The Dead and the Dark(57)

“Oh.”

“I mean, you meet tons of stray cats on the road, but that doesn’t mean you take them all with you.”

“I’m the stray cat?”

“Obviously.”

“I feel like you’d be the stray cat,” Ashley said. “You’re, like, two steps from being a cat lady now.”

“What’re you trying to say about me?” Logan scoffed.

Ashley arched a brow at her and they both burst into laughter. The sound echoed off the motel walls and that heavy feeling in her chest—that dread—quietly dissolved until Ashley could breathe again.

Logan’s smile was easy. She was only inches from Ashley now, cheek pressed into the mattress, eyes half lidded with sleepiness. It was the first time Ashley had seen laughter make it all the way to her eyes. They danced in the half-light, black and endless as the night outside. Ashley couldn’t remember Logan inching this close to her. Maybe Ashley was the one who’d moved. There was something restless in Logan, magnetic and dark and impossible to ignore. She’d lain across from Tristan like this a hundred times, but she’d never felt this pull.

Ashley held her breath.

“You okay?” Logan asked.

“Yeah, I’m…”

Ashley didn’t know what she was.

Logan’s expression deepened, her smile fading like a dimmed bulb. She propped herself up on one elbow, hovering just above Ashley’s face. Her black hair fell in a curtain between them, brushing gently against Ashley’s cheek. Ashley tasted her heartbeat, tangy and electric on her tongue. She let out one ragged breath, then another. It would be so easy to reach up, to pull Logan to her. She wondered if kissing Logan would make her forget about everything else.

This was a bad idea.

Before Logan could close the space between them, Ashley sat up. Her mind raced between panic and embarrassment.

“I…” Logan collapsed back onto the mattress and covered her face with her hands. “Oh my god, why did I—”

“It’s okay,” Ashley said, too quickly.

Even in the dim light, Logan’s cheeks burned brilliant red. She buried her face in her pillow and let out a long groan.

Ashley tucked her hair behind her ears. She didn’t know what to do with her hands. All at once, the motel room was too small. It was suffocating. The rose-patterned walls were too close, the air was too hot, the ceiling was too low.

“I thought you were…” Logan said.

Ashley fixed her eyes on a shadow in the far corner of the room. Logan’s stare bored into her. “I’m not into girls like that.”

Logan said nothing.

“I’m not into you like that.”

“Cool,” Logan said flatly. “Super cool. Got it the first time.”

They sat there for a moment that felt like a year. Ashley’s heart barreled up her throat, threatened to choke her with panic. Because, for a second, she’d wanted it. She’d wanted it more than she’d wanted anything in a long time. She hadn’t kissed anyone since Tristan. Even now, something tugged in her stomach and she wanted to reach across the bed and kiss Logan like she’d meant to.

“I’m so embarrassed,” Ashley said finally.

“Why are you embarrassed?” Logan cleared her throat. “You’re not the one who … you’re fine. We’re fine. Let’s just forget about it.”

“I should go,” Ashley said.

Logan shook her head. “No way. Not with everything going on. Just crash here and leave in the morning. It’s fine.”

“You’re sure?”

Logan sighed and buried herself under her comforter.

From the nightstand, Ashley’s phone buzzed. She reached across Logan to silence it, and even that felt like too much contact. It felt like danger. The silence was molten. The motel room buzzed with quiet anxiety. It burned in Ashley’s cheeks.

“Good night,” Ashley said.

Logan hummed something that sounded like night from under the comforter. She curled into a ball, pointedly facing away from Ashley like she could minimize physical contact. Ashley reached out and unplugged the string lights and they were left in the hot, stifling dark.





23


The Witching Hour


Beatrice Ursula Gunderson didn’t believe in ghosts.

That said, she did believe her best friend. And if Ashley Barton said the ghost of her missing boyfriend was haunting her, it was at least worth a look.

Bug had tried Ashley’s cell phone at least a dozen times over the last half hour, but she had no luck. Maybe that was for the best, since Ashley refused to look into the real suspects. The Ortiz-Woodley clan had something to do with all of this. Logan’s dads were cult-level weird, sneaking around all over Snakebite, lurking at the library, at the grocery store, at the park. They always whispered like everything they said was a secret.

Once, when she was boating on the lake, Bug was sure she’d seen the one with the glasses just wandering around at the cabin in broad daylight.

The neon BATES MOTEL sign had a brilliant yellow glow at night. For the most part, the lights in the motel rooms were off, but one window on the inside corner was ringed with a halo of soft light. It was probably Logan’s. Bug wondered if Ashley had ever been inside. She couldn’t pretend to understand what Ashley was getting from this friendship.