Sometimes, when I’m sitting by moonlight at the water’s edge, I can hear and know things that I shouldn’t. That night I heard the woman screaming on the beach was when I knew for sure. Tess told me that only those with “the gift” can hear the screams of the Spanish princess who ran ashore at Hawthorne Cove to escape a pirate ship in the 1700s. She told me only a select few can hear her pleading, wailing cries. I heard her plain as day.
I guess that means I’m touched. So why didn’t I know better than to head into Potter’s Grove alone that night? Could I have prevented it? Did I unknowingly think I deserved it?
I know I’m not the girl I was once in California—carefree, filled with love, running off into the night with cute boys. I promised myself things would be different here. I promised Rebecca that I would be pure and sweet and “virginal” like Maddie.
I would make Mom proud.
Looks like I screwed that up once again. Even if I told anyone about what happened, who would believe me? My word against his. Hardly a fair fight.
Sadly,
Cordelia
October 22nd
Everything is wrong wrong wrong. How do I get myself into these things? Rebecca suspects that something is up. It’s like she can see right through me, right down into my belly and see it growing, forming. How??? I’m not even sure, but I think that she knows. SHE KNOWS. And if Rebecca knows, it must be true—I don’t need some stupid test in a box to tell me the truth. Now I have no choice but to tell him…my dear, sweet, beautiful boy. It will destroy him—destroy us.
God, why does this always happen to me? Why do I always screw things up??? Just when things were settling down, becoming normal again. Normal—ha! Like I could ever be lucky enough to be normal.
I wish I could just disappear. Just float away into the forest or across the ocean to a place that is warm and magical and free. I want to be free!!! I don’t want a baby to be growing inside of me. It will just suck all of my energy. I just wish I could be like Maddie. Sweet, innocent little Maddie. She has no idea what she’s up against. She can’t see that they’re out to get her. The same way they’re out to get me. But I’m above it all. I’m untouchable. They’ll be sorry. All of them. I won’t let them get away with any of it. Ever.
Maddie lifted her eyes up from the pages filled with swirling letters and quick sketches of flowers and ivy vines. Sixteen-year-old Cordelia—pregnant! She just couldn’t believe it. Maddie collapsed onto her bed, completely exhausted and emotionally overwhelmed. Who was the “beautiful boy”? Was it someone Maddie knew? An image of Reed’s face floated into her mind, and she quickly pushed it away. But if not Reed, who? Trevor Campbell? Finnegan O’Malley?
How could anyone have hurt her so much if they knew she was pregnant? And the thought that Cordelia had to withstand all of that pain out on Misery Island while pregnant haunted Maddie to her core. Or…maybe that’s the reason why she was taken, so that no one would ever know the truth. The truth that Maddie had right in front of her, scrawled hastily among pink and purple flowers.
When she flipped through the rest of the journal, a torn piece of paper fell onto her lap. It looked like an e-mail or a hastily typed text message that had been printed out. The part that would have given the sender’s information was gone, but the cruel message was right there in bold letters.
C.
I NEED TO SEE U AND TALK ABOUT WHT HPPND. DON’T SAY U DIDN’T WANT IT, CUZ I NO U DID. KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT OR I’LL SHUT IT 4 U.
It occurred to her, then, that maybe the person sending the notes knew that Cordelia kept this journal, the love letters, and now this threatening note, that it would only be a matter of time before he was exposed.
Considering this, Maddie flipped through the journal, desperately looking for a name, a clue, anything that would point to someone. But Cordelia had covered her tracks well—there was nothing. Maddie came across a passage scribbled on the last few pages of the journal. The writing appeared different from the large, balloonlike letters scrawled in assorted colored inks throughout most of the journal. These words, scratched haphazardly in black ink, seemed angry, forced, as if Cordelia had written them in a fury.
October 30th
The thousand injuries of Hawthorne I had borne as I best could, but when she ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge. You, who so well know the nature of my soul, will not suppose, however, that I gave utterance to a threat. AT LENGTH I would be avenged; this was a point definitively settled—but the very definitiveness with which it was resolved precluded the idea of risk. I must not only punish, but punish with impunity. A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser. It is equally unredressed when the avenger fails to make himself felt as such to him who has done the wrong. Nemo me impune lacessit! “No one assails me with impunity!”
Scrunching up her forehead, Maddie stared down at the words. What the hell does this mean? Cordelia must have copied it down from a required reading for English class. But why would she change the name to Hawthorne in the passage? It sent a chill down her spine when she realized how fitting that excerpt was—it was as though Cordelia knew what was coming, what the Sisters of Misery had in store for her.
Maybe Cordelia had Tess’s gift of knowing what was coming next. Maddie reread the text, wondering if she was included in the group that Cordelia intended to avenge. The worst part was that Maddie felt like she deserved it.
Later that night in bed, Maddie felt as if her body was being sucked downward, sinking deep into the rusted coils and suffocating in the starchy foam. Maddie thought about Cordelia’s longing to be free. To just take off and leave everything—all the responsibility, all the guilt, all the questions—to just abandon it all and start fresh.
That’s what her father did when he took off, left them all behind. And maybe Cordelia really did follow through with the plans scribbled into her journal, escaping from her problems. Maybe Cordelia really was the only one responsible for her disappearance.
Maddie closed her eyes, pressing the heels of her palms against the sockets until she saw little fireflies of light. The pressure felt good against her throbbing temples.
It only occurred to her after she turned out the light, hanging in that limbo stage right before sleep, that one of the last entries in Cordelia’s diary—the one that told of her desire to disappear forever—was written on October 22. Maddie knew the significance of that date from living so close to Salem, Massachusetts. October 22, 1692 was when the last hanging of the Salem Witch Trials occurred. And all these years later, Cordelia was being persecuted in the very same way. She had written this passage in her journal exactly nine days before Halloween, the night that they had all gone out to Misery Island.
The next day, Sully reluctantly gave her access to the evidence storage room. She was now more convinced than ever that Cordelia had been raped and had continued to be tormented by her attacker. She wondered if her cousin had ever made a formal complaint and if it was one of those loose ends that made the police originally turn to Reed as a “person of interest.” She had wondered all along if there was a missing piece, and Maddie suddenly had a feeling of what it might be. Cordelia was pregnant—or at least thought she was—and perhaps her rapist wanted to keep her quiet. Or, at the very least, scare her out of town. Now all Maddie needed was some concrete evidence.
Maddie knew very little about operational procedures when it came to collecting and preserving evidence, but one look at the ramshackle storage facility and she understood why so many cases remained unsolved in small towns. There had obviously been a leak at some point in the decrepit storage room, and many of the corrugated cardboard boxes were water stained and moldy.
Maddie turned to him and asked, “So you guys are real high tech here. Good thing no one needs any DNA samples or evidence out of these disgusting boxes.”
He sighed and shrugged his shoulders. “I know, Maddie. There’s nothing we can do. It’s all the tax cuts.”
Her thoughts flashed over to the fle
et of new SUV police cruisers parked in front of the station. Maddie assumed that the police department had decided to use their minimal funds to improve their rides, as opposed to building up the aging police facility and dilapidated holding cells. Obviously, prisoners and unsolved case evidence storage took a backseat to allowing the Hawthorne police force to travel in style.
Maddie brought the box into an empty interrogation room, flicked on the fluorescent lights overhead, and began sifting through what little evidence there was on Cordelia’s case. The newspaper clippings were yellowing and stuck together from moisture. There were stacks of papers documenting testimonies and witness statements—all had been taken from sightings of Cordelia in the days and weeks before her disappearance. In the transcripts, Maddie finally found the break she was looking for: only one person was known to have seen Cordelia on the morning of November first. As Maddie ran her fingers over his name, she felt simultaneous shock and relief. It wasn’t Reed Campbell.
It was Finnegan O’Malley.
Maddie walked home in a daze, his name repeating in her head like a mantra: Finnegan O’Malley. Finnegan O’Malley. Could he be the one responsible for raping Cordelia? For sending those threatening notes to Maddie? For sending that horrible message to Cordelia right before she disappeared? After the time she spent in the musty police station, Maddie felt the need to clear her head as well as her lungs. Once home, she pulled on her sneakers and decided to take a quick jog. Running always allowed her mind to regain focus. While her body worked out its kinks as she plodded along, her mind was lulled by the rhythm of her Reeboks slapping against the ground. She decided to run through Potter’s Grove in order to retrace the steps of Cordelia on that fateful night she wrote about in her journal. The night she was raped. Maddie could feel her gift growing, but she needed to put herself in emotionally charged places where Cordelia had been. Potter’s Grove was first on her list. Rebecca’s Closet was next.
Everyone Maddie had come in contact with, including her own mother, was convinced that Cordelia had disappeared by choice. Her grandmother, God bless the poor woman, was becoming more delusional by the hour. And her friends, if you could even call them that, were offering up no new information about that Halloween night. The trail was growing colder by the second, and Maddie didn’t know where to turn—or who to turn to—next.
Maddie entered Potter’s Grove, stopped for a moment, and bent down over her knees, trying to catch her breath. A searing cramp reached up her torso. She curved away from the cramp, trying to stretch it out, and was instantly aware of the feeling of being watched. Maddie heard what sounded like footsteps ahead of her in the stand of trees.
“Hello?” she called out. There was no answer. Hair stood up on her arms and on the back of her neck. Someone was watching. She could feel the weight of his eyes.
Maddie pulled up each leg behind her, quickly stretching out her quads before continuing her jog, and then decided to cut past the pond so that she could get to the road quicker.
Footsteps came out of nowhere and thudded up behind her. Before she could turn, Maddie was toppled to the ground by someone.
“What the hell?” Maddie screamed, struggling to pull free from her attacker.
“Hold on, hold on,” came the guy’s voice. “Jesus, Crane. Where’s the love?”
He had her firmly pinned down on her stomach, but Maddie angled her neck so she could look back to see the face attached to the familiar voice. It was Trevor Campbell.
“Trevor!” Maddie elbowed him hard in the side, causing him to roll off of her in pain. “What the hell are you doing? Trying to scare me to death?”
He started laughing. “So, you have no time for me, but you’ve got all the time in the world for my brother?” He stayed on the ground, opening his arms wide. “Like I said, ‘Where’s the love?’”
Trevor Campbell was the last person Maddie wanted to run into while she was in the middle of nowhere. She stood up, brushing herself off. “Nice seeing you, Trevor. Say hi to Kate for me.”
Maddie started jogging again, and within a minute, Trevor was jogging along by her side. “So, you and my brother seem to be getting along well,” he said again, only this time the friendliness had left his voice.
“None of your business, Trevor.” She ran a little faster. To Maddie, Trevor Campbell would always be the boy who used to hide under the bleachers to see the girls’ underwear, the one who’d find a young girl’s weakness or insecurity and then tease her mercilessly, the boy who never had a nice thing to say to anyone, but always expected the world to fall at his feet.
He grabbed her by the arm, hard. “Oh, I think it is my business.”
Maddie turned to face him, not wanting to show any weakness or fear. “Is that so?”
“You hanging around with Reed just brings up the whole Cordelia business again, and that’s not good for me or my family, understand? It just makes him look guilty. He doesn’t even know about what went on out on Misery.” The look of shock on her face must have clued him in that he’d said too much. How could he possibly know about Misery Island? Could Kate have told him after she’d sworn them all to secrecy?
He let go of her arm and put his hands up in the air. “I’m not trying to be the bad guy, okay? I’m just looking out for my brother.”
“Trevor, you’ve never looked out for anyone but yourself.”
“I’d look out for you if you’d let me,” he said huskily, pulling her body fully against his. Maddie could tell that he wasn’t just being playful. His whole body was at attention. He tried to kiss her then, his tongue roving over her lips, his hands everywhere on her body, pulling, prodding.
Where the hell did this come from? Is this what happened to Cordelia?
“Get off me, you pig!” She pushed him away from her, coming just short of having to knee him in the groin. He pulled back, laughing. He ran his hand through his closely cropped blond hair. He resembled his brother in so many ways, yet Maddie could see evil and a sense of entitlement when she looked into his eyes, something that she didn’t sense from Reed.
“Hey, come on,” he said. “Don’t save it all for my brother.”
“You’re disgusting,” Maddie snapped. She turned and sprinted away from him, lengthening the space between them with every stride.
Maddie heard him call out after her, “You really are nothing like your cousin, are you?” And then quieter, “Stupid bitch.”
All she could think of as she made her way back to the road and out of Potter’s Grove was two things.
One, he definitely was involved in Cordelia’s disappearance
And two, Kate, more than anyone, deserved to end up with that bastard.
Chapter 22
RAIDO REVERSED
THE WHEEL
Disassociation from Those around You, A Journey
Backwards; Confusion
MAY
Tess wandered into the kitchen before bed, her hair all in disarray and her eyes showing that she had gone beyond exhaustion but wasn’t ready to give up the fight.
Abigail expected Maddie to keep track of her grandmother, which was becoming more and more of a challenge. When Maddie came home from grocery shopping the other afternoon, arms overflowing with paper bags, she stopped in shock at the sight of Tess in her floral nightgown wandering down the street, heading to the beach.
The other night, Maddie heard a loud banging coming from Tess’s room. After pushing the door open and discovering a chair had been wedged in front of it, she noticed her grandmother’s window open. There sat Tess, perched on the roof like a white cat, staring up at the moon. She was frighteningly close to falling off. Her white hair, normally flattened into even plaits, was wild and splayed around her head like a halo. Her eyes were distant, and she was singing quietly to herself. Then she mumbled about someone in the basement. Maddie assured her that there was no one in the basement and convinced her to come back inside to the safety of her own room.
Now in the warm glow of the kitchen,
Tess turned to her, whining, “Momma, I’m hungry.”
Maddie turned to look at Tess, trying to discern if she was joking or if she really saw Maddie as her own mother.
“Grams,” Maddie said sharply, hoping it would snap the woman out of her trance. When she realized that Tess was still staring blankly, Maddie mentally added another item to her to do list. Call Dr. Stevens. “If you eat anything right now, it will just give you bad dreams.”
“I don’t have bad dreams, Momma. Only happy ones. I promise,” her grandmother insisted in a child’s voice.
“Grams, I’ve heard you crying out for the past few nights,” Maddie said hesitantly, not sure if she should encourage this regression. “It sounded like you were having nightmares. Plus, I found you out on the rooftop. Do you know how dangerous that is? You could have killed yourself out there.”
“That’s not me, that’s the girl. I hear her crying, too. Can’t sleep ’cause of all that crying.” Tess shuffled over to the kitchen table, looking out the window at the inky sky, and continued, “I keep telling her to leave me alone. Don’t bother me. Keep me out of it.”
A weight fell across Maddie’s shoulders, the same gnawing feeling that she felt when she visited Rebecca.
“What girl are you talking about, Tess?”
“The one who lives in the basement,” she replied flatly.
Maddie could feel herself getting slightly annoyed, perhaps to cover her growing uneasiness.
Forcing a laugh, Maddie said, “Well, Miss Tess, you have quite an imagination, don’t you? I’d think that you of all people would be used to the sounds that come out of this old house at night—the ocean, the wind, the creaking of the old floors—all these things are making your dreams seem like they’re real. But that’s all they are, just dreams. There’s no girl in the basement. There’s nothing here for you to be afraid of.” Maddie heard her own voice rising a few octaves, the way it did when she was nervous.
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