by Lisa Jackson
“Oh, dear! No . . . he can’t find out.” Panic made her voice tremor. “I-I’ve prayed and prayed about it, done penance. It’s . . . It’s behind me,” she said in a whisper.
“The camper might not think so. Might not have gotten the word from God.”
“Reva! You’re . . . You’re abhorrent!”
“Am I?” Reva said behind a smile, and she could tell by Sosi’s little gasp that she got the message.
“We were just kids. Experimenting.”
“While two girls went missing.”
“I had nothing to do with that.”
“I just think it would behoove you to come. We need to be focused and clear and solid. Then we can put any indiscretions behind us.” When Sosi didn’t immediately respond, Reva pushed a bit. “I thought Jo-Beth explained everything to you. How important it is if you want to keep your secrets and—”
“I know! She did. But I’ve made my amends through God and—”
“For the love of—! Look, we’re not talking about God right now, okay? We’re talking about the cops. And I don’t think they’ll give a rat’s ass what your ‘penance’ or ‘amends’ or prayers have to do with anything. It’s about missing people and the fact that you, Sosi, were there, doing some things we aren’t exactly proud of. You and everyone else.”
There was silence on the other end and Reva took the opportunity to shake out a cigarette, turn on the ignition, then crack the window before lighting up. As she drew the smoke into her lungs, she watched a minivan pull up to the drive-up and while kids yelled from the back seats, the thirtyish woman placed her order. The nicotine started to take immediate effect and Reva felt instantly calmer, didn’t focus on the kids too much, especially the one in the baby seat, turned backward. She slid her eyes toward the building, noticed the paint peeling, and would not look at that infant again. Nor would she think of Sosi—the baby-making machine, the child even now growing in her oh-so-fertile womb.
“I don’t know how I’ll get away.” Sosi sounded worried. But not as holier-than-thou as she had been.
Good.
“I don’t either. That’s your problem,” Reva said, taking another drag. The minivan was replaced by a dirty white sedan with a couple of teenagers in the front seat. Wash Me had been scrawled in the dirt on the trunk.
“You know, Sosi, if one of us goes down, all of us will. We weren’t exactly forthright about everything that happened that summer.”
Another silence.
“Think about it. I’ll be there in a few hours. You’ve got my number, right? It came up on your screen?”
“Y-Yes.”
“Good. Find a way to make it work. Make a reservation at the Hotel Averille in the town of the same name. We’ll all be there. We’re meeting Jo-Beth at five. Be there.”
“I-I’ll try,” she said tentatively, then more firmly, “and I’ll pray. For all of us. And the people missing, of course.”
“You do that,” Reva said, and didn’t bother saying good-bye, just clicked off. Then, cigarette clamped between her lips, she thought about going through the drive-up line. She could use a triple espresso. Shit, did McDonald’s even make espresso, or just that weak-ass coffee? She didn’t really have time, anyway, she thought, and pulled out of the lot, to spy, across the highway, a coffee kiosk.
Good Brews.
And there wasn’t a line of cars, none except for a battered green SUV of some kind that was just pulling out. Good. After a quick perusal of traffic in both directions, she hit the gas and shot across the road to the parking lot on the far side. Pulling up to the window, she waited impatiently, made her order to a girl who moved as slowly as a banana slug, and felt her nerves tightening. She finished her cigarette and hoisted the butt out the window as she was finally served. She really didn’t have time to stop for anything, even gas, the pressure to get to Camp Horseshoe was that intense, but she needed something to rev her up, make her focus, and figure out a way that she could get herself out of the trap that was the past. The other girls—well, they could fend for themselves. The guys as well. But she had to take care of number one.
“Here ya go,” the girl inside the little hut said, handing Reva a hot paper cup that nearly slipped out of her hands in the rain. A chocolate-covered coffee bean was balanced over the plastic lid, and Reva snatched it up with a quick “Thank you” as she handed the girl a bill and added, “Keep the change,” which was all of forty cents. After a quick sip of the hot liquid, she set the cup in one of the holders in the console and took off again, finding her way back to the main highway and trying to come up with a plan of action that would save her skin.
CHAPTER 14
Camp Horseshoe
Then
Sosi
Tears streamed down Sosi’s cheeks. She tried to fight them, to brush them aside, but they just kept coming, rolling from her eyes. Tears of embarrassment, tears of shame, and yes, tears of fear. “It’s not . . . It’s not what you think,” she said, swallowing hard as Reva, flashlight in hand, stood over her and the girl she was with, a junior counselor of fifteen.
Nell’s dark eyes rounded and she pushed herself away from Sosi, scooting across the carpet of pine needles where they’d fallen, unable to stop themselves from kissing and touching and needing, ending up here under a copse of pines.
They’d been too loud, too aching, too burning with desire to realize that they were close enough to the path running behind the cabins that someone would surely hear them. And someone had.
Reva.
Sosi bit her lip, fought to keep from crying, while Nell, straightening her clothes and climbing to her feet, cast one last glance at Sosi. Gone was the hunger, the raw desire in her wide brown eyes. Now in the moonlight those gorgeous orbs only registered fear and maybe a little shame. Without a sound, Nell hurried away through the night-darkened forest back to the cabin where she co-counseled with Annette Alsace.
“What I think,” Reva said, beyond the glow of the flashlight, “is that you’d better get your butt down to the cavern. Pronto.” There was an edge to her words, and through her tears Sosi was able to see the flash of her teeth, white in the near-darkness.
“But, I . . . I mean, this never happened before.”
“She’s fifteen,” Reva hissed. “Jailbait.” She paused and, when Sosi could do nothing more than sniffle and wipe her nose, she elaborated. “You do know what that means, don’t you? Underage.”
“Yes.”
“Never mind that she’s a girl and your whole damned family—no, make that the whole damned church you belong to—would at the very least frown on what was happening here, or maybe shun you or turn you in to the police.”
“It . . . It was just a kiss.” But she fingered the tiny cross swinging from a petite chain at her neck, the cross that was so recently between Nell’s teeth.
Oh, dear Lord. What have I done?
“Was it?” Reva demanded, and Sosi crumpled in on herself. “Just a kiss? Innocent? An experiment? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Yes.” She tried to say the word with some authority and swiped at the last of her stupid tears. She didn’t think she was . . . well, attracted to girls, but this one, Nell Pachis, was different. Kind of an intellectual, Nell with her wild dark hair and gorgeous brown eyes loved books, animals, music, and . . . and she was beautiful, in body and spirit—a Greek goddess who was lithe and happy and sexy. Like no one Sosi had ever met. The best part of it was, Nell had also found Sosi attractive and had come on to her, not the other way around.
But you didn’t stop her, did you? Nuh-uh, you wanted to kiss her, to touch her, to see if . . .
“She was touching you,” Reva charged. “Her hands were all over you!”
In the darkness, Sosi felt herself blush. Well, there was that. The kissing had led to some petting and she’d let Nell touch first her breasts and then . . . oh, dear, lower, into her shorts. Sosi knew that Nell could feel that Sosi was turning on, getting moist. The kissing, oh my, the kis
sing had deepened and . . .
“Maybe a little.”
“Maybe a lot,” Reva said, “and you were touching her—No! Don’t even try to deny it. I saw—okay? Jesus, Sosi, if you didn’t want anyone to see you, you could have found someplace a little more private, don’t you think?”
Glumly, Sosi nodded. How could she explain when there was no explanation? She’d felt a spark, a sizzling attraction, a raw attraction here in this darned camp. After living under her father’s very strict thumb, she’d finally felt that she could breathe a little, step a bit into forbidden territory, learn something other than what her family, homeschool, and church could provide.
“And, by the way, you both stink of weed. Come on! Anyone can smell it.” Reva let out a long breath. “You’d better warn Nell. Look, just so you know, I don’t give a flying fuck who you screw. Really. Boy? Girl? Whatever, but for the love of God, Sosi, use your damned head. Other people do care.” Under her breath, she said, “Fucking idiots.” Then, more loudly, “Come on, let’s go. You’re just lucky it was me who heard you and smelled the smoke, not Mother Naomi, that bitch.”
“Oh, you shouldn’t . . .”
“What? Call it as I see it? Or, more precisely, call her as I see her? Is that what you were going to say? Well, tough. The reverend’s wife is a stone-cold bitch, and she’d skin you and Nell both alive if she caught you. She’d bring it up at the next all-camp meeting after discussing punishment and recriminations with her husband, as if he’s the damned paragon of virtue. If you ask me, he’s one serious pervert. But, it doesn’t matter. You two, you and Nell, could be in serious trouble and thrown into religious counseling about the sins of your act. The police might even be called in because Nell’s underage.”
Sosi gasped.
“Well, maybe not, but your parents for sure and Nell’s as well. Not a pretty thought, is it?” Before Sosi could say another word, Reva added, “Move it. We’re already late. And Nell has to stay back at the cabins. To be with the campers.”
“She doesn’t even know we’re meeting.”
“Good. Let’s keep it that way.”
Sosi had no arguments. She hadn’t done anything wrong, at least she didn’t think so, but Reva was making her feel as if she’d committed some mortal sin and God would strike her down at any second. She wasn’t sure about that, but she did know her father would kill her. He was a youth pastor in their church and he wouldn’t like to know that she was making out with anyone—boy or girl. The girl-on-girl thing, though, that would surely make it worse.
Climbing to her feet, she straightened her clothes, brushed the needles and dust off her. For the first time, now that her eyes had adjusted to the luminescence of the flashlight, she saw that Reva was holding a knife, and not a small pocketknife, but a large butcher knife with a blade that glinted in the cast of the flashlight.
“What . . . What’s that?”
Reva cast her a don’t-be-dumb look and said, “For something later.”
“What?” she asked.
“It doesn’t concern you. Come on.” Reva was already heading along the path in the direction of the ocean.
Sosi followed, her eyes on Reva’s straight back and the glow of the flashlight illuminating the forest. The beam swept across the trail and wind-gnarled branches that curved upward. The smell of the earth from last night’s rain was intense, the path below her feet uneven because of rocks and roots just below the surface. “Where did you get it?” she whispered, loudly enough to be heard above the rustle of the leaves overhead as the breeze off the ocean intensified. “The knife? Did you bring it to the camp, or is it one of Cookie’s?”
“Let’s just say I borrowed it and leave it at that. And by the way, you never saw it, or me with it. Got it? Never.” Reva sounded irritated as she walked quickly along the path, her flashlight in one hand, the hilt of the long-bladed weapon that Sosi was supposed to disavow clenched firmly in the other.
Why the lie?
What was the knife for? To scare someone? Or worse? Maybe she didn’t want to know.
Sosi had to half jog to keep up with the taller, more athletic girl. “Where are the others?”
“Duh, Sosi. Already at the cavern, probably,” Reva said over her shoulder. “Enough with the questions. We’re late already. Hurry up.” She increased her pace, kind of race-walking.
“Are any of the guys coming?”
“So now you’re interested in boys?” She snorted. “No, this is all girls. Which should be right up your alley.”
“Yeah, right,” Sosi said, but she felt a cold little shiver run down her spine. Something was wrong here; Sosi sensed it. And it was a lot more serious than her little makeout and petting session. Hurrying, running along the twisting trail, feeling the breath of wind, and spying the veil of clouds slipping over the nearly full moon, she caught up with Reva. “Where’s Jo-Beth?”
“She went ahead, told me to get you. She’s probably waiting, so come on, move it.”
That sounded plausible. Jo-Beth was the ringleader who had planned this meeting, a get-together of all the female counselors to talk about what happened to Elle and make sure that everyone said the same thing, so that no one got caught doing the things they shouldn’t.
Like smoking pot and getting sexually involved with another counselor. And not just any counselor, but an underage girl. Oh, Sosi, you idiot! But was it any more of a sin than being with a boy? Most of the girl counselors were hooking up with their male counterparts, and as for the indulgence in weed, they all did it. Okay, a few preferred alcohol or regular cigarettes, but they all did it. And so what if she liked girls? Big deal.
But it was taboo. And illegal, because of Nell’s age.
Darn it all, anyway.
Reva had reached the crest of the ridge where the trees gave way and the path angled down the cliff face, switching back and forth to the beach far below. In the darkness it was difficult to see the curving stretch of sand leading to the cape, but Sosi heard the crash of the waves breaking against the rocky point of the cape, where it jutted into the ocean. The air here was damper and smelled of salt.
Coming to a dead stop, Reva halted and positioned her flashlight so that its beam splayed upon the downward grade of the trail. “Go on ahead.”
“No, you go. I’ll follow.”
“I said, ‘Go on ahead.’ I’m not coming with you. Not right now.”
“No,” Sosi argued, shaking her head. She wasn’t going down there alone, without a flashlight. What if no one else was in the cave. What then?
“I’ve got something to do. I’ll be there soon.”
“Uh-uh. No.”
“Go!” Reva gave her a little push and Sosi stumbled, her heart clutching in fear. “I’ll catch up with you later.”
“We’re supposed to be all in this together! That’s what Jo-Beth said.”
“And I said, I’ll catch up with you later, like in a few minutes. Go on,” Reva insisted. Then said, “You’re not scared, are you?”
“No.” Still Sosi didn’t move. She flicked a gaze at the knife again and Reva’s fingers gripping the handle tightly. Her skin crawled as she considered the implications, none of them good. What in the world was Reva up to?
“Don’t tell me,” Reva said, a sneer in her voice. “You need your little girlfriend to come, too.”
“Oh, shut up.” Sosi had heard enough and she was tired of Reva’s innuendos and high-and-mighty attitude. As if she were the boss.
The boss with a very big knife.
Rather than argue further, Sosi turned and started down the trail snaking along the sheer rocks of the cliff face. Her heart was pounding as the climb down was dangerous, but she’d done it ever since she’d shown up at Camp Horseshoe, and the path was wide enough—usually—though tonight with only a bit of moonlight and winking starlight to guide her, she hugged the rock wall and wished like crazy she’d thought to bring her own small, pocket-sized flashlight, but she hadn’t, because she’d thought she’d re
turn to her cabin before setting out for the cavern.
She hadn’t expected her meeting with Nell to turn into a hot makeout session or that Reva would find them. She shuddered as she made her way in the dark, keeping close to the hillside, angling downward. She told herself it wasn’t really that dark and that she wasn’t really alone. Soon she’d be with the rest of the female counselors, and later back with the campers and Nell. At that thought her heart did a funny little skip. Should she stand next to her, or act as if they weren’t involved?
Whoa! Involved? You’re not involved with her. With anyone. Not romantically. Not sexually. Remember that! Avoid Nell when you’re in public and in private.... The back of her throat went dry and she was so caught up in her thoughts that she hadn’t realized she’d reached the foot of the trail, that she’d made it to the beach.
As she stepped onto the sand, she squinted to the far end of the beach, the cape where the cliffs jutted into the sea and a grotto had been carved by the tidewater. Was there some light coming from within? Were the other girls waiting?
As she took a step forward, she sensed a movement and heard, over the thunder of the waves, a sharp, scraping noise, then felt a shower of pebbles raining on her from the cliff high overhead.
Ducking and covering her head with her hand to protect herself, she half ran away from the shadow of the steep hill, where something or someone had kicked the small stones, whether on purpose or by accident.
Reva?
Jo-Beth?
Or someone else?
She looked skyward while trying to convince herself either a stiff gale or some animal had dislodged the bits of dirt or tiny stones that had fallen from the cliff.
No one and nothing was visible. No person. No animal. She squinted, thinking she saw a shadow move at the outermost point of the ridge high overhead, but nothing appeared. “It’s nothing,” she said, her voice caught by the wind rolling off of the sea, her hair blowing around her face. Still, she was edgy, her skin pimpling as she imagined unseen eyes staring down at her from the deep umbra.