“You’re welcome to go.”
I study my brother for a long moment, taking in the beachy sweep of his dark hair, the warm glow of his skin. His eyes are bright but hard somehow, and they don’t crinkle at the corners like they usually do when he looks at me. It makes me sad.
“What’s going on?” I ask him. “What happened to you this summer?”
Jonathan sighs. He passes his hand over his face, and when he’s done it looks as if he’s drawn his mouth down farther still. It’s a trick that should end with a reversal, with his hand sweeping everything up into the grin I know so well, but he just stares at me like his heart is breaking. I rise onto my tiptoes and wrap my arms around his neck. When Jonathan hugs me back, he shudders. I’m afraid that he’s crying, but after a few seconds he steps back and gives the end of my ponytail a tug. His eyes are dry.
“I’m okay, Junebug. I’ll be just fine.”
“Why won’t you confide in me?” I can’t keep the hurt out of my voice.
“I’m not trying to keep you out. It’s just…” He puts his hands on his hips and looks over my shoulder to where the moon has drawn a wavy line across the water. “I need some time.”
“Time to what?”
“Figure a few things out.”
“Is this about Cal and Beth?”
He lifts one shoulder. “In a way. But there’s more to it, June. I just can’t share it with you right now.”
“Will you ever?”
“Soon,” he promises.
It’s not nearly enough, but at least I got him to admit that there’s something going on. I’ll take it. “You won’t go home with me?”
Jonathan shakes his head. “I need to stay.”
I can’t for the life of me imagine why he has to stay at what’s supposed to be a fun campout with friends if he’s clearly stopped having fun. But after we roast hot dogs and Phil takes out a guitar and serenades us with classic country in a more than passable voice, a pair of headlights illuminates our camp. It’s after eleven. We all look up to see who’s arrived, but when I glance at Jonathan in the firelight, the set of his jaw assures me that this—whoever it is—is what he’s been waiting for.
Car doors open and slam, but the interior lights are too dim and too far away for me to make out who it is. Four figures approach us in the darkness, but it isn’t until one of them calls out that I realize it’s Sullivan.
“Hey!” he says, entering the circle of light around the fire. “Great night for a fire. Got a chair?”
A few people shift around, spreading out another blanket and moving a handful of roasting sticks that were leaning against a lawn chair. But Sullivan’s not alone, and when the others join our ragtag crew, my mind goes dark as a light switched off. It’s the rest of the Tate brothers. Dalton is just a couple years older than Sullivan but he looks much older than that. Hard living has left his face lined, his expression perpetually harsh. He chews tobacco, and it pulls his mouth to one side as if frozen in a constant sneer. And the other two Tate brothers are no softer. I don’t even know their names, but they’re grown men, clearly out of place among the kids who have gathered around hot dogs and country music. Kids. I haven’t thought of myself as a child in a long time, but next to the Tate brothers I feel small. Naive.
They commandeer chairs and produce bottles that I hadn’t previously seen. They swig and laugh while Phil (who’s roughly their age but half their size and clearly not cut from the same cloth) quietly puts his guitar away and slips off toward the scattering of tents. I’d like to follow him, but Ashley throws an arm around my shoulders and whispers: “Sullivan came!”
“And his brothers,” I mutter under my breath. “They’re not exactly a great fit here.”
“Of course they are! The Tates fit everywhere they go.”
I couldn’t disagree more, but I don’t have a chance to say anything more because Sullivan catches sight of us and comes to sit on our blanket. Ashley scoots over to make room for him and within seconds is regaling him with stories of the weekend. I burn with shame on her other side, trying not to catch Sullivan’s eye and wishing that he would just leave us alone.
It’s my abject avoidance of Sullivan that allows me to see the exact moment that Dalton Tate walks past my brother. He lays one hand on Jonathan’s shoulder, and without saying a single word the two of them move off into the darkness. The older brothers follow.
I’m stunned. The familiarity between Dalton and Jonathan is startling enough, but the fact that the four of them disappeared together makes my stomach flip. I want to chase after them, to figure out what in the world is going on, but when I glance over at Sullivan to see if he’s about to take off too, I find he’s already watching me.
He cuts his chin to the side so slightly I doubt that Ashley even notices. But his intention is clear: no. It’s his eyes that I can’t understand. Sullivan is not amused or flirtatious or cunning. His expression is raw and unmistakable. It’s filled with regret, and something that makes my blood run cold: fear.
CHAPTER 15
WINTER TODAY
Juniper had to drag Willa out of bed on Monday morning, and then practically light a fire underneath her to complete every step of her before-school routine. If Willa would have tolerated it, Juniper would’ve gone so far as to drag a brush through her daughter’s long, dark hair, and spoon-feed her oatmeal while she half slept at the table. But the bathroom door was resolutely locked, and though Juniper wheedled and made vague promises that she hoped Willa found enticing, it was after eight o’clock when the moody thirteen-year-old finally emerged. Her face was scrubbed pink and her hair pulled back in a messy ponytail, but Juniper wondered if she had remembered to brush her teeth. No matter. Willa was dressed and presentable, so Juniper thrust a granola bar at her and ushered her out the door.
“We’re going to be late,” Juniper muttered as she shut and locked the front door behind them.
“Whatever.”
“Okay, I’m going to be late.”
“What’s Cora going to do, fire you?”
Juniper rolled her eyes at Willa’s back. “That’s not the point.” She rummaged in the front pocket of her backpack for her car keys and nearly mowed Willa down when the girl stopped suddenly in the middle of the sidewalk. They both stumbled, and Juniper dropped her keys in the snow. “What the—”
“Look,” Willa said, her tone brittle as the February air.
“At what? Seriously, Willa, my keys are buried in eight inches of snow. A little help here?” Juniper crouched down and plunged her bare hand into the snowbank to retrieve them. When she turned her attention to her daughter, she saw what Willa was pointing at.
The tires of her car were flat. And not just flat; they had been slashed.
Juniper had never seen a slashed tire before, but the six-inch gashes in the otherwise smooth rubber of the two passenger-side tires were a dead giveaway. Pushing past Willa, Juniper hurried to the driver’s side. Those tires had been slashed, too. Her first, visceral emotion was fury. Tires were expensive. She could count on two hundred dollars a piece, plus the cost of a tow… The numbers ticked higher in her head even as she began to realize that she was more scared than angry.