The Last Time I Lied(109)

At the bottom, the front door gapes open. The door itself sits on the floor, all but blending in with the lake bottom. To my left is a sitting room. There’s a hole in the wall where bricks and floorboards and scraps of wallpaper have tumbled out. A striped bass circles the room. I swim out the open door, passing from inside to outside, even though it’s all part of the same watery landscape.

Pain pulses through my body. My lungs burn. I need air. I need sleep. I start to swim upward, heading to the surface, when something catches my eye.

A skull.

Bleached white.

Jaw missing.

Eye sockets aimed at the sky.

Scattered around it are more bones. A dozen, at least. I glimpse the arch of ribs, the curl of fingers, a second skull a few yards from the first.

The girls.

I know because nestled among the bones, shining faintly in the muck, is a length of gold chain and a locket in the shape of a heart. A tiny emerald sits in its center.

Something enters the water behind me. I feel it more than see it—a shuddering of the lake. An arm reaches out and wraps around my waist. Then I’m tugged upward, away from the girls, toward the water’s surface.

Soon we’re breaking through Lake Midnight. I see sky, trees, the camp’s other motorboat bobbing on the water a few yards away. Within it stands Detective Flynn, his gun trained on Chet, who drops the decimated oar.

And I see Theo. Swimming next to me. Arm still around my waist. Lake water sloshing against his chin.

“Are you okay?” he says.

I think of Vivian, Natalie, and Allison lying directly below us.

I think of all the years they spent down there, waiting for me to find them.

So when Theo asks again if I’m okay, I can only nod, choke out a sob, and let the tears flow.





44


I sit in the front seat of Detective Flynn’s police-issued sedan, the hospital a distant memory in the rearview mirror. I ended up being more bruised and battered than I initially thought. The doctor’s diagnosis was startling. A concussion from the oar. A sprained ankle from the fall. Lacerations, dehydration, a persistent headache.

I ended up spending two days in the hospital. The girls were there for one of them. I shared a room with Miranda, and we spent that time complaining about our sorry states, giggling over the ridiculousness of it all and gossiping about the handsome male nurse who worked the morning shift.

Visitors streamed in and out. Sasha and Krystal from the room next door. Miranda’s grandmother—a whirling dervish of Catholic guilt and smothering hugs. Becca dropped by with a book of Ansel Adams photographs, and Casey brought apologies for ever thinking I had tried to hurt the girls of Dogwood. Marc arrived with a stack of gossip mags and the news that he’s back together with Billy the librarian. Even my parents flew in from Florida, a gesture that touched me more than I expected.

We plan to head back to Manhattan later this afternoon. Marc is going to tag along. It’ll be an interesting drive for all parties involved.

For now, though, I have unfinished business to attend to, as Detective Flynn reminds me.

“Here’s what probably happened,” he says. “Based on what she wrote in her diary, Vivian, like you, assumed the worst about Peaceful Valley, Charles Cutler, and Buchanan Harris. She found the location of the asylum and took Allison and Natalie with her to get proof of its existence. From the way you described it, it’s probably very easy to get disoriented down there. They went into the water, swam around the wreckage, never came back up. Accidental drowning.”

Just because I had assumed exactly that doesn’t make dealing with it any easier. Not when I now know that Vivian died the same way her sister did. It’s too tragic to comprehend.

“So there’s nothing to suggest Chet killed them?” I say, knowing it’s impossible.

Flynn shakes his head. “He swears he didn’t do it. I have no reason to doubt him. He was only ten at the time. Besides, there’s still quite a few bones at the bottom of that lake. It’ll take a while to find them all. Until then, we won’t know for certain it’s your friends down there.”

But I already know. It was Vivian, Natalie, and Allison I saw in the depths of the lake. The locket was all the proof I need. Now just thinking about it causes grief to balloon in my chest. A common occurrence over the past two days.

“As for the second group of girls from Dogwood, Chet said he had no plans to hurt them,” Flynn says. “Seems to me like he didn’t know what he was going to do. He was just running on anger, not thinking about the consequences.”

“Where is he now?”

“County jail for the time being. He plans to plead guilty to all charges tomorrow. From there, he’ll probably be transferred to a mental-health facility for an unknown amount of time.”

I’m relieved to hear it. I want Chet to get the help he needs. Because I know a thing or two about seeking vengeance. Like Chet, I’ve felt the desire for revenge burn inside me. It’s singed both of us.

But I’ve healed. Not completely, but definitely getting there.

“And I guess I owe you an apology,” Flynn says. “For not believing you.”

“You were only doing your job.”

“But I should have listened to you more. I was so quick to think you did it because it was the easiest explanation. For that, I’m sorry.”