“Fireworks caused the fire. That’s what the police said.” He pulled out his phone and glanced at it. “Damn. I’ve gotta get to AP Chem.” Not that Sean needed to worry about angering my aunt by being late to her class. With our school’s highest GPA, he was the top candidate for the Upstanding Citizen Award, which came with a full college scholarship. If I knew Sean, he’d finish with the best grade in the class.
Unlike me. I’d be thrilled if I got a C in basic chem.
I went in the other direction, toward calc. Inside, I took my usual seat—front right and next to the window so I could look outside if I got bored.
The teacher clapped her hands. “Okay, everyone. Let’s get settled.”
Since I couldn’t start school with everyone else in September, Sean had brought me my assignments, but I was barely squeaking by in some of my classes. It was time to get to work. I opened my notebook and clicked my pen.
When I looked down, my heart stopped. I stared at the top corner of the white laminate desk surface where someone had drawn a tiny hummingbird in dark blue ink.
My hand flew to my right hip, and I traced the identical pattern. Brianna and I had used fake IDs to get matching tattoos earlier this summer. The fact that this one looked exactly like mine was just a coincidence. It couldn’t mean anything.
An intense longing for my friend rushed through me, and tears swam in my eyes all over again. Jeez, I was hopeless.
The teacher’s sympathetic gaze sliding my way only made things worse. She nudged her head toward the hall and lifted her eyebrows.
Running from the classroom, I went to my locker and dumped my stuff. I pressed my forehead against the cold metal until my ragged breathing eased.
This…wasn’t going to work. Not today, anyway.
Slamming my locker closed, I ran.
I shouldn’t be afraid to go downstairs. This was my house now that my parents had died.
The creak of my bedroom door sent a quiver down my spine. Old houses have rusty hinges, plumbing that sputters, and wooden floorboards that protest whenever you walk across them. History, my dad used to say. No, it felt creepy. Out on the landing, I peered down. My aunt had left a light on in the dining room, and a yellow beam bled across the carpet covering the entryway and glinted on the table where my parents had always dropped their car keys. Where Aunt Kristy dropped her car keys, now.
Somewhere deeper in the house, a man spoke, but I couldn’t make out his words.
Barefoot, I tiptoed down the staircase to the first floor. While I could poke my head into the study—where I’d determined the voices came from—and tell my aunt what I was doing, why bother? I could dart into the kitchen, drink fast, and scoot back to my room without her knowing I’d been near.
“…haven’t told her?” the man said.
Abandoning my thirst, I slipped through the living room and hovered against the wall beside the almost-closed study door.
“… need to know…” my aunt said. “I…best if she never knows. Janie’s…fragile.”
Great. She was talking about me with some man.
Nothing good ever came from eavesdropping, especially when you were the subject of the conversation. Part of me wanted to run back upstairs and jump under my blankets. Hide.
Curiosity only killed cats, not teenage girls.
I leaned forward, tilting my head to place my ear closer to the opening.
The hardwood floor groaned as the man shifted. “I think you—”
“This is a closed subject,” Aunt Kristy said crisply. “Are we clear?”
A long moment passed. “You are her guardian.” She’d applied for that honor a day after the police called her.
“Legally,” the man added, “It’s up to you to tell her or withhold the information.”
“Exactly,” Aunt Kristy grated out. “Is there anything else we need to discuss before you leave?” A chair screeched across the floor as if she’d shoved it back to stand.
“No,” the man said. “Just doing my duty, delivering the report as requested, now that—”
“Thank you. I appreciate your efforts on our behalf.”
“Anytime, Ma’am.”
“Let me walk you out.” Footsteps approached, and my heart leaped against my ribcage. Pivoting, I raced into the living room and stared around frantically before diving behind the sofa. I landed on the carpet, jarring my hip against the wall. Breathing fast, I lay still, listening. As my aunt and the man crossed the living room, my hands grew clammy with sweat.
“Thank you for coming,” Aunt Kristy said. “I know you’re busy at the station.”
Station? I crept forward to peer around the end of the sofa.
Aunt Kristy unlocked and pulled open the front door.
A cop stood with her in the entryway. After dropping his hat onto his head, he grunted. “Let me know if there’s anything else we can do.”
“Thanks.” My aunt’s hands twitched as he stepped out onto the porch. His footsteps retreated, and a car door slammed. The engine fired.
Aunt Kristy shut the front door and slumped against it. She swiped her dark hair off her face with trembling hands. “Just what I needed,” she growled. The click of her heels echoed as she strode into the study.
Because I didn’t want to get caught snooping, I waited until she went upstairs, shutting the lights off behind her. Rising, I crept to my father’s study and clicked on my phone light. Dad’s oak desk sat sentry on the opposite side of the room with two windows overlooking the inky backyard behind. My heart pinching, I crossed to the back of his desk where I pulled out his chair and sat.
This chair had hosted my pretend rocket launches to Mars. My buggy rides down shady lanes. And Dad used to spin me around in it until I laughed and got dizzy.
When I closed my eyes, I could almost feel him.
Nothing lay on the scarred wooden surface except a green blotter and a few pens. I pulled open a drawer and pawed through pencils, a stapler, a billion paper clips, and a small framed picture of me taken when I was ten. Bank statements, a few thumb drives, and a folder with copies of letters Dad had sent to various businesses and the government. Nothing worth bringing a cop to the house at night.
The bottom drawer wouldn’t budge, but I wasn’t stopping now. When I wiggled a letter opener in the lock, it clicked open.
“Bingo.” Inside the drawer, I found a green folder containing a letter from Dad’s lawyer dated July 18, a week before the accident. Two pages of tiny print ended with Dad’s printed name—he hadn’t signed it yet.
My breath caught. He’d never sign it, now.
Mr. Somerfield’s name jumped out at me. If I read this correctly, Dad had been planning to dissolve their business partnership, which was odd, because we’d gone boating to celebrate the upcoming release of an app Dad had designed for the company. But they had argued a lot.
Had Mr. Somerfield known about this?
Stuffed in the back of the drawer, I found a yellow envelope with Davis Accident Report scrolled across the front.
Ah. This was what my aunt was talking about.
I stared down at it for a long time. Did I dare look? Going through the details would make my grief fresh all over again, but looking might also drag my memories closer to the surface. I wanted to remember what happened that night, didn’t I?
Raking my teeth across my lower lip, I separated the top of the envelope and reeled back when I found pictures.
They’re not people you love.
The whimpering part of me insisted they were nothing different than photos I’d see on TV, but I couldn’t stop the tears from filling my eyes.
When I upended the envelope, the images slid out onto the desk. Black and white and with the bodies carefully posed, the photos looked like graphic art. A gruesome nightmare played out before my eyes because they were the people I loved. No use pretending otherwise.
I traced my fingertip along the burned arm of the person in one photo. Long limbs. Gutted belly. Face a blac
kened skeleton. Horror rushed through me, making me weak.
Leaning closer, I squinted at the writing along the bottom. Male, approximate age early-twenties. Burned beyond recognition. One of the crewmen of the rented yacht?
Another photo: Male, approximate age mid-forties. Burned beyond recognition.
Dad.
My keen echoed in the room. This charred carcass with bits of flesh clinging to its bones wasn’t my dad. This…this thing wasn’t the man who’d rocked me to sleep when I was little and read me stories when I was sick.
If I was wise, I’d go upstairs, take a sleeping pill, and sink into a medication-induced coma. In the morning, I’d convince myself this had all been a dream.
Next picture. Female, approximate age forty. Burned.
Mom.
A whiff of Chanel No 5 drifted through the room. If I closed my eyes, could I pretend she was still with me or would I see flames?
Clumping the pictures together, I shoved them back into the folder then pulled out and skimmed through the accident report.
Approximate time of death of the passengers: 23:00. Four hours after we left Finley Cove, where Dad had rented the boat.
If only I hadn’t talked my best friend, Brianna, into coming with us. But it had been her birthday. I’d wanted to celebrate it someplace special. I couldn’t have known she’d die.
Cupping my face, I peeked through my fingers at the report.
Location of the wreck: ten miles offshore, due east of Big Berry Island. They’d found me wandering the beach after I escaped the boat and swam to shore.
A witness, Andrew Smythe, reported seeing a bright light at sea he dismissed as boaters setting off fireworks. He eventually became concerned about ongoing flashes and called 9-1-1.
The Coast Guard rushed to the scene but found nothing. It took divers and a thorough search to drag up the final evidence.
Highly combustible fuel source suspected. The heat of the flames killed the victims almost immediately. And, the yacht burned through to the outer hull before sinking underwater, taking everyone down with it.
I wiped my eyes, but they kept tearing. Bringing my phone closer, I stared at the last bit of information in the file.
My harsh cry rose from deep in my belly and burst into the room.
Possible homicide. Investigation is ongoing.
No, no. This couldn’t be true.
Homicide?
Mom, Dad, and Brianna had been murdered.
You can find Dead Girls Don’t Lie on Amazon.
Phoenix Arise: YA Sci-fi Thriller (From the Ashes Book 1) Page 28
