I remembered seeing this one my first day on the island: it showed four people standing on a cold, rainy beach. Back then, I hadn’t been able to make out much about them, but now that had changed completely. The tall woman on the right had white-blonde hair. It was pulled back in a ponytail instead of in a pixie cut, but still, she had to be Kaye, didn’t she? And the man standing beside her was heavier than Andy was now, but he had dark hair and gauges in his earlobes. He had to be Andy. Suze had even captured the way Andy looked at Kaye—the amused smile, the calm set to his eyes, the sense that, just by looking at her, he was completely and totally happy in the universe.
Kaye wasn’t looking back at him. She stood ankle-deep in gray-blue water next to a dark-haired woman with elegant shoulders and an expressive mouth. She had to be Kaye’s friend Violet. Suze’s friend Violet. They had all been friends, hadn’t they? Suze, Violet, Kaye, and Andy had all been in the same year in high school, while Owen, the outsider, had been a year below them.
I leaned in to peer at the last figure standing on the beach. His hands were jammed into the pockets of his gray sweatshirt. At first, I thought he was staring down at the pebbly sand. Leaning closer, I realized he was staring straight at the viewer, with a gaze just as intense as the one Suze had given herself in her self-portrait.
He wasn’t staring at the viewer. He was staring at the painter. At Suze.
I recognized that fascinated expression, as if he wanted to capture you and put you under glass. Something about it was especially disconcerting considering his baby-faced prettiness.
I straightened up with a jolt.
Surely I was being paranoid. There had to be an explanation for why Scott had one of Suze’s masterpieces tucked behind his bed. It was partially of him—maybe it had belonged to him, and he had lent it to the Artist’s Lodge. Maybe… Maybe…
A glimmer of light caught my eye from inside Scott’s closet, just visible past the cracked door. Without stopping to think, I crossed the room and flung the closet door open.
My eyes wouldn’t settle on it; it just didn’t make sense. Steel tubes—pipes, I realized stupidly, corner pieces of pipes—jumbled together with empty glass bottles, a few white rags, boxes of what looked like fireworks. A stack of magazines sat on the floor beside the pile of pipes and bottles. They were cut to pieces, their innards spilling out.
I began to panic.
Backing blindly out of the closet, I fled Scott’s room and raced downstairs. Scott wasn’t home. Scott knew about me and Owen. Scott was—
I dialed Owen. The phone rang and rang, but he didn’t answer.
“Owen,” I groaned, “where are you?”
I called Lacroix’s office—he’d given me his direct line because of Rhys—and I told him what I’d seen. Weird, terrible words floated through my head as I did so: pipe bombs. Molotov cocktails.
I hung up on Lacroix while he was still trying to convince me not to go to Owen’s myself. I was already in my car, starting up the engine. I had to drive one-handed because of my wrist, but at this point, I could have flown there. I tore out of the driveway and took the corners of Fall Island’s winding, narrow roads as fast as I could, making it to Owen’s in record time.
As soon as I pulled into his driveway, I leapt out of the car and ran up to his front stoop. I banged on the door, calling out for him. Music was playing somewhere inside—probably his workshop. I shouted his name this time, and abruptly, the music stopped. A moment later, he opened the front door.
“M.? What’s wrong?”
He was okay, he was okay—I could have cried from relief.
Stepping onto the front stoop, he pulled me into a hug. “What is it?”
“We need to go—”
A deafening crack—louder than a Florida lightning strike, louder than anything I’d ever heard. The cement stoop trembled, shaking me off my feet. I threw my hands out to grab onto the railing, but everything was moving too fast. I tumbled to my knees, and Owen came down with me, wrapping his big arms around my back, covering me with his body. I thought he was saying my name, but I couldn’t hear anything except a tinny ringing. Apart from the dark blue of Owen’s T-shirt and the strong curve of his neck, I couldn’t see anything, either. My eyes wouldn’t quite focus, and there was dust everywhere. Why was there dust everywhere? Then I realized: I’d been right. Someone had tried to blow us up.
Slowly, my senses cleared. My sprained wrist ached from trying to grab the railing, but I didn’t care. In jerky, twitchy movements, I put my arms around Owen.
He was alive. Unhurt. Thank God.
That tinny, ringing sound grew louder—more like a thin wail now. Owen glanced over the top of my head, towards his driveway, and belatedly it occurred to me that the wailing was a police siren.
“Lacroix’s here,” he said, and although he sounded muffled, it was a relief that I could hear him at all. “Jesus. Are you all right?”
I nodded. I had to swallow a few times before I could say, “Are you?”
“I think…I think you just saved my life.”
Our eyes met. Dust skimmed the left side of his face.
“Why?” he breathed. “Why would you risk your life for me?”
“We should move away from the house,” I said.
We walked cautiously down the stoop, which seemed to be fine. Maybe it hadn’t been shaking after all. I glanced at Owen’s house, but that looked fine, too, just dusty. I couldn’t see any damage, except…
His garage—his workshop. I edged across the driveway. The far side of Owen’s garage had been blown to pieces. Chunks of wood and cement were scattered across the side yard. The damage was much worse towards the back, as if the bomb had been put against the back wall of the garage. If Owen had been at his workbench when it went off—
But he hadn’t been. He was okay.
What would I have done if something had happened to him?
Behind me, car doors slammed. Boots thudded on asphalt. I turned.
“You all right?” Lacroix barked, as he strode towards us, glancing from the two of us to the blown-out side of the garage, with Officer Palmer a step behind him. Owen and I both nodded, too shocked to do or say anything else. Lacroix released a tight breath. “Okay. Stay back. Bomb squad has to clear the scene.”
Lacroix’s radio buzzed, and he turned away, muttering a response. A second cruiser pulled up a moment later. One of the cops I didn’t recognize, but the second I remembered from the Artist Lodge fire.
I took Owen’s hand. “We need to go.”
He didn’t respond, but he let me pull him past the cop cars to the end of the driveway. The dust hadn’t made it this far down yet. Facing away from the house, I could almost pretend nothing had happened.
I looked up at Owen. “Your workshop—” I began hoarsely, knowing he would be devastated and wishing there was something I could say to make it better.
He cursed and pulled me into a tight hug. “Forget about my workshop. I only care about you.” He kissed my hair and tightened his hold on me. “How did you know about the bomb?”
“Lucky guess.”
“And you came anyway.”
“I came to warn you—”
“But you could have been hurt.”
“So could you,” I retorted.
He looked at me, his dark eyes troubled, and methodically swept the dust from my face with his fingers.
A third cop car, siren blaring, drove past us onto Owen’s lawn. A few minutes later, state police rolled up, followed by a K-9 unit, and, finally, the island’s chief of police. The Chief shot Owen a dark look, as if he didn’t think Owen was worth this amount of effort. I ground my teeth, but I’d known some of them would act like that. That was why I’d wanted Lacroix here, too.
“Owen!” Claire was running up the street towards us, wearing her flowery coffee shop apron. She threw her arms around her much-taller son, while tears seeped out from under her cat’s-eye glasses. “Bob Foster—you know him, he’s at the shop all
the time—he listens to the police radios, and he said there was something about a bomb at your house!”
Owen gently pulled away from his mother. “It’s okay. We’re fine now.”
Claire stared at him, her face utterly white. She peered past him to his house and, if possible, turned even paler. “Your workshop!”
I reached out and squeezed Claire’s arm. “We don’t know how much has been damaged. A lot of the violins and tools might still be okay.”
Claire hugged me. “Oh, Miranda!” She pushed her glasses back up on her nose. “So—neither of you was hurt? You weren’t inside when it happened?”
Before I could explain, a dog barked excitedly on the opposite side of the house.
“Stay here.” Without another word, Owen started across the yard.
“Owen!” Claire cried. “Where are you going?”
Casting Claire an apologetic look, I ran after him and caught up to him just past the police cars parked on his front yard.
Owen stopped walking mid-stride. I stepped out from behind him and realized he was staring at Scott.
Lacroix had cuffed Scott’s hands behind his back and was shoving him forwards, while the other officers and the K-9 dog clustered around them. Scott was snarling and red-faced, jerking his arms backwards against Lacroix’s tight grip, fighting Lacroix with every step.
“Scott—” I darted forwards, stopping only when Lacroix shot me a severe look.
Scott’s roving gaze fixed on me. The color drained from his face. “Miranda—what are you doing? I told you to stay away—I told you he was dangerous!”
“He’s not the one who tried to blow me up, Scott,” I said softly.
Every sound around us faded into nothingness. Even the K-9 dog stopped barking.
“Don’t you understand?” Scott said. “I tried to warn you. Owen killed her. He killed Suze and got away with it. I had to punish him. Don’t you see?”
“No, I don’t—”
“You wouldn’t listen to me, Miranda,” Scott continued earnestly. “I tried to frame him for the fire, but—”
“You set the Lodge on fire to get Owen in trouble?”
Scott smiled. “Partly that. And I knew Suze would’ve wanted me to do it. She wouldn’t have wanted his portrait—” Scott jerked his chin towards Owen, “—to be there with the rest of her work. Her killer’s portrait! Have you ever heard of anything so crazy?”
I swallowed. “But first you stole the one she did of you and Kaye and Andy, didn’t you? Before you set the fire.”
“It was mine. She did it for me. She—she never loved me,” he confessed, “but she could see me in a way that no one else could. She understood me. And I thought that maybe you could, too, Miranda. I just wanted to protect you.” His eyes shimmered, as if he were about to cry. “When I heard about what Larsen did to you…”
“Owen did not do this,” I insisted, for what felt like the hundredth time. I scowled at the other police officers, including the Chief. Some of them exchanged uncomfortable glances. The Chief frowned back at me, then at Owen, but Owen was expressionless.
“You’re wrong about him. You all are. Officer Lacroix,” I said, my voice trembling, “I don’t know about you, but I’ve heard enough.” Lacroix met my gaze and nodded. He started pushing Scott forwards again, steering him towards one of the cruisers parked in the driveway.
“Miranda, you have to listen to me,” Scott shouted as Lacroix opened the car door. “He killed Suze—he killed her, and you’re—” Lacroix shoved him into the back of the cruiser and slammed the door shut before Scott could finish his awful sentence.
Immediately, I turned to Owen, who was still doing his impression of a granite cliff face. “Owen.” He didn’t even look at me. “Owen.” I stood up on my tiptoes and touched his face. “Hey.”
His beautiful eyes were lined with a heavy grief that made my chest ache.
“I gave that portrait of me to Matthew,” Owen murmured. “Another thing I’ve done wrong.”
Before I could say anything, Lacroix headed back towards us, while his partner stood awkwardly by the cruiser. The Chief had already gotten into his car to leave, though the state police were still picking through the wreckage by Owen’s garage.
Lacroix hesitated a short distance away from us, his usual expression of stoic professionalism shading into a grimace. “Look, um, Larsen, I just wanted to say I’m sorry. I should’ve listened to you. I honestly never thought those threats would come to anything.”
Owen’s mask fell away, leaving him looking absolutely stunned, but when he spoke, his voice was level, even casual. “Me, neither. It’s all right.” He paused. “Thanks.”
Lacroix nodded. “You have somewhere to stay tonight?”
“He’ll stay with me,” Claire said, stepping forwards.
Lacroix nodded again. “Good. The detectives are going to need some time to look around.” His eyes met mine as he was about to turn away. “Miss Lewis. Thank you. People seem to open up around you.”
“It’s because she listens,” Claire said pointedly.
“Fair enough, ma’am,” Lacroix said.
Chapter 24
Claire insisted that I come over to her house for dinner, so I gave both her and Owen a ride up the street. By the time I pulled into her driveway, the sky had turned from violet to cobalt. Her windows were dark. Somewhere behind the house, her dogs were barking.
“How about some wine?” Claire said, as we walked into her kitchen. “Or something a bit stronger?”
“I’d love a whiskey, if you have any,” I said.
“Good idea,” Claire told me, pouring us each a tumbler. She sipped hers meditatively, her eyes over-bright. “That boy, Scott Parker. What part of the island is he from?”
“South,” Owen rumbled, slumping into a chair at Claire’s kitchen table.
“So his dad was a fisherman?” Claire asked.
“More like a professional drinker.”
“Did you know him well in high school?” I asked Owen.
“Not really. He was in Suze’s year, so he was a year above me, like Andy and Rusty and Kaye. He was always sort of…weird. We never got along.” Owen spun his whiskey glass in slow circles on the table, frowning. “I had no idea he hated me this much.”
A whimper sounded from the dining room. Ferdinand was sitting behind a baby gate that he could have knocked over with a single tap of his huge paw.
“Shoot, I have to take Ferdy out,” Claire said.
“I’ll take him.” Owen set his whiskey down and led Ferdy outside.
Claire took Owen’s seat across from me at the kitchen table. For a moment, Claire was so still she reminded me of Owen; it was not like her to be still or quiet, as if she were watching a movie of her own thoughts.
“The thing is,” she said, already halfway through some mental conversation, “what if that boy didn’t do this to punish Owen for supposedly killing Suze? What if he did it because he’s the one who deserves all the attention?”
The warmth from the whiskey dissipated as quickly as it came. “You think Scott killed Suze?”
“I don’t know,” Claire admitted. “He seemed so obsessed with her just now, didn’t he? But I knew Suze… She would never have noticed a boy like him.”
“I think he knew that, though. He said she never loved him.” I thought about Scott’s intense stare, his fragility, the way Andy always seemed to be keeping him in check.
“The police never even questioned him, as far as I remember,” Claire said. “Not the way they questioned the other boys from Suzanna’s year.”
“The other boys? You mean Jonas Whittaker?”
“Yeah, all of them: Rusty Solomon, Ron O’Brien, Andy Carrillo—”
“Andy?” I interrupted. “But he never went out with Suze, did he? And neither did Rusty—”
“No, no,” she said. “The police talked to every friend Suzanna had ever had, hoping someone would know more about her life. But she had so many secrets. Th
ere was so much that she knew, and that she did, without telling a soul.”
Suze’s secretiveness didn’t surprise me. I’d seen her strange, prescient eyes, her temperamental mouth.
Ferdy burst inside through the kitchen door, careening towards us and skidding wildly on the kitchen tile. Owen stepped inside after him, smiling slightly for the first time all night, and came over to stand beside my chair. With a sad, affectionate glance down at me, he tucked a lock of my hair behind my ear.
Claire stood up, smiling to herself and rubbing her eyes. “So that’s something, anyway,” she said to herself.
After dinner, Owen walked me to my car. I had intended to give him a chaste kiss goodnight before he headed back inside. Instead, I grabbed his shirt and pulled him in close, kissing his mouth hard and biting his lower lip. I kissed and licked his jaw and neck, so desperate for him I could barely think. With a groan, he pinned me against the car. His breath was ragged in my ear.
“Miranda, sweetheart, I—”
He stopped himself, trembling, and braced himself on the car with his hands on either side of me. I squeezed his waist, wishing I could slide my fingers into his jeans, but I knew I shouldn’t. Not in his mom’s driveway, for God’s sake.
Even if I could have, it wouldn’t have been enough. I wanted him all night. I wanted him forever.
“I don’t want to go,” I whispered. “When I saw Scott’s room, and then I called you, and you didn’t answer right away, I was so afraid—”
“You’re crying,” he breathed. “Oh, M.” He kissed the tears from my cheeks and the corners of my mouth.
I wrapped my arms around him, and he pulled me in tight, rubbing my back over my leather jacket.
“What if we just left?” he asked.
I drew back in shock, my heart pounding even harder. “Left what?”
“Left the island. Started over, together. Made a new life somewhere else.”
“You mean…live together?”
He cursed. “I’m sorry. I know that with your ex and everything—”
Set Me Free Page 19
