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The drive to Corolla Beach took nearly forty-five minutes and Bex, Laney, and Chelsea laughed the entire way. Trevor and his friends had left ahead of them, tasked with finding wood and building the bonfire. As Laney navigated the last few winding miles toward the beach, Chelsea turned down the radio and leaned over the backseat.
“Okay, Bex. We have to tell you something about Corolla Beach.”
“Let me guess. It’s not really a beach? Or, wait, it’s a nude beach?” She waggled her eyebrows but sincerely hoped that wasn’t the case.
“No.” Laney laughed from the driver’s seat. “And, Chelsea, way to make it sound so ominous. It’s not that big of a deal.”
Chelsea gaped. “It’s totally a big deal. Someone died there.”
Bex felt the smile drop from her lips, her blood running cold. “What are you talking about? What do you mean?”
“A girl drowned there when we were freshman.”
Bex could finally breathe again—not that drowning made anything better, but it wasn’t murder. It wasn’t anything like what her father had done.
Allegedly. The voice, nearly a breathless whisper, was at the back of her mind again. She clenched her teeth against the unwanted intrusion. Innocent men don’t run, Bex’s mind ticked. She tried to push her father and his crimes—alleged or otherwise—out of her thoughts.
“That’s awful,” Bex said.
“Yeah. And someone tried to murder a young couple there last summer.”
Bex bit her lip. “And we’re going there, why?”
“Oh”—Chelsea spun back to sit forward in her seat—“that guy got caught. Or died. Or something. It’s not like he’s still out there lurrrrrking in the night, looking for his next kill.” She pounced on Laney, who screamed and swerved the car, its headlights cutting yellow streaks over the dunes and beach grass.
“Chels!” Laney caught Bex’s eye in the rearview mirror. “And by the way, she’s totally lying.”
“I am not,” Chelsea whined, turning her attention back to Bex. “They say the guy who murdered the young couple had a hook for a hand.”
Bex giggled, then heard the tires spin over the sand, trying to gain traction. The girls all jerked when it finally did, the car righting itself on the road with a clunk.
“Why are you trying to kill us?” Laney asked, trying to maintain her anger over her laughter.
But Chelsea wasn’t listening.
She was leaning forward in her seat, hands flat on the dashboard. “Aim that way again,” she said, pointing toward the area where they were nearly beached.
“Why?” Bex asked, picking up the towels and chips that had flopped off the seat when the car lurched.
“I thought I saw something.”
Laney slowed the car but didn’t stop. “What are you talking about? What did you see?”
Chelsea blew out a sharp sigh. “If I knew what it was, I wouldn’t have asked you to light it up, now would I?”
Heat began to prick on Bex’s ears. “You guys, this is a little too horror movie for me,” she said with a nervous giggle. “Can we just get to the beach?”
Chelsea spun to face her. “You just want to get your freak on with Trevor. Like we haven’t noticed him puppy dogging you all week. Turn around, Lane, just for two seconds.”
“It’s probably nothing,” Laney said, turning anyway.
“Could be pirate treasure. Give me the booty!” Chelsea screamed in the worst pirate accent Bex had ever heard. “See? There!” She bounced on the seat as she pointed.
Laney and Bex leaned forward, squinting. “Oh my God, someone’s out there.”
Bex cocked her head. “Is it two people? Are they having sex?”
Laney stopped the car and slammed on the horn, the headlights fully illuminating a pair of bare feet in the sand. She honked two more times, and Bex’s stomach started to fall as a memory nibbled at her periphery.
It was a pretrial hearing in one of those cavernous courtrooms that was supposed to be closed to the public. But it was packed nonetheless.
“Counselor,” one of the attorneys—Beth Anne couldn’t keep their names straight—raised his hand as he stood. She remembered thinking how strange it was that a grown man, a grown man in a suit even, still had to raise his hand when he wanted to speak. “I’d like to request that the defendant’s daughter be excused before viewing the crime scene photographs. She’s only a child—”
“No!” A stocky man from the prosecution’s side of the room jumped up. “She should have to sit here and see what her father done! What he done to my little girl!”