Reckless Girls(69)

It’s Jake’s machete, and it killed Nico.

He’d had it on the beach the night of the party, too. I’d seen him use it to cut down branches for the fire.

What happened? Had they argued? Had Nico confronted Jake about me? Or had it been something else?

All it would take was one hard blow, and then it would be over. Nico never would have seen it coming.

Like so much about Nico’s life, even his death would have caught him by surprise.

I pick up the machete.

There are flies on the blade, too, Nico’s blood still staining it, and I steel myself, wiping it on a nearby tree to clean it as best I can. It may have killed Nico, but it’s going to save me.





TWENTY-EIGHT





I have to move faster.

You’re a survivor, Lux, Brittany had said after the storm on the boat, and I hope to god she’s right.

I know I’m tougher than I let myself believe. I held that knife on Robbie, and if it had come down to me or him, I know I would’ve killed him.

But I didn’t want to then, and I don’t want to now. I want to get to the Susannah and get out of here.

I want to forget that Meroe Island ever existed.

As I walk, sweat drenches me, stinging my eyes, making the little cuts and scratches on my arms, my shins, my hands, burn. But I keep moving, and as I walk, I think of those sailors again, left to die and rot in what should’ve been an Eden.

I think of the skull we found and wonder where it came from. Who it belonged to.

The more I walk, the hotter I get, my head swimming. I haven’t had any water to drink in ages, and now my body is losing fluid by the gallon, it feels like. My stomach cramps, my brain feels foggy, and I think I hear footsteps behind me.

I whirl around, the machete lifted, but there’s nothing—just leaves, more trees, more jungle.

Robbie’s words about someone living out here are pounding through my brain.

But he had just been fucking with me. There’s no one else here, and that’s almost scarier. No stranger killed Nico, there’s no boogeyman hiding in the jungle: it had to be either Jake, Brittany, or Eliza.

It was one of the people I trusted—one of the people I called a friend.

It would be easier to believe almost anything else, but I don’t have that luxury anymore. I can’t close my eyes to what’s happening around me, and I push on and on, thinking, Just let me get to the other side, let me find the Susannah …

And then, out of nowhere, the jungle thins.

The sun is reflecting off the water, and, I think I see the Susannah’s tall mast.

I break through the foliage to stumble onto the beach, and yes, there she is. Nico’s boat.

My boat.

And there, standing in between me and salvation, are Eliza and Brittany.

They don’t look surprised to see me, even as I lift the machete, the muscles in my arm screaming.

“Lux, stop!” Brittany yells, and then I see sunlight glinting on the gun Eliza points at me.

“Lux, Brittany is right,” she says calmly. “There’s no need for all of this.”

“No need?” I choke out, almost laughing. “One of you fuckers killed Nico.” My voice rises to a scream. “I know it was one of you!”

“And you killed Amma, but you don’t see us making a big deal about it,” Eliza answers, eyebrows raised.

I lower the machete, shaking my head. “I didn’t. It was … she was holding me down, she was trying to drown me … it was self-defense. An accident.”

The sun dances off the water, and it feels so close and so far away all at once.

Freedom. Escape.

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Eliza says, her arms steady. “You’re the one we want to talk to. To explain.”

“Then don’t point a gun at me.”

“Fair enough.”

She lowers it, and for a split second, I think about charging them. But there are two of them, one of me. Besides, I want to hear what she has to say. I need to make sense of this somehow.

Still, I keep my fingers curled around the handle of the machete.

“None of it was supposed to go down like this,” Eliza says. “We were just looking to have a good time.” She flashes that winning smile. “Have an adventure.”

“Amma and I met her when we started traveling,” Brittany adds. “Chloe. Well, Eliza. But when I met her, her name was Chloe.”

“Brittany and I really hit it off,” Eliza goes on, “and we had a similar … let’s say, philosophy about life.”

“Philosophy?” I echo, the word sounding thick in my mouth.

“The world takes a lot from us, doesn’t it? Women like us. Women who don’t get things handed to them. Women without a lot of options. So sometimes, you have to take back. You have to create your own options.”

Her gaze sharpens on me. “I think you get that, don’t you, Lux?”

I don’t answer, the sound of my own heartbeat and the surf loud in my ears.

“So, one night in Rome, I lifted a wallet off these American assholes. They didn’t notice, the cash let us have a little extra fun, no harm, no foul. It felt … satisfying, I guess. And then it became a little more. More wallets, a few watches, once a passport just to fuck with some guy. Then we went to Australia.”