Lake Hollow Curses (Lake Hollow #3)

21. Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-one

Remington James

W e’re on the edge of downtown, where there may be witnesses, he’s not going to hurt me here. I squeak out, “Oh, hey.”

He steps up to me folding me into his arms pressing me close, but I stay rigid, keeping a loose grip to his T-shirt hem. I fight the tears welling up.

When he steps back, he looks stricken. “If I didn’t know before, I do now. There’s something wrong. What is it?”

Standing here in front of me, it’s even harder to believe he did it. Wearing his Flicks n’ Fun polo, a pair of jeans, the crinkles next to his eyes, the dimples in his cheeks, those light green eyes. My Cal. But that’s just it… the person that did this has gotten away with it, because they’ve covered their tracks. They would be unthreatening, charming.

My smile is weak, when I do my best to sound fine. “I haven’t been sleeping much, worrying about all the things I need to do before I leave.”

His disappointment in my answer only tells me how bad I am at trying to cover up my emotions. “I thought we were past this… you keeping things from me.”

Huh. Me, too.

Wrapping my arms around myself, I try to keep it together, but it’s difficult as hell when he’s right here. “Cal, I’m tired. In a week, I’ll be in Florida… it’s been a lot.” The setting sun feels like a sand timer. I don’t want to be in the dark, with Cal, alone.

So much has changed. He’s gone from the first person I felt I could lean on in my life, to the person I need to get away from.

It’s ripping my heart out.

“Come back to my place with me? We can finish that trashy show, get wings, and have some fun in the hammock?” His half smile and wink only make me question myself. But how? How is he the monster?

Don’t be naive, Rem. Jeezus, get a grip.

“I shouldn’t. I need to get sleep.” I’ve never said no to him.

His face falls as he reaches a hand out to me. “Honey, I may be emotionally stunted but there is clearly something going on between us. Please tell me what’s going on.”

Like a reminder, not that I needed one, a yard sign is stuck in the grass only a foot from us. My gaze locks on the pictures of the victims. Cal notices what has my attention. “They put those everywhere.”

“It must be hard to see Sara on those.” There isn’t a way to take that back, I just blurted it out. “You don’t like talking about the past, being reminded must be… must be difficult.”

“It won’t do any good. The signs, digging up the past.”

“Why is that?” I just need to get back to the cabin, dusk is fast becoming pitch black. The fact I’m not willing to be alone with him under the cover of night anymore is hard to reconcile.

He shrugs, rubbing his thumb over his bottom lip. “It doesn’t matter.” He tries to get me to take his hand again. “Come with me?”

“I-I-”

Like a savior in a dented silver Prius, Grady pulls up next to us. His timing is impeccable.

“Hop in… both of you. I think we all need to talk.”

Any other time I’d balk at getting inside that rattle trap or most vehicles, but the alternative is standing here floundering to come up with a good exit.

Cal agrees to follow in his truck. The look of longing on his face as I pull open the passenger door of Grady’s borrowed car makes me feel rotten. Just another degree of despair.

Grady texts Wilder and Charlie to meet us at his cabin. I can’t have everything talked about in front of Cal, no one else knows about the pages or about the picture. What the hell do I do? Pacing back and forth in Grady’s dimly lit cabin kitchen, Cal keeps trying to catch my eye.

“They should be here in a few minutes.” Grady pockets his phone. “It’s high time that we discuss everything.”

No, no, no. I don’t allow myself time to second guess it, I grab Cal’s hand and tug him into the bathroom. There is no resistance, but Grady’s confusion causes me to call out, “Just give us a minute.”

Cal asks, “Are you finally going to tell me?”

Taking a deep breath, I close my eyes and ask him, as level toned as I can, “Why would you have a picture of a drowning girl in your shorts pocket?”

I open one eye, to see him gaping at me with his mouth wide open. “In my… wait, what the fuck.” He steps back from me. “Oh my God.” He shakes his head at me. “You found that when you put the note in my pocket, didn’t you? I was doing the morning walk through at the Funpark and found it stuck under something, I was going to throw it away, but I forgot to.”

My heart slows as I realize that all I ever needed to do was ask. But there’s still the fear over the letter, over the pages of Katie’s journal. Then his face contorts as he realizes that I was suspecting him of being involved in the drownings. “You… you thought I might be responsible…”

I’m not totally convinced he wasn’t, but his explanation of the picture gives me enough to tip the scales towards innocent. “It didn’t look good, you have to admit that.”

“The only thing I’m guilty of is not staying on top of my laundry or throwing that damn picture away.” His eyes are sad as he slumps back against the wall of the small bathroom. “I thought we were past the point in our relationship where we kept things from each other. Why couldn’t you just ask me about it?”

Something tells me all our relationships are about to be tested when we tell each other what we know or believe. Grady seemed intent on getting it all out in the open, but this could be the worst idea. What if this shows our hands to the killer?

Stop. I need to stop being so freaking paranoid. I know these four. I can trust them.

“I’m sorry. I am, but…” Rubbing his arm, I continue, “My default is to shut down. Trusting anyone other than myself is hard sometimes.”

When we return to the living room area of the cabin, Grady, Wilder, and Charlie are in the middle of a debate. “Dumb as hell. You can’t just do that,” Grady finishes saying.

Turning to us, Wilder says, “Grady thinks we need to share with one another all the information we have about the drownings. I don’t necessarily agree that it’s wise, but.” He gives him an irritated look while his face twists. “The time for secrets is over.”

I could be having an out of body experience, as my heart zooms along dangerously, my limbs are tingling. I don’t want to tell them what I’ve hidden, it feels important enough… the detective’s warning dire enough… that I should continue to keep it to myself.

Grady and Wilder tell us what Gary Marlow said about Daniel Gibson. As they go back and forth relaying the story, I watch Charlie’s reaction. He’s stunned. At one point jumping up, telling them it’s all lies. “No way. It’s a lie. Carlotta, my parents… no one, has ever said anything like that. All the stories Lala told about Daniel were loving, fond memories. It’s a fucking lie.”

“How could not a single person ever comment about Daniel’s supposedly bad behavior if it was true?” Cal asks as he sits on the arm of the recliner. “This town gossips about a parking ticket, there is no way a scandal like that gets swept under the rug. I don’t want to insult your dad, but I don’t believe it, either.”

Wilder sighs. “I felt the same way, but while Gary Marlow may be a crabby asshole, he isn’t a liar.”

Giving us a minute to process the information, Grady stares out at the moonlit lake before turning back to us. “What do we know… what have each of us found out this summer?”

My mind is still grappling with the fact Gary Marlow is saying Daniel was a psychopath. That he had hurt Carlotta, ended her pregnancy.

Grady talks over the guys all debating the merit of the news his dad shared, “Stop. Hey, hold on. I didn’t believe it until I started to think about some things she’d said in the past. She said more than once that people will hide their darkest secrets from the world, which always made me feel like she was speaking personally. I’d asked her once why she’d never had kids, and she said that her first baby was ‘taken from her’ early in her pregnancy. There… there were signs. Not to mention that the rift between our families makes more sense to me now,” he says the last bit to Charlie.

Charlie shakes his head; his face is pale. “It was over land. All of the problems were over a land dispute. My dad got pushy pissing your dad off.”

“It started long before that and you know it.”

“Technically, it’s always been about the appropriation of land, all the way back to our great grandparents. Long before Carlotta or Daniel were born.” Charlie sits next to Cal. “I, for one, don’t buy it. Your dad is making it up. Maybe he has to justify why he wasn’t around for Lala or why he didn’t do more when she passed away.”

“Can we get back on track here?” Wilder asks as he puts an arm around my waist. “You okay?” he whispers into my ear.

Nope. Okay is the last thing I feel right now. I’m nervous that telling Cal and Charlie about the letter could be a mistake, that letting them know about the diary… we could be tipping one of them off. I’ve never been more conflicted in my life.

Pulling Carlotta’s letter from his pocket, Wilder says, “It all starts with this… Lala left this for me. Both Remi and Grady have seen it.” I didn’t expect him to give them the letter to look at. The panic in my face when I peer at Wilder isn’t eased when he doesn’t look too certain of what he’s doing either.

I murmur under my breath, “What. Are. You. Doing?”

“If it’s one of them, it’ll push them to do something. If not, then we can try to figure things out together.”

Their reactions are both of shock, tears fill Charlie’s eyes. “Why would she think it was one of us?”

“I don’t understand. I just don’t understand.” Cal’s hand rubs over his cheek. “What the actual fuck?”

I expected them to both act surprised, to feel slighted. There is no trace of a suspicious reaction. “That’s not all…” Here goes nothing. I hate that I never told Charlie this when it happened. That I kept it from him, and he’s going to feel hurt. “When the electrician came to work on the light switch problem in the bathroom of our cabin, they had to cut away a piece of the wall, there was a diary inside it.” Charlie perks up, but I cut him off before he can ask anything. “It belonged to your sister. It was Katie’s.”

He puts his head in his hands. “You found a diary belonging to my sister?” When he looks up at me, I see a gut wrenching hurt, as he says, “You found something like that and never told me, because…” He shakes his head. “I don’t, I don’t understand what’s happening here…”

Cal rests a hand on his back while he says, “What was written in her diary? Where is it?”

It takes all the strength inside me to tell them I handed it over to Detective Hemminger, that I didn’t know what else to do. I had read it, she named who she saw kill Sara, but it was water damaged and unreadable. No one in this cabin looks any better than I feel. The words are absorbed and it’s like that ticking bomb I’ve felt under our feet. It’s blown, leaving in its wake the shattered remnants of distrust, hurt, and disbelief.

“Sara was killed,” Cal’s voice sounds detached.

Even if it’s been suspected by most of the people in Lake Hollow over the years, the confirmation seems like more than he can bear right now. He bends over his knees, his hands fisted in his hair, a loud bellow lets loose from him that makes me jump. “Noooooo!”Grady quickly moves to his side, crushing him against him, while Charlie in a daze grabs his hand. Wilder and I watch on, frozen. The pain is too much to witness, but I can’t leave Cal, and Wilder holds me tight not wanting to leave me.

Time lapses as we grieve as a group.

They know, just as Wilder, Grady, and I, that none of it was accidental. It’s not a whispered rumor anymore, it’s not a paranoid passing thought. It’s all connected, it was all done by someone, and they were pointed at as the culprit.

Everything starts getting tossed around.

“She had evidence, but someone got into her office and took it…,” I offer forth.

“Katie was acting weird after Sara’s death, I should’ve realized…,” Charlie says wiping tears away.

“The meds, that was really strange, tell them about the medication I found…” Grady pokes him.

Pulling his phone out, he tells us about Grady finding a broken open metal lockbox full of Potassium Chloride vials and syringes. It was in things Lala left for Grady that came from Lala’s. Mitchell had packed it up.

“Are you accusing Mitch of doing this?” Charlie is quick to ask.

“No, no… he said he’d never seen it and I believe him. But who would’ve placed them in there?” he replies, rubbing his jaw. “I don’t know why she’d have them; dad was sure she was in good health.”

Cal pipes up, “Fuck… okay, today Kami felt the need to tell me something.” He kicks at the coffee table, while rubbing at the back of his neck. “Her mom remembered Lala asking questions about a medical condition called…” He pulls his phone out to look at something. “I searched it up… it was hyperkalemia, which is low potassium. She wanted to know if Jeremy Eiler had been diagnosed with it, or if young people could be.”

I don’t like where my mind is going…

“What if… shitballs on fire… okay, what if it’s been Carlotta all along? Before any of you jump down my throat just listen, okay, I’ve watched a lot of true crime shows.” They all look at me with their eyes wide, Grady starts to object, Charlie’s mouth drops open. “She left a letter pointing the attention away from her, she met with a detective that didn’t grow up here and presumably didn’t know her past with Daniel, which Julia Hemminger most certainly would have… she said she knew Lala and your mom, Charlie.” I pace, gnawing at my thumbnail. “Something triggering may have happened and she started to recreate the way Daniel died. She got her hands on potassium chloride, which Wilder found out is not traceable in an autopsy, she injected the victims… who knows where, and dumped the bodies in the lake by The Bends.”

“Except there are major flaws with your theory,” Wilder says next to me. “She got away with it. No one was questioning that they were accidental until she found something that she brought to the Ross family’s attention. Not to mention that she, herself, appears to have been killed by someone.” He shakes his head. “I don’t think so.”

“I agree, it wasn’t my aunt. She knew something that got her killed,” Grady says with confidence.

Charlie shakes his head. “That’s pretty far-fetched. I’m with Wilder and Grady on this.”

Cal chews the inside of his cheek, his face still flushed, tendons on his neck sticking out from all the information dumped on him in the last few minutes. “But… I don’t think you’re that off base. It couldn’t be Carlotta; she was trying to find answers. Did you tell the detective all this? About the meds being found?”

If it’s not Carlotta, not one of the guys… who the fuck could it be? Deep down I can’t let go of the detective’s warning. I start to analyze the way Cal and Charlie are behaving. But they aren’t giving me a hint of something amiss in their reactions. Right now, all the guys seem to be on the same page, working to find answers.

“The night Sara died.” I close my eyes for a few seconds, then blow out a breath. “Sorry to rehash this, but it may be the only way to pick up something missed in the past.” Wilder squeezes my hand in encouragement. He’s had to walk me through this enough to know I won’t back down. “Cal, when did you last see her?”

His voice is thick as he says, “We’d just gotten home from the baseball tournament. She’d had a fight with my parents on the way home, they’d grounded her, taken her car privileges away. She was angry and left to walk… to walk to Wilder’s I guess.”

I knew all that. None of it was anything different from what any of the guys had heard before. I turn to Grady. “You were dropped off at Wilder’s. They were fighting, she left to go home. You followed her?”

Cal sits forward. “No… no, you said that you hadn’t followed her? Right?”

Grady tells them the lies he has since confessed to Detective Hemminger and to Wilder. “When I saw Katie, she was trying to get away from me unseen. I made an assumption.” He looks at Charlie in apology. “I couldn’t wrap my head around it, but if the drowning wasn’t an accident. If it wasn’t Wilder…”

“You thought it was Katie?” Charlie looks sick. He puts a hand over his mouth. “And that’s why you acted strange, not singing at her funeral…”

Nothing new is learned from going through it, but Charlie knows now that Grady had suspected Katie did something to Sara. It’s not easy to hear. None of the revelations tonight have been.

Then the connections between the drownings are thrown out.

“They aren’t though, two of them were tourists,” Cal states, “If we’re going with a pattern, what possible one could there be?”

“I’m not convinced there’s a pattern,” Charlie says.

We spend a half an hour tossing out the things that people have said over the years, from the downright ridiculous, “sacrifices to the lake by satanists,” to “accidental drownings blamed on the water currents pulling people under.” But the only thing we can all agree on is that the Sheriff’s office reopening of all the drownings, except Katie’s, is suspicious.

“They can’t think she did any of this, she would’ve been nine when the drownings started. That’s an insane leap,” Charlie says with conviction. “And then what… she drowned herself?”

Charlie asks Wilder questions about the visions, asking him how he knows that he didn’t black out and do something. It gets heated. Charlie questions the break-in at Carlotta’s office and that only Wilder and I knew about the evidence.

Wilder points out that so did Lala’s killer.

Charlie points out that Wilder had access and even had his hands on the necklace to put it in the cabin to scare me. Instead of throwing it, he could’ve pocketed it.

Wilder rolls his eyes and lets them know I witnessed him tossing it.

Cal gets involved pointing out again that Wilder wasn’t even around when Susanna Ross was here.

Eventually, they drop the bickering back and forth.

By the time we’re all talked out, my fears about Cal and Charlie have eased considerably. The relief that our secrets are out, the lies admitted to, and the suspicions talked through, almost makes the prospect of leaving even worse. We’re feeling more like a unit, like a group of people invested in each other.

Rubbing my eyes and yawning, I lay down on the couch, my head in Charlie’s lap. He runs his hand through my hair, saying softly, “Try to sleep. We’ve been talking for three hours.”

Grady and Cal bring the mattresses from both beds in the cabin to lay side by side on the floor where the pushed back table had been. We all strip to our underwear. We curl up in the middle of the mattresses, Charlie on one side of me, nestled close, Grady on the other. Cal behind Charlie his legs and arms spread out, Wilder laying behind Grady, a hand on his waist.

I can’t sleep. I find myself bumping into the guys as I squirm around endlessly, my mind still spinning over possibilities, my impending departure, and I’m getting turned on being this close to them with minimal clothing on. Even fully clothed, I want to pounce on each of them. Biting the knuckle of my finger, I groan in a stretch that thrusts my breasts out. One of them grazes Charlie’s chest.

He gives me a small smile. “Uncomfortable?”

Kissing his cheek as I stay close to whisper, “Could you hold me?”

His tender words as he whispers he loves me, makes me finally lose it. The tension from the last few days, the emotional outpouring tonight, all of it causes me to weep. Silently, tears course down my face, as Charlie holds me tight, telling me it’s going to be alright. But how can it be? In my heart I know it’s going to hurt like hell, saying goodbye. Grady moves in closer. “Are you crying, Rem?” He kisses my shoulder, tightening his arms around my waist. Wilder reaches over him, rubbing my shoulder.

“Please don’t cry, baby,” Cal says in a strained voice, his hand smoothing the hair on top of my head.

Waking up in the middle of the night with limbs tucked around and on me, I shift, stretching out my arms. A little breath of a sigh escapes me. Charlie’s eyes fly open at the sound. “Are you alright?” His hand caresses my cheek. Those bright blue eyes that I love search my face like the answer to his question is written on it. To be fair, I have a tendency to doodle.

“Mmm… I’m,” I start to respond, but my brain effectively shorts out when Grady groans against me as he repositions. His erection settles against one of my ass cheeks. That horny little beast inside me is waking up. “I’m feeling a little,” I bite my lip as I grab Charlie’s waist, “frisky.”

It turns out none of them were asleep because my admission is heard by everyone. Cal sits up teasingly saying, “We can help with that.” He wastes no time standing and putting a hand out to pull me up.

But I don’t want to separate from anyone.

Not right now. Tonight made me want to hold on tighter to each of them, to keep us together a little while longer. Because long distance could prove to be too much for them.

I prop myself up with my elbows, giving a little shake of my head.

Wilder speaks up, his voice sleepy sounding, “We have the mattresses out here, where do you think you’re taking her, Truitt?”

My heart flutters in my chest as I look them over. “Does that mean you’re going to hold out on me? Because we’re all in the same room?” The craving I’m feeling only mounts when I think about the dreams I’ve had of us together. My leaving is pushing me to be bold. The anxiety from the past couple of days has made me need this release.

“Fuck it,” Cal says, dropping to his knees at my feet. Crawling closer in between my legs, he says, “This is all about you, sweetheart.”

They all focus on me. Grady undoes my bra kissing my shoulder, his hand cupping my breast.

Charlie’s lips find mine, he whispers into my mouth in between kisses, “I recognize that look.” The knowing wink of his unravels any hesitation I had to keep going. The hunger for them makes me flush head to toe.

Wilder nudges Grady to sit, giving him room near me. His tongue licks my neck just under my ear, as he says, “We’re going to make sure you're satisfied, James. What do you want?”

I meet his eyes, turning slightly, while the other three are giving my chest and inner thigh teasing attention. It’s important to me that Grady and Wilder don’t deny or hold back their attraction when we’re intimate. “Touch each other.” I take his hand placing it on Grady’s knee. “I don’t want any of us to stop what we feel like doing.”

Cal hears me, and he raises his head to look at us. “As long as everyone is willing participants, I don’t give a shit what you two do. I’m here for Remi.”

“Same here,” Charlie says after pulling away from my nipple.

Excitement courses through me. No one leaves, we’re all allowing this to happen, after a night fraught with emotional turmoil. “Freaking yes. Smash.” I kiss Charlie gripping his thigh, turning to nip at Wilder’s mouth. “Smash.” Diving at Grady’s luscious lips, I say, roughly against them, “Smash,” then turning to face Cal whose pulling at the waistband of my underwear, I say, “Smash.”

That’s exactly what we do.

Grady races to his bathroom returning with condoms and lube, while Cal and Charlie slip my underwear off, tossing both my bra and underwear on the back of the couch. Wilder puts pillows down onto the mattresses and another comforter. My eyes follow him, his impressive erection confined inside his boxer briefs has me dying to touch him.

My back arches off the mattress when Wilder’s mouth, teeth, and tongue start paying attention to my clit. Cal lays next to me, turning my head to kiss me. “When you moan into my mouth like that… holy fuck.” I pull at his underwear, freeing his dick.

On the other side of me, Charlie has moved to my other nipple. I tug at the back of his underwear. “Off… take them off.”

Throwing my head back, my hands hold the comforter over the mattress. I’ve lost track of Grady, so I lean back up, to see him rolling a condom on, standing at the edge of the room. “Come here…,” I direct him.

Wilder takes his hand pulling him down next to him, giving him a teasing nip at his lips. My greedy pussy needing one of them to fill me, I say in a strained voice, “I need to be fucked… please, ple-“ Cal’s mouth cuts me off as he flips me on top of him.

“Climb on, sweetheart,” he says.

Making out with Charlie, while feeding Cal’s dick into me, I can’t control my wandering hands. From one hand stroking Charlie’s dick, the other stroking Grady’s. I have Charlie slide to the side giving me access to Wilder.

I suck and lick at Wilder’s dick.

Wilder growls, “I’m going to come. I need. I ne… oh, fuck.” My tongue flattens along the bottom of his dick, as I suck the tip and lap up the pre-cum.

My orgasm as Cal pumps into me, makes me back away from Wilder, Grady reaches around me, placing a firm hand around Wilder’s dick, while he removes his condom. When his head drops to suck Wilder dry, I lose it. I’m turned on too much to hold off the rush of pleasure through me.

Cal is removing his condom, when I encourage Grady to lay perpendicular from me, pulling his bare, thick dick into my mouth, I moan around him. I pop off to direct Wilder to lay with his dick near Grady’s head, we’re forming a triangle. Grady lifts his hefty cock wrapping a hand around it, sucking one of his balls into his mouth. Wilder gets settled near my clit, his tongue flicking over it, into me and back out.

“Huh, that gives new meaning to triangulating… fuck, okay, do your thing.” I can’t help the giggle with Grady’s dick still in my mouth. Leave it to Cal to watch and give commentary.

I look over at Charlie, who is focused on putting a condom on. He lays behind me kissing my shoulder. His hands roaming over my chest, playing with my nipples.

I come quickly, turning to pull Charlie inside me. We rock together, as I watch Wilder push Grady down on his stomach, rubbing his dick down his asscrack, but instead of lubing up and entering him, he lays against him grinding onto him.

Without penetrating him, he comes on his back. Grady flips over pulling Wilder in to kiss him while stroking himself until he squirts all over both he and Wilder. Cal jacks off watching all of us.

We don’t get our fill until I’m covered in little love bites on each breast, the guys have come at least three times, I’ve sucked on them all, they’ve all teased me with their tongues, and every one of their names get shouted out by me in release.

Feeling sated after sexy playtime and a deep sleep, I slip out to get back to my cabin. I want to get a full day of work on the mural. I’m hoping to complete it before the rain that is forecasted this weekend. The sun is just starting to peek over the horizon, dew on the grass almost causes me to slip a couple times. I pause to appreciate the still water with a glossy pink tinted surface. Birds chirping make me smile to myself. Birds and frogs. Freedom and survival.

Careful not to let the screen door swing shut, making noise, I guide it closed slowly. When I turn, what I see stops me cold.

Dead in my tracks.

Lying on the coffee table is a familiar necklace.

The antique ivory silhouette locket that Wilder had thrown into Lake Hollow. Stepping closer, I see that it’s resting on top of something.

Oh, no, no, no. I press my hands over my mouth shaking. Two pictures are underneath it depicting drownings of young women.

I back away, almost tripping over Droolius who has another picture in his mouth. When I pull it out, I see it’s like the other two.

I’d come close to convincing myself that Carlotta either played a part in the drownings or falsely accused the men I care about.

Now… now I don’t think I should trust any of them.

While I slept soundlessly last night, after we shared unbridled passions, one of them came here leaving this. To torment me, scare me.

To remind me… now the killer knows everything I know.

My hand shakes while I cry so hard that I’m hiccupping. I put the Kelley family’s antique necklace in my new trunk from Ceily. I intend to give it back to them once and for all. Break the curse. Not that I believe for a second it’s anything other than a way for the murderer to mark their victims. “Take that you bastard.” I give an aggressive middle finger to all corners of the room. “Hope you have a hidden camera somewhere to see this, you demented piece of shit. You’re a coward and history will forget you.” My voice gets choked.

I can’t help having both the heebies and the jeebies.

Charlie’s accusations towards Wilder come to mind… “You had access to it. You could’ve pocketed the necklace instead of throwing it in the lake.” Because how the hell does it come back from a deep, dark, weedy lake not once but multiple times? Neat little trick. But not likely.

What if… what if Wilder is guilty? The initials WPL on the note in the locket, on the doorframe. What else could it be? Carlotta could’ve been wrong, and Susanna was an actual unrelated accident. Giving Wilder a pass from being pinned as guilty. The visions, the connections…

Tick, tick boom.

Another motherfucking blast to my heart and the confidence I’d built in my relationship with him. But it could be any of them, Grady, Charlie, Wilder, or Cal. I’m fucking gullible, thinking that this situation could result in anything but heartbreak and devastation.

We laid it all out last night, and this morning I have more questions than answers.

Nat finds me huddled on my bed bawling when she wakes up. Without a word she climbs onto the bed and holds me. Never once admonishing me for getting myself involved in an impossible relationship. She rests her head against mine. “We’re out of dryer tampons.”

I’m not asking. I groan with a chuckle. Goll darn it, I’m going to miss my Natalie-isms.