Chapter 48 Audrey
Audrey
Let’s go,” Melinda says. She gestures with the gun.
“You don’t need that,” Stranger tells her, watching me. “Audrey will come with us.”
I nod tightly. Melinda hesitates, then stows the gun in her purse. “My dog’s in my car,” I say. “I can’t leave him here on his own.”
Not when I don’t know if I’ll be coming back. Or maybe it would be better. Someone will find him here eventually.
“We can take your car,” Melinda concedes.
She gestures for me to go out in front of her, Stranger trailing both of us.
We reach the sidewalk. I chart escape routes.
I could shout for help. Maybe someone would hear me before Melinda managed to get a shot off.
I could run down the road—-surely she wouldn’t just take me out in broad daylight.
Instead, my legs carry me right to my car.
When she sees exactly what my dog’s in my car entails, she pauses, her hand dipping toward her purse again.
“He’s friendly?” she asks.
“He won’t be a problem,” I say quickly. I don’t want her deciding he’s a threat that needs to be dealt with.
“I’ll ride in the back with him,” Stranger suggests.
“Fine. You drive,” Melinda says to me, and I walk stiff--legged around to the driver’s side.
I get in and quickly turn to reassure Barry, whose ears are pricked, his fur bristling at the nape of his neck.
“It’s okay, buddy. They’re friends,” I say as brightly as I can.
Stranger slides in next to him, and he snuffles at her suspiciously before settling onto the bench with a groan, apparently unbothered.
Melinda gets in more cautiously, keeping a wary eye on him.
He looks uncertain, but thumps his tail.
Some guard dog, I think, and I’m grateful. I can’t let him get hurt.
If he does, it will be all my fault. I should have let this go. I should never have started down this road.
“Drive,” Melinda tells me.
I am barely aware of starting the engine and pulling away from the curb. Melinda gives me directions. We head out past town, past Eden Crest. When Melinda gives the direction to turn, I almost miss the narrow dirt road.
I know exactly where we are, of course. I always do. Couldn’t get lost even if I tried, and I know we’re around the other side of Eden Crest, and that if I walked through those woods I’d get to Emily’s house. And to the bunker.
A small log cabin sits tucked a good half mile back from the main road. Another car is already here.
“Andrew,” Stranger says, voice tense. I throw the car into park. “Stay,” I tell Barry firmly.
“Leave your phone,” Melinda instructs. I toss it onto the seat. Barry whines as I shut the door. He stands on the back bench, clearly confused as to why I’m walking away and leaving him there.
Stranger is already starting for the house. And then she halts as a scream splits the air.
Meghan.
Stranger takes off running. I’m half a second behind her, Melinda lagging in her heels. Barry barks frantically behind us, nails scrabbling at the door, but I don’t look back.
There’s another yell. I put on a burst of speed, but I’m still five steps behind Stranger as we burst from the thick trees into a small clearing to find the source of the noise.
Andrew Hill stands in the middle of the clearing, his hand -tangled in Meghan’s hair. Meghan is on her knees, head wrenched back, grabbing at his arm. In his other hand, he holds a gun.
“Andrew!” Stranger shouts. I skid to a stop a few feet from her. Meghan pants, holding on to Andrew’s arm with both hands. “Stop. Put the gun down.” She holds her hand out in a restraining gesture.
“Damn it,” Andrew says. “What are you—-why is she here?” He looks to me.
“Because she knows,” Melinda says, approaching. Her own gun is in her hands again, small and gleaming, but she keeps it pointed at the ground.
Andrew laughs. “We’re just telling everyone now?”
“Let Meghan go,” Stranger says. I stay quiet, stay to the side, and watch Andrew’s grip on Meghan’s hair. I don’t like how close to her his weapon is.
“She told Liam she was going to the police,” Andrew says.
Stranger makes a noise in the back of her throat. “Meghan,” she says softly. “You promised. You said you understood.”
Meghan’s face is streaked with tears. She thrashes in Andrew’s unrelenting grip.
“They can’t get away with everything,” she says.
“What they did to you. You left the beads in the woods. You made the handprints. I thought you were the witch and you were supposed to help me, but it was the other way around.” Her eyes are wide and wild.
“I didn’t need help. I made my choices,” Stranger says, shaking her head. But Meghan bares her teeth, her anger too righteous to be tamed.
“There’s no way out this time,” Melinda says softly.
Her expression is almost one of relief. They might have skated by pleading ignorance of the bunker and all those bodies.
But now? Meghan’s disappearance might go unnoticed, but getting rid of me will only intensify the investigation.
It’s a strange knot, but not a hard one to untangle. They’ll be found out. All of them.
But Andrew is shaking his head. His eyes well with tears. “After everything we did? We buried our sister in the woods, Melinda. We left all those girls out there to protect our family. And it worked. We paid the price, and we were happy. You were happy,” he says to Stranger, almost pleading.
“Was I?” she asks, head tilting. “Is that what you thought, Andrew? Did you think we were friends, all this time? That we were family?”
His face goes hard. He lifts the gun. It points straight at Stranger’s chest. “No. I guess not.”
“Andrew,” Melinda says warningly, but he doesn’t falter.
“We don’t have a choice,” Andrew says. “You’re the one who always talks about protecting our family.”
“I don’t want your protection,” Melinda says. Her voice cracks. “And Liam doesn’t need it. Not anymore.”
“What are you talking about?” Andrew demands.
“He’s dead,” Stranger says bluntly. “He knew what he’d done and what you were going to do, and just like before, he was too much of a coward to do the right thing. He always thought feeling bad about it was enough.”
Andrew’s eyes swim with confusion. Melinda takes a breath. “He OD’d. After he told you, I guess, and he hadn’t used in two years, maybe he couldn’t handle the dose anymore . . .”
For a moment, I think Andrew is going to put the gun down. But then his expression shutters, hardens. I know that look. This possibility, his brother’s death, has haunted him long enough that his grieving was done a long time ago.
He clenches his back teeth. “Here’s an idea, Melinda.
You’re the expert, tell me what you think.
The police find Audrey’s body. We turn in that diary of Emily’s—-minus the final chapter.
We’re horrified to discover that it was Dad after all, and Emily followed in his footsteps.
Liam found out. Couldn’t handle it. And Emily’s nowhere to be found, of course.
We say she killed Audrey. The girl, too, if it even comes up.
Not like anyone’s looking for her. Maybe you don’t get that Senate seat after all, but we move on. ”
“What do you do with me, then?” Stranger asks viciously.
“I suppose you could always bury my body in the woods somewhere. Even if they run DNA, they’ll think they’re looking for Emily Hill, right?
No match, no problem.” There’s a curl of a smile at the corner of her mouth.
She’s provoking him, can’t she see that?
But of course she can. She hasn’t survived this long wearing his dead sister’s name without knowing exactly how far she can push things.
“This is ridiculous. He’s not killing anyone,” Melinda says, stepping forward.
But Stranger isn’t done. “Oh, but Melinda’s a problem, isn’t she? Can’t trust her to keep her mouth shut. That’s okay, you can always blame crazy Emily for killing her, too. Although at that point, they would look at you. That’s a problem.”
Andrew’s face is empty now. There is no more grief there, no more rage, and my blood runs suddenly cold. Because that is the face of a man without hope, and without a future.
And there’s nothing more dangerous.
“There’s only ever been one problem, and we should have dealt with it years ago,” Andrew says, and, gun still pointed at Stranger’s chest, he squeezes the trigger.
I tense, caught between the instinct to leap toward him and to flee. Melinda is faster.
“No!” Stranger yells. I scream, an involuntary noise tearing from my throat as Melinda staggers, a circle of blood at her chest. One faltering step, and then she falls. Stranger half catches her, sinking to the ground with Melinda in her lap.
Andrew stares. His grip on Meghan falters.
“Meghan, run!” I shout. She doesn’t take further urging. She scrambles away and is on her feet in a flash. Andrew doesn’t seem to notice. He stares at his sister.
I should follow Meghan. Instead, I duck forward, pulling off the light jacket I’m wearing to press it against the wound.
“Help her,” Stranger says, grabbing at my arm. “You know what to do. They train you.”
They train me enough to know that nothing I can do is going to help.
Melinda is trying to move. Or her body is.
I’ve seen this strange, slow movement before, on an older man who’d fallen rock climbing.
I’ve heard the labored, uneven breaths, the strange groan.
Agonal breathing. It isn’t really breathing at all, just the last--ditch reflex of a brain deprived of oxygen.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I can’t—-” But Melinda is already gone, blood--flecked face slack, eyes empty.
And I’ve lost my chance to run. Because Andrew still has the gun, hovering over us. And he has no way out at all.
He’s got nothing but anger he’s kept in check for years, and a life he did the unthinkable to protect dissolving with every dying breath in his sister’s lungs.
Andrew Hill isn’t going to let himself go to jail.
I think he and I realize it at the same time—-the inevitability of what happens next. In that moment, we lock eyes. But the shock of what he’s just done makes him slow. I move first.
I fling myself toward Andrew. He tries to track me with the gun, but I collide with his legs. We both go down. His weight lands on top of me. I twist under him, trying to see the gun, and then it’s all I can see, filling my vision as he straddles me.
I have time to think the words clearly—-I am going to die—-before the gun goes off.
It takes me another moment to realize that the ringing in my ears means a bullet hasn’t hit me.
Stranger has clamped her teeth onto Andrew’s wrist, both hands gripping his arm.
He bellows in pain and shoves her away, but she wraps herself around him, a howl tearing from her throat.
Her fingers wrap around the butt of the pistol. She rips it free. I scramble for it.
Stranger makes a noise of pain, followed by a thump. My hand reaches for the gun—-and something grabs me, yanks me away.
I flip onto my back. Then Andrew is on top of me, one huge hand around my throat, squeezing.
A fist thuds into my side, quick jabs that make my whole body seize up with pain.
I can barely see, have lost all sense of my body and his except for weight and pain and a horrible pressure against my throat.
I can hear him breathing, ragged gasps. His spit strikes my face.
In my peripheral vision, I can see Stranger. She’s moving, hand to her temple. Too slow, too weak to help. My vision fades to gray, to black.
They’ll know, I think. They’ll find us. They’ll find all of them. Every lost girl. Every ghost will have a name. At least there’s that.
There comes a faint clicking, clattering. Like beads rattling in the wind; like fingernails on a windowpane. I need to tell you something, a voice whispers in my ear.
And then I hear something else. A churning of gravel, and a terrible noise like the grinding of stones.
Andrew Hill begins to scream.