“Hey,” Zeke called to them. “Sorry to bother you, but would you happen to have a cell phone we could borrow?” He gestured to the dripping bag hanging from his shoulder with a chagrinned expression. “Mine sort of took a bath.”
Squinting in the bright sunlight, the nearest girl propped herself up on her elbow and then shielded her eyes with a hand. “What?”
“A cell phone. Could we borrow one? It’ll only take a second. She just needs to call our ride.”
He nodded to me. The girl looked between us and then glanced to her friends.
“Uh, okay,” she allowed. “Sure.”
She reached over and fumbled her cell from her bag. Extending it to him, she studied him cautiously.
“Thanks,” Zeke said, taking the phone and then handing it to me.
We retreated till a few yards separated us from the girls.
Her gaze tracked us.
I swallowed uncomfortably and then dialed Baylie’s number. Moments passed while it rang.
“Hello?”
“Baylie?” I let out a breath, nervous and relieved to hear her voice at the same time. “It’s Chloe.”
Silence answered me.
“Baylie? Are you there?”
“Uh, yeah. Hey, Sandra. What’s up?”
My brow drew down in alarm at her stepmother’s name. “Sandra? It’s–”
She laughed, the sound tight and forced. “That’s great. Listen, I can’t really talk right now. What did you need?”
I paused. “Are you okay?” I asked carefully.
A heartbeat passed. “Sorry, the connection’s bad. What’d you need?”
I hesitated. “A ride.”
She didn’t respond.
“Baylie? Baylie, please. What’s going on?”
She gave a small chuckle, the sound even more forced than before. Rustling came from the other end, like she was moving. “And, uh, where was that again?”
I exhaled. Several feet away, Zeke watched me, his body practically radiating caution.
“Mariposa Beach.” I glanced around, looking for a landmark. “Maybe a half mile from a pier. Baylie–”
A nervous cough came from the other end of the line, cutting me off. “Okay, well, uh… yeah.” The laugh returned, the noise so unlike her that it made my skin crawl. “Look, I, uh…” The rustling sounded again. “I’ve got to run, but I’ll get you those souvenirs I promised just as soon as I can, alright? Bye.”
The line went dead.
I lowered the phone.
“What happened?” Zeke asked warily.
I shook my head. Glancing to the girls on the beach towels, I pushed a smile onto my face and then walked over to them.
“Thanks,” I told the blonde girl, handing her the phone.
She nodded.
I turned away, heading back toward Zeke.
“Chloe?” he pressed.
I continued walking. “Something’s wrong.”
“Wrong how?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know.”
My brow furrowed as I dropped my gaze to the sand. She’d said she couldn’t talk. She hadn’t wanted anyone to know it was me.
“Was that guy there?” Zeke asked.
I blinked and glanced to him.
His eyebrow twitched up.
I looked away, my stomach churning at the way he’d put words to my fear. But Noah wouldn’t hurt her. At worst – really,
stupidly
worst – he’d only be mad she was speaking to me.
Though that was completely deranged. He couldn’t keep Baylie from talking to her friends.
Even if they
were
‘scaly, scum-sucking fish’.
Anger shivered through me at the memory of his words.
“Did she say she was coming to get you?”
Distantly, I nodded.
“Did he hear that?”
I didn’t answer, staring unseeing at the cars in the crowded parking lot. This was dumb. Noah may have decided he hated me, though God knew why, but he wasn’t a monster.
At least, not that kind of monster.
“Chloe?”
Blinking, I looked to Zeke and shook my head. “I-I don’t know.”
His mouth tightened. “We need to get out of here,” he said flatly.
I grimaced.
“Chloe, we can’t risk–”
He cut off as a young couple strolled past us.
“We don’t have a choice,” I replied, keeping my voice low as the couple walked away. “I need to get away from the ocean, Zeke. Baylie’s my best shot. She knows where I am, she has a car, and she said she’d get here just as soon as she could.”
Frustration twisted his face. “And maybe he’ll follow her.”
I looked away. There was that chance, ridiculous as it was.
But I’d already disappeared on her once before. I’d promised I wouldn’t, that night I came back on a bus after my distance from the ocean had nearly driven me insane. But I had.
And the water wasn’t safe either. The ghost of a knife slice on my leg proved that.
Zeke sighed. I glanced over at him.
“Or we could watch for her,” he relented, though he sounded grudging about it. “Make sure.”
A grateful smile pulled at my lip.
He shook his head at the expression. “From someplace a little more out of sight, though,” he insisted with a dark glance to the crowds.
I nodded.
Still looking reluctant, he turned and led the way from the beach.
Chapter Twenty-One
Noah
Footsteps pounded on the stairs. I glanced away from the book I couldn’t remember a moment of reading.
Baylie rounded the landing and then ducked into my bedroom. “Can I talk to you?” she whispered.
My brow drew down. It’d been days since she’d wanted to be in the same room with me, let alone talk. Cautiously, I set the book aside and swung my legs off my bed. “What is it?”
She cast a nervous glance over her shoulder and then shut the door. “Chloe just called.”
I froze, my blood pressure spiking. “Is she alright?”
Baylie nodded. “I-I think so.”
Remembering how to breathe, I dropped my gaze to the floor as my senses stretched out, searching for the other greliarans in the house.
Everyone was downstairs. Maddox was in the kitchen. Dad was on the patio with Richard. And my cousins…
“She needed a ride,” Baylie continued.
“Was anyone around when she said that?” I asked distantly, focused on the four of them. They were all together, in the front room from the feel of it, and that was worrisome.
Typically, they stayed spread out at the back of the house to keep a better watch for dehaians.
Baylie made a negative noise. “I stayed as far from everybody as I could and didn’t let on that she’d called. I don’t think anyone heard.”
I hoped she was right.
And I wondered why in the world Chloe wanted a ride.
“Noah…”
I looked back up at Baylie.
“What’s going
on
?” she asked, desperation in her blue eyes. “I know the… the thing about you, Maddox, and Peter. But Diane, she wouldn’t tell me anything about Chloe. She only said Chloe was involved with that somehow, and wasn’t missing like you guys told the cops. She just had to go away for a while.”
I tried not to grimace. Diane and her respect for people’s privacy. It was wonderful most of the time.
Except for ones like right now.
“But,” Baylie continued, “she also said that these cousins and uncle of yours… she told me to stay away from them. Made me swear not to say a word about Chloe around them either, like maybe they’re a danger to her or something. I don’t understand what’s happening, Noah. You’re…” She searched for a term and failed. “And then there’s these other people no one seems to want around. My best friend’s disappeared and nobody will tell me why, even though they swear she’s okay. And now she just calls from Marip–”
I rose quickly, holding up a hand to silence her. She flinched back, a terrified look on her face like she thought I’d do something to her.
It made me feel sick.
“Please, Baylie. Don’t say where she is.”
She nodded jerkily.
I let out a breath, checking downstairs again. No one had moved, and thus they probably hadn’t heard.
Hopefully.
“Look,” I tried, refocusing. “I swear to you that you’re safe around me, alright? I would never, in all my life,
ever
hurt you. And neither would Maddox or Dad. We’re still the same people we’ve always been. So please.
Please
try to believe I’m not a monster?”
She made a desperate noise. “I don’t–”
I stepped forward and she flinched again.
Chagrin colored her face.
“Sorry,” she whispered.
I nodded.
“It’s just…”
“Weird,” I finished for her.
“Scary.”
I wasn’t sure what to say.
“Does it… you know, hurt?” she asked.
I hesitated and then shook my head.
She drew an unsteady breath. “Is Chloe like you?”
For a heartbeat, I searched for a response. Chloe had been so worried about telling Baylie the truth, and after how things had gone the past few days, I couldn’t blame her. Sure, finding out nearly everyone around you wasn’t human wasn’t easy. But I didn’t want Baylie to look at Chloe the way she’d been looking at me for the last week. Chloe’d had enough trouble with how people treated her today.
And maybe this was her secret to share.
“No.”
“So why–”
“Baylie, she’s not. She’s just… she’s your friend. And…”
I hesitated, wishing I could do more than this. Be the one to go find her, even if I knew the odds of me getting away from my cousins were small.
“And she needs your help,” I continued. “So you go pick her up and whatever you do, don’t bring her back here. Just get her in the car and take her wherever she needs to go. And if you’re heading away from the ocean and she tells you to stop, you have to, alright? No matter what.”
She stared at me like I was insane.
“Please,” I begged her.
Questions rose in her eyes, but after a heartbeat, they died. “Okay,” she agreed uncertainly.
“Thank you.”
She nodded.
I drew a breath. “Alright. Head downstairs and I’ll try to distract–”
All four cousins vanished from my awareness.
A curse escaped me. Baylie stumbled aside as I tore across the room and yanked open the door.
I made it to the base of the stairs and found Wyatt leaning on the open doorway with his brothers by the car in the driveway beyond.
“Problem, cuz?” he asked mildly.
I shivered. He looked like a cat with a canary, if that cat was the size of a several-hundred-pound weightlifter.
And more bloodthirsty.
“What are you–”
“Oh, we just wanted your attention,” Wyatt replied. He glanced to Baylie. “Doesn’t help to go in the other room, girl. We can still hear you.” He winked at her and then returned his attention to me. “And now we’re going fishing.”
Owen grinned and then climbed into the car.
I shoved past Wyatt, heading for him.
Clay stepped into my path as the engine started. Cracks tried to spread through my skin as he grabbed me, and only the fact we were in view of the neighborhood kept me from letting them spread farther.
Baylie shrieked. I looked over my shoulder to see Wyatt snag her arm and yank her to him.
“Hey!” Maddox shouted from deeper in the house. I could feel him running toward us as I shoved at Clay, fighting to break his grip.
Wyatt muscled Baylie forward, driving her down the stairs at his side. Desperately, she swung a fist at him.
He paid it no attention.
“Take her!” he yelled at Brock, and shoved Baylie to him.
Brock caught her as she stumbled, and he swiftly wrenched her arm behind her back. She cried out with pain as he propelled her ahead of him toward the car.
“What do you think?” Wyatt called to me. “Nice bait, eh?”
Ignoring him, I twisted in Clay’s grasp and then slammed an elbow into his side. He choked, his grip loosening.
I ran for Baylie.
In the car, Owen twisted in his seat and threw open the rear door. Brock forced her toward the vehicle.
I swung a fist at his head.
Brock staggered, his hold on Baylie breaking. She tumbled to the ground.
Clay grabbed me, pulling me backward. I turned, spotting Maddox at the base of the porch steps, his arms pinning both of Wyatt’s to keep him from following.
“Hey!” Dad shouted. He rushed outside. “Break it up!”
He shoved Maddox and Wyatt apart and then stormed toward us. Behind him, Richard strolled onto the porch, his gaze taking in his sons, the car, and Baylie on the ground with one unconcerned sweep.
“What the hell is this?” Dad demanded, helping Baylie to her feet.
“Ask them,” I snapped, jerking my head toward Owen and Brock by the car. “They’re the ones who just tried to kidnap Baylie.”
“Now, hang on,” Richard interjected. “Who says they were
kidnapping
her?”
“Them,” Baylie said. She looked up at my dad. “They called me bait.”
Dad paused, studying her. Marks showed on her arms, red and vivid and promising deep bruises to come, while her palms were scraped and bloodied from the fall to the driveway.
And his face darkened.
“Is this true?” he asked them.
I swallowed, recognizing the dangerously low tone.
Even if my cousins didn’t.
Wyatt scoffed. “Come on, Uncle Peter. That thing is waiting for her! Maybe others are too. If we put this girl out there, who knows how many we might–”
Dad strode toward him. Wyatt’s eyes went wide and he retreated a step.
“Peter,” Richard started.
“You were going to use Baylie as
bait
?” Dad snapped. “For
them
?”
Wyatt blanched. “I–”
“Get out,” Dad snarled. “All of you. I brought you here to keep my family protected, and if you…” He shook his head. I could see him fighting to keep control. “You’re done. Go home. Now.”
“Wait a minute,” Richard protested, descending the stairs. “Now, my boys wouldn’t have put the girl in any real danger. She was just being stubborn about her friend. And besides, those creatures are still out there. You can’t honestly expect us to just leave them be, when they’re–”
“Enough!” Dad ordered. Muscles jumped in his jaw. “Enough, Richard. Go home.”
Richard watched him for a moment. Contempt twitched his lip. “Coward.”