tina,” I snapped.
“Sorry!” she whispered. “Got to get out of Waitress Mode.”
“Is there a problem?” Adora said.