“What?”
“The kiss. Kissing Spence. He was here and he seemed like he liked me and I thought maybe he did like me. He was just … new. He didn’t know me. So I thought that maybe …”
“You thought that no one who does know you could possibly like you.” Alexei is still too close. He sees too much.
“What I’m saying, Alexei, is I’m sorry I dragged you into this. I’m sorry.”
“This isn’t your fault.”
Everything is my fault.
“If I hadn’t kissed Spence — or let Spence kiss me — then you wouldn’t have fought with him and there wouldn’t be any stupid videos online and you wouldn’t have to live in a cave for the rest of your life.”
Then Alexei does the strangest thing.
He laughs.
“Oh, Gracie.” He leans closer, takes my face in his hands and looks straight into my eyes. “I am fairly certain the cave is temporary.”
I hit him in the chest. “You know what I mean!” I say, but Alexei just laughs harder.
He glances at the massive overgrown fortress behind us.
“Now. Are we going in there or aren’t we?”
It takes a half hour to find the entrance. It’s covered by brush and vines. But here, at last, there are signs of life. The vines are crushed, like they’ve recently been pushed aside. And maybe it’s my imagination, but in the dirt I can almost swear that I see footprints.
“Spence?” Alexei asks.
“Maybe,” I say. “I doubt the police would have looked here very hard. Spence was a pretty big guy. If he’d been killed here, it would have been hard for him to end up in the water.”
I squeeze through the vines and step inside, dragging my leg after me. A moment later, Alexei follows. I can feel him at my back as my eyes adjust to the dark. It’s still the hottest day of the year so far, but inside the narrow opening, the air is so much cooler, darker. Dust dances in the slim rays of light that slice through the darkness beyond the entrance. But it’s too dim to see much, so I reach into my pocket for the flashlight I always carry. The light slashes across the space. I watch it sweep across the ancient walls. Moss grows between the cracks in the mortar. The stone floor beneath my feet is dirty and damp. And in it I see footprints, too big to be my own.
Alexei’s gaze catches mine, and I can almost hear what he is thinking. Probably because I’m thinking it, too. And so we follow those footsteps into the shadows, no matter where they might lead.
It’s not a tunnel. Not really. I know I’m not underground, at least not yet. It’s more like a corridor made of stone. Only tiny slivers of light cut through the darkness. Moss and vines creep through the cracks. I see signs of wildlife, too. Probably some small animals have nested here, but there is no other living thing inside the passage now. No movement. No sound. Alexei and I are alone as we walk on and on.
We’re inside the hill by now; we have to be. We’ve been walking for too long, and it’s too dark — too quiet.
Then the passage ends, opening into some kind of chamber or room. All I know is that the air feels different here. When I try to sweep the beam of my flashlight across the walls, the beam stretches then fades, reaching out so far that it doesn’t find an end.
“What is this place, Alexei?”
He says something in Russian, low and under his breath. Then he mutters, “I have no idea.”
Carefully, we go on. When the beam flashes across a giant urn I inch forward. It’s stone, but the interior is black. I rub my finger along the inside and realize it’s coated with soot.
Alexei looks at me. “This is where they used to light their fires,” he explains.
I walk forward, down a wide staircase onto the sunken floor. My light catches other urns. Some stone pedestals that look like places where ancient pillars might have crumbled. I point my light up and see mosaics covering the ceiling above us, catching the light, and I just know in my gut that it is inlaid with gold.
Alexei cranes his head upward, following the light. “Have you ever seen anything like it?”
I have, but I can’t say so.
Alexei looks at me. I can feel his gaze through the darkness. Our hands brush.
“Grace!” Alexei points in the dim light, so I flash the beam across the dusty floor, past cracks in the stone and plants that grow, even in the darkness. “Grace, are those …” I follow Alexei’s gaze, and then my light catches them.
“Footprints. Spence?” I ask.
“Who else?” Alexei shrugs.
Neither of us asks how a West Point cadet could have died here and ended up in the sea. Neither of us worries that in the dark there might be nothing we can find. We just ease forward, following in the footsteps of a dead man.
There are vines overhead. A bird squawks and I jump, suddenly grateful Alexei’s beside me.