The Hollows(31)

He was annoying her. Why, for once in her life, couldn’t someone simply believe what she was saying? It was the curse of being a teenage girl. Everyone always questioned you. Everything was because of hormones or social media or just being young and being a girl. It was infuriating.

‘I’m sure, Ryan. I think they fired the gun and then followed to see what would happen.’

She heard a groaning sound and realised she was making it herself.

‘I’m scared they’re going to do something worse,’ she said. ‘Like, next time they won’t just scare the horses.’

‘But why are they targeting you and not me?’ he asked, visibly shaken by her words. ‘It wasn’t your post.’

‘I don’t know. Maybe they think I’m an easier target. And anyway, the rabbit was left outside your place. They’re probably after both of us. They might be following you too.’

He blinked, his mouth forming a frown, like he’d remembered something.

‘What is it?’ she asked. ‘Has something happened to you?’

‘I don’t know. It’s just . . . a couple of times I’ve felt like I was being watched. Like, you know how you can feel it when there’s someone behind you? That’s happened two or three times but when I turned around there was no one there.’

Something else struck her and she jumped down from the swing. She raked her hands through her hair.

‘What is it?’ he asked.

‘My Hydro Flask. I swear to God I usually watch that thing like a hawk. But it’s possible I put it down for a minute and they took it when I wasn’t paying attention.’

They were both quiet for a minute.

‘Deleting that post clearly wasn’t enough,’ Frankie said. ‘They might not have even noticed it. I think we need to talk to them.’

‘What? You mean, like, DM them?’

‘No. I think we should really talk to them, face-to-face. Apologise and get this over with.’ Even as she said this, it sounded like a terrible idea. But what else was there to do?

He was chewing his thumbnail. She wanted to slap his hand, get it away from his mouth. His knee was bouncing up and down too, and she realised something: he was scared. Maybe even more afraid than her.

‘Who are we going to talk to?’ he asked. He poked a finger at the message on the screen. ‘We don’t know who sent this.’

‘I think I do. I think it’s those freaky kids,’ she said. ‘The ones who said we were trespassing.’

Whenever she pictured the boy, with his close-cropped hair and hollow eyes, a little chill rippled across her skin, making the hairs on her arms stand on end. The girl, surely his sister, wasn’t much better.

‘What makes you think that?’ Ryan asked.

‘Just . . . the way the threats are written. The stuff that was taken. It doesn’t seem like the kind of thing adults would do. And did I tell you I saw them again?’

‘Wait, when?’

‘Yesterday. They were on the path behind me. Here, at the resort.’

He still didn’t seem convinced. ‘You’re only blaming them because we haven’t met any other locals.’

‘Ryan, I’m sure it’s them. But even if it’s not, it’s a small town. I bet they know the person or people who are sending us the threats. If we apologise to them personally maybe they’ll spread the word, tell people to leave us alone.’

Ryan got off the swing. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Why? Are you scared of them?’

‘Those freaks? Of course not. I just don’t think it’s a good idea – going to apologise to these . . . freaks. If it really was them who scared the horses, they’ve got a gun, remember?’

‘But they wouldn’t . . .’

‘Wouldn’t what?’

‘Shoot us in broad daylight in the middle of the street.’

‘You think?’

He was confusing her. But surely it would be safe in public? If these kids really were murderous psychopaths, they wouldn’t merely have fired a gun into the air to frighten the horses. They would have done more than leave a dead rabbit outside the cabins. She’d been walking alone when she’d seen them on the path yesterday. They could have attacked her then. They could have shot her when she was lying alone in the woods after falling from the pony.

‘I can always go on my own,’ she said, having no real intention of doing that. Even if she didn’t believe they would hurt her on their own doorstep, there was no way she would go and face those two without Ryan beside her.

She took a step towards the exit, calling his bluff, and his hand shot out, catching her forearm. The swift movement made her gasp.

‘You’re not going alone,’ he said. Thank God.

‘Then come with me.’

He bit his lip. ‘Maybe we should tell our parents.’

‘No. We can’t. I don’t want my dad to know. He’ll confiscate my phone. Stop us from hanging out together. I think this is the . . . the responsible thing to do.’

The way Ryan was looking at her, impressed by her maturity, made her feel the way she did when she went home with a glowing report card, except multiplied by a hundred because it was him and, unlike her parents, he wasn’t predisposed to be impressed by her. She felt proud. Capable. At the same time, though, she was aware that her courage was built on the flimsiest of foundations.