The Last Time I Lied(81)

It’s possible Vivian stumbled upon something Franny was desperate to keep hidden. Perhaps something worth killing over. Now maybe I’m on the verge of finding it out, too, and this is another warning from Franny.

Her story about the falcons shoots into my brain, breaking through all my other cluttered thoughts. Is that why she told it? To make me frightened enough to stop searching? Did she tell Vivian the same story after she’d been caught in the Lodge?

“It makes more sense than thinking I did it,” I say.

“This is a good person you’re talking about.” Flynn puts down his notebook, pulls out a handkerchief, mops his brow. “Hell, she’s the biggest taxpayer in this county. All this land? That’s a lot of property taxes she pays each year. Yet she’s never complained. Never tried to pay less. In fact, she gives just as much to charity. The main hospital in the county? Guess whose name is on the damn building?”

“All I know is that it wasn’t me,” I say. “It was never me.”

“So you say. But no one knows what happened. We only have your word, which, if you’ll excuse me, seems kind of suspect.”

“Something strange is going on here.”

The detective shoves the handkerchief back in his pocket and gives me an expectant look. “Would you care to elaborate?”

I’d been hoping it wouldn’t reach this point. That Detective Flynn would accept my word as fact and start trying to find out what really happened to Miranda, Krystal, and Sasha. But now there’s no choice. I have to tell him everything. Because maybe everything that happened—the shower, the birds, the person at the window—wasn’t directed at me. Maybe it was meant for one of the girls.

“Someone’s been watching me all week,” I say. “I was spied on in the shower. Someone put birds in the cabin.”

“Birds?” Flynn says, once again reaching for his notebook.

“Crows. Three of them. One morning, I woke up and saw someone standing at the window. They’d vandalized the outside of the cabin.”

“When was this?”

“Two days ago.”

“What was the vandalism?”

“Someone had painted the door.” I hesitate before saying the rest. “They wrote the word liar.”

Flynn’s brows arch. Exactly the reaction I’m expecting. “Interesting word choice. Any reason behind it?”

“Yes,” I say, annoyed. “Maybe to preemptively make sure no one believes me.”

“Or maybe you did it to deflect suspicion from yourself.”

“You think I planned to abduct those girls?”

“That makes about as much sense as everything else you’ve told me,” Flynn says.

My headache flares—a fire at my temples.

This isn’t happening.

I’m not going crazy.

“Someone was watching us,” I say. “Someone was there.”

“It’s hard to believe you without any proof,” Flynn says. “And right now, there’s nothing to back up your story.”

Another realization swerves into my head. One I was too upset to conjure until just now. One that will prove to Flynn he’s wrong about me.

“There is,” I say. “A camera. Pointed right at the cabin door.”





28


The cabin glows green on the monitor, thanks to its night-vision feature. It’s an ugly green. A queasy shade made worse by the camera’s position. Instead of a straight shot from the back of one cabin to the front of Dogwood, it’s been angled downward into a bird’s-eye view that induces vertigo.

“The camera is motion sensitive,” Chet explains. “It starts recording only when movement is detected. It stops when whatever it’s recording also stops moving. Each time the camera records something, a digital file is automatically saved. For instance, this is a paused shot from the night it was installed.”

On-screen, the cabin door is ajar. The motion that triggered the camera. In that sliver of darkness, I can make out a foot and a green-tinted glimpse of leg.

Chet moves to a second monitor—one of three that sit side by side in the Lodge’s basement. While most of the space is filled with tidily stacked boxes and cobwebbed furniture, just as Mindy had predicted on my arrival-day tour, one corner has been outfitted with unpainted drywall and a floor of white linoleum. This is where the monitors reside, sitting on a metal desk with two PC towers slid together like books on a shelf.

Chet occupies a creaky office chair in front of the desk. The rest of us—Theo, Franny, Detective Flynn, and myself—stand behind him.

“This all seems pretty elaborate for one camera at one cabin,” Flynn says.

“It’s just a test camera,” Chet replies. “We’re going to install more throughout the camp. For security reasons. At least, that was the plan.”

Behind him, Franny flinches. Like the rest of us, she knows there won’t be a camp left unless Krystal, Sasha, and Miranda are found by the end of the day. This could very well end her dream of one last glorious summer.

“The camera can also be set to a constant live feed. That’s what this is.” Chet points to the third monitor, a daytime view of Dogwood. “Usually the live feed is turned off because there’s no one to constantly monitor it. I turned it on while we’re all down here, just in case the girls return.”