The Summer We Fell (The Summer, #1)(85)

“Juliet already checked the beach, but maybe we should check again,” Luke suggests.

Liam starts putting on his shoes. “I’ll go up to the top of the cliff. The view’s better from there.”

Caleb and Beck go with him while the rest of us continue onto the beach.

Fix this, fix this, I plead to God, well aware it’s useless.

Ask and ye shall receive? I’ve been asking for years, and God has not lifted a fucking finger on my behalf. I’m asking and asking now, when it’s never mattered more, when it involves someone more worthy than me of God’s attention, and all I get is fucking silence.

We trudge through the sand, and I come to a dead stop at the glint of white and yellow in the water.

“Luke,” says Harrison, “isn’t that your board?”

We all stare.

Half of Luke’s favorite board bobs calmly, trapped in the rocks. My stomach plummets, as if some much wiser part of myself already knows what’s about to unfold.

“Yeah,” Luke says hoarsely. “Looks like it.”

“He wouldn’t have tried to surf,” says Harrison. “Right? He argued against it yesterday. And no one could have done that in the dark.”

Let there be another explanation. Any other explanation.

Luke’s eyes catch mine. “I think we need to call the police.”

Any minute now, Danny could walk out here yawning, wondering what the fuss is about. But I nod, my hands shaking so badly I have to hand the phone to Harrison.

I walk away while he’s talking to them. And turn to see Caleb walking down the cliff, Danny’s shoes in one hand.

The shock of it is a sonic blast, a force that levels me, and I sink into the sand, dizzy and dazed.

The guys are wide-eyed, saying things I can’t hear.

Danny jumped with Luke’s board. In the dark. He probably wouldn’t even have been able to see where he was landing. There’d have been little chance of him surviving even if the board didn’t break.

But it did.

I rock in place with my knees against my chest, and Luke tells Libby to stay with me as they go to the house to wait for the police, but I can’t really process it.

“This can’t be happening,” I whisper again and again. Was he trying to prove something to himself, or had he just given up? I guess it doesn’t matter—either way it’s my fault.

I need to call Donna. But oh my God. How am I ever going to tell her this?

“I’m going to get her a blanket,” Libby says and then she’s gone.

The waves crash and the wind picks up again, and when it settles, Grady speaks. “This is your fault,” he whispers, his voice broken.

I blink, uncomprehending. “What?”

“Your little love triangle with Luke and Danny,” he hisses, brushing at the tears on his face.

“Danny catches you together and suddenly disappears, and the only piece of evidence that remains is Luke’s surfboard. Luke, who’s constantly starting fights on your behalf and who fought with Danny over you last night. Surely even you can put those pieces together, Juliet.”

I stare at him. For a moment, I’m simply too numb, too destroyed, to understand what he’s saying.

Yes, I know it’s my fault, but then…that word “evidence” catches in my brain.

Evidence. Luke’s fights. Luke’s arguments.

He’s blaming Luke. And he’s trying to make it sound like this was intentional. “What the fuck, Grady? Danny’s—” My voice breaks and I have to swallow hard to hold it together. “Danny may be

dead and you’re sitting there creating conspiracy theories? Maybe you should have gotten a little more sleep last night.”

It was the wrong thing to say.

His eyes narrow. “Conspiracy? Tell me how I’m wrong. We all saw them argue last night and watched Luke take off after you. Then Danny catches you with him and a few hours later he’s dead and the only piece of evidence is Luke’s smashed board in the water. A child could see what happened.”

My stomach drops. It’s insane, but when he spells all this out for the police, they’re going to agree with him. Every fucking thing that’s happened is pointed straight at Luke.

The police will look at the incidents he’s been involved in. They’ll look at the part where he threatened to drown that kid.

They’ll hear from everyone in the house about the argument last night between Danny and Luke, about how they heard Danny shouting at someone on the beach. Then half of Rhodes will come forward to mention Luke defending me after the pastor’s funeral.

Luke, who was out on the beach last night for hours, with no alibi. Luke, whose surfboard is the only evidence they have. Even if they can’t pin it on him, he’ll lose his sponsors for sure.

“Grady,” I plead, “you know Luke would never do this. Please don’t tell anyone about my conversation with Danny. He was being…irrational. He sensed we were drifting apart and he was saying all kinds of crazy stuff.”

“Danny wasn’t crazy, and don’t you dare try to imply he was. The only thing that was crazy was that he didn’t see it sooner. I kept telling him and he wouldn’t listen.”

Oh, God. What has Grady been saying and for how long? And why did Danny never ask me? Why didn’t he just end things?