Bitter Falls (Stillhouse Lake #4)(33)

He looks at Bon, then at me, and says, “What the hell you thinking?” Like he knows Bon. “Oh shit. Boy, I told you to get the money, not kill somebody! Well, we’re in it now.”

“I’ll fix it,” Bon says, and starts walking toward me with the knife. I don’t have time to stall anymore, and panic drowns me for a second before I fight my way through to a plan. It’s not much, but it’s all I have.

I run straight for the darkness looming at the edge of the cliff.

I launch.

But I don’t make it.

Bon’s lunged in pursuit. His arms are just long enough that he takes a hard grip on the back of my shirt and hauls me backward off balance. My arms make windmills as I struggle to keep upright, but he yanks again and I feel myself falling. I twist and hit the stone in a fetal position, head protected, and realize he’s hauling me like a sack back from the edge. “Let go!” I yell, and then I scream. I hear it echo out across the water. Maybe someone—anyone—will hear.

But kids have been out here partying and screaming all night.

Panic is burning a hole in my chest. I punch and kick at Bon as he drags me, and as he bends over to get a better grip, my phone tumbles out of his pocket. I grab it and hold down the button; that brings up an emergency menu, and I hit the button to call 911. I can’t hear when they answer, I just scream, “Help me, I’m up at Killing Rock, I’m being—”

He slaps the phone out of my hand. It skitters across stone to the edge and disappears, and I feel like I’ve lost my only hope. I feel naked now. I can’t call Mom. I can’t call the cops. I don’t even know if the 911 operator heard me at all.

I’m so scared now. This feels final. And I can’t stop crying, tears cold in my eyes and down my cheeks and it all floods through my mind in a rush, all the things I’ll never have again: hugs from my mom, from Sam, from Connor; kisses from pretty girls; movies and games and laughing and running and knowing for sure my mom is coming to save me. It’s all a blur, suddenly, and then it goes still in my mind. Crystal clear.

I have to stay alive on my own.

Nobody’s coming to help.

I stop fighting. I go limp and heavy, but it doesn’t stop Bon’s effortless pull. There’s nothing I can grab on to . . . but then I remember all the things Mom’s taught me. These moves always seemed like a game before. Not now. Now they’re all I have.

I hear her say, If you don’t have anything else, you have to use your own body.

I roll, fast, and Bon’s wrist is turned and his shoulder jerked hard; I set the soles of my running shoes on the rock and lunge up at the waist, breaking his hold on my shirt. I think it rips, but I don’t care. I let momentum work for me; it carries me up into a crouch, and I duck and roll as mullet guy makes a grab for me. “Get her!” Bon says. I dodge.

I spin, coil myself, and leap into a run again for the edge.

I’ve never done this, never jumped off this damn rock, and it’s black down there, no way to tell where the water is, where dangerous rocks could be. I’m jumping blind, but I know instinctively it’s my only shot at making it out of here alive. I’m scared out of my mind as I go off into the dark.

It’s a long two seconds of falling. If I hit a rock, I’ll shatter my legs—maybe not even know I’ve done it until I’m underwater. No no no no no not like this . . . I don’t want to end up drowning. I can’t. Every cell in my body screams at the thought, an incoherent blur of the dreams I’ve had of floating in the water, of my dad’s underwater garden of dead women. Not like this.

I somehow avoid any deadly boulders. I tuck myself and hit the water in an enormous splash that stings like I dove into fire, and I sink, I sink as I unfold and instinctively begin to stroke for the black surface. I think it’s the surface. It’s so dark. I’m blind in the water. If I’ve lost my direction, I could be swimming down. My lungs are already burning, but that’s panic, and I need to stop it before it makes me thrash and lose everything. Calm down. Swim. Break the surface.

It seems like an eternity before I feel air on my flailing fingers, and then my head is up and I take a shuddering gasp. I try to orient myself. Where am I? Close to the shore on the Killing Rock side, but I don’t want to go back there; the beach is practically deserted now, everybody running for the hills, their cars, wherever they can go to get away. The cops. Where are the cops? I can see flashing lights somewhere up on the horizon.

I can’t see Vee anywhere. She left me here. She left me.

I’m a good runner, but I’m not a great swimmer. I get tired fast, and I have to pause to tread water. I know this isn’t safe. Stillhouse Lake is deep, and dark, and people have died in it. Nobody knows I’m out here but Bon and his drug-dealing friend. My phone is gone.

I need to save myself. But I’m tired.

I can’t see if they’re chasing me, but it doesn’t matter. The lake is so cold, and I feel sluggish. I need to get out. Now.

So I swim for shore.

The first police car is pulling around, lights flashing, and there’s an ambulance right behind it. I can’t even feel relieved. I’m too cold.

The two cops who get out of the police car don’t see me swimming toward them. Their backs are to me, and before I can get enough breath to yell, they’re already heading up the path. I wonder if they’re going to think I hurt Candy. That’s a new idea. I don’t like it, and I tread water again. Maybe I shouldn’t go up to the shore.