Shadowlands (Shadowlands (Hyperion)) (21 page)

After a while, I walked down the steps and out onto the beach, sitting down in the cold, freshly smoothed sand. Dawn was rapidly approaching, and I wanted to watch the sun come up. It was something my mother, Darcy, and I used to do together when we were little, down in Ocean City. She’d wake us up when it was still dark out and cuddle me into my stroller, then carry Darcy down to the water while she pushed me ahead of them. I’d doze off on the way, but she’d always wake me just when the sky began to turn pink. Then we’d both crawl into her lap and nestle there as we watched the first light creep toward us over the water and up the beach. Watched the gift of a new day opening at our feet.

That’s what she’d always called it. A gift. I’d never realized how right she was until now.

Had my mother ever been to Juniper Landing? Had she ever watched this particular sunrise?

I took a deep breath and let it out. A tickle skittered down my spine as I felt Tristan approaching. His feet stepped up next to me in the sand.

“You want to talk about it?” he asked.

I shook my head and hugged my knees to my chest. “Not yet.”

He dropped down next to me, pulling his legs up to his chin. I listened to the rhythmic sound of his breathing and stared down at his leather bracelet, his hand pressed into the sand near my hip.

“Is he gone?” I asked after a while. “Steven Nell. Is he really gone?”

“Oh, he’s gone,” Tristan said, lifting his chin a bit as the first haze of pink appeared on the horizon.

“What about Olive?” I asked. “And the singer from the park?”

“They’ve…moved on,” Tristan said carefully.

“And the guy with the hat?” I asked.

“Him, too.” He didn’t even pause. He knew exactly who I was talking about.

“So when Mrs. Chen said Olive had sent for her stuff…”

“That was a lie,” Tristan said frankly. “Krista messed up. It happens. Rarely, but it does. Of course, usually there’s no one checking up on the visitors so…you made things a little more complex.”

No one checking up. That’s why Darcy forgot her. Why Aaron forgot her. Why the locals remembered her. It made it simpler. But then, why did I remember?

“She was still there that day, when you came by with Aaron,” he said. “Joaquin went over there with her, and they were almost done cleaning out her stuff when you got there, but Krista was still in the room. She told me she hid in the closet until you left.”

I knew it. I knew someone was in there.

I turned in the sand to face him, and he turned to face me. I crossed my legs just like his, and our knees touched.

“I need you to say it, Tristan,” I said, my voice cracking. “Just tell me. Just say it out loud. Is this what I think it is? Am I…?”

I couldn’t make myself utter the word that clung to the tip of my tongue. I couldn’t force it out. It was too unbelievable. Too surreal. Too wrong.

Tristan reached for one hand, then the other. He held them both between us, his fingers warm like the sun that was now bursting forth from the horizon.

“I’m so sorry, Rory, but yes, it’s exactly what you think,” he said. “You, your sister, your father…all of us here on the island…we’re all dead.”

This book would not have come to fruition without the endless hard work and patience of the dream team: Lanie Davis, Emily Meehan, Sara Shandler, Josh Bank, and Sarah Burnes. It’s been a crazy ride, and it’s only just begun!