CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

That night, Sabrina stood in her kitchen, washing the few dishes that remained in the sink a little more vigorously than necessary.

When Z had texted everyone about her discovery, Sabrina couldn’t help feeling a tiny bit jealous. Z had delivered a huge clue. They had a name now. Devon Warner. They knew he had taken Sadie’s bracelet and gun from her after he knocked her out in the motel room.

Had he been the one to take the bracelet to Lily’s house? Did he use Sadie’s gun to kill Lily?

This case seemed to be moving quickly now, and Sabrina was still coming up blank in seeing any other spirits. She was starting to worry that the serum had somehow worn off. Was it less potent for her than for the others because she was the oldest? Or maybe it was because she had taken so many drugs before. If she didn’t perform, would she be kicked off the team?

Andrew had suggested that she concentrate on something specifically related to the ghost she was trying to conjure up. She’d tried rummaging through some newspaper articles about Lily earlier, hoping it would spark something. She’d even done a little online research that afternoon on paranormal sightings to see if there were any tips she could follow. But she still had no luck.

As she finished the dishes, she wondered if maybe trying to summon Anthony again would be easier than Lily. He wouldn’t necessarily help with the case, but she’d been longing to see him again. She wanted to make sure he was okay. To tell him she loved him. And to ask him what he meant when he’d said, “Be careful, Beanie.”

Her online research into the supernatural realm suggested that spirits were often all-seeing, aware of everything going on among the living they visited. So was Anthony warning her about some new specific imminent danger he could see coming her way … something to do with this case? Or was the warning more general, or about something else entirely? Could he have merely been cautioning her to stop numbing her body with drugs?

That was the problem. Even when Sabrina could see these spirits, they spoke to her in a cryptic way that was impossible to pin down. The same thing had happened with Lily. When she’d said, I know why they want it, there was no guarantee she was even talking about the serum. She could have been musing about why people wanted her candles!

Suddenly, she heard a rustling behind her. Her back stiffened for a moment — could it be Anthony? She waited for cool air to blast over her or for the lights to begin flickering like last time, but nothing happened. She turned around, realizing it was probably just Rocket begging for scraps but was surprised to find her mother on one of her rare expeditions outside her bedroom. She was so frail and haunted in her thin nightgown that she might as well have been a ghost.

“Sabrina, it’s you,” her mother said, as she shuffled by to get a glass of water. Christine Ross was still a beautiful woman, even with the vacant stare she wore whenever she was awake. Her thick, dark hair resembled Sabrina’s, though it was usually tangled, the effort of brushing it too much for her to handle.

“Yeah, it’s me, Mom,” Sabrina sighed. Who else would it be?

She stepped aside so her mother could fill her glass at the sink, each movement sluggish and heavy as though she was moving her limbs through mud. Sabrina gnawed the inside of her cheek, silently begging her mother to hurry up so she could get back to trying to summon Anthony. People always talked about wanting something so badly that you could taste it. That used to make sense to Sabrina. When she’d lust after a pill, she could literally feel the bitter, chemical tang on her tongue moments before it was even in her hands. But her desire to talk to Anthony had bypassed her taste buds and gone straight to her heart.

When Christine finally turned the water off, she took a long sip, then looked up at Sabrina.

“Oh, I just spoke to Anthony a few minutes ago, honey.”

“What?” Sabrina asked. Had she heard right?

Her mother shook her head, mildly disappointed. “I’m afraid your brother isn’t very happy.”

“What do you mean? What did he say?” Her mother had claimed to have spoken to Anthony before, but Sabrina always dismissed it as the drugs talking. Her mother was on a cocktail of medications no sane doctor would approve of mixing.

But now Sabrina saw it in a different light. What if it actually was the drugs talking? Patricia had told them certain drugs had the ability to open up channels in your brain, to stimulate dormant senses.

What if her mother was telling the truth?

Christine shivered and narrowed her eyes. “You need to be careful, Sabrina.”

“Careful of what?” Sabrina asked, clutching the edge of the counter. “What do you mean?”

Christine opened her mouth, then closed it, as if she’d thought better of speaking.

“Mom, please,” Sabrina begged, but she knew it would do no good. The moment was over as quickly and strangely as it had begun.

*    *    *

Sabrina gazed out the window from the last row of English lit the next day, still preoccupied with figuring out some way to unlock her abilities. If she could just see Lily again, maybe she’d be able to expand on what she’d told Sabrina the first time. I know why they want it. Could Devon Warner be part of the “they” Lily Carpenter had been referring to? And if so, who was his partner in crime?

“Sabrina.”

Mr. Wincott was standing beside her, a concerned look on his face. He was one of the youngest teachers on staff at Cedar Springs. Not so coincidentally, he was also the one most of Sabrina’s classmates were infatuated with, his witty observations sending them into fits of giggles from their front-row seats. What bothered Sabrina, though, was how much Mr. Wincott got off on it.

“Are you okay?” he asked. Like Sabrina, he was a “halfer,” but in his case half Chinese and half British. He’d once tried to discuss their commonality with Sabrina, but she’d been too hungover at the time to add any significant opinion. His posh accent was yet another reason he’d attained hot-teacher status.

She looked around to see the rest of the class had already begun packing up. The bell must have rung.

“Yeah,” she said. “Just a little distracted.”

He followed her into the hallway.

“How’s the school year going so far, Sabrina?” he asked. He had a way of seeing into people, which made Sabrina feel the need to blush.

“Fine. Nothing special,” Sabrina lied.

As they approached her locker, Sabrina saw Z standing next to it, waiting. It felt like a lifetime ago that Z had ratted out her and Scott, though it had only been a few weeks ago.

“Zelda,” Mr. Wincott said. “Fancy meeting you here.”

“Is it really that hard to believe?” Z drawled, smart aleck that she was. “We’re all forced to be here the entire day, aren’t we?”

Mr. Wincott nodded, faintly amused. “That we are.” He raised an eyebrow at her. “You missed our adviser meeting this morning.” All the Cedar Springs High students were assigned faculty advisers. Sabrina’s, Mr. Manzetti, or “Sweaty Manzetti” as everyone called him behind his back, had given up on scheduling meetings in the middle of last year since Sabrina never bothered showing up.

Z shrugged. “I wasn’t feeling well.”

“Glad to see you’ve made such a quick recovery,” he replied cheekily, and Sabrina suppressed a smile.

Mr. Wincott looked from Sabrina to Z as if he was trying to work out how the two of them were friends, then shook his head. “Always a pleasure, ladies,” he said breezily before he continued down the hall.

“Have you spoken to Nash?” Z asked, once Mr. Wincott was a reasonable distance away.

“No, why?” Sabrina replied. Z gave her a funny look. Was it possible Z had heard her thoughts about Nash at some point? Sabrina made a mental note to be more carefully guarded.

“Don’t you think it’s weird that I told him Devon Warner’s name three days ago and we haven’t heard anything since?” She gave Sabrina a look implying that she felt it was, indeed, very strange. But Sabrina knew better than to get too caught up in Z’s conspiracy theories. On the ride to Falcon Rock, she had heard Z expound ideas on JFK’s assassination, OJ’s guilt and whether a man had actually walked on the moon.

“I don’t know,” Sabrina said as she took her Spanish book out of her locker. “I mean, yeah, I’ve been waiting to hear from them. But I guess I just figured they’d call us when they need us. It’s not like we’re actually in the FBI. They don’t owe us an explanation.”

“They’re the ones who drugged us against our will, so yeah, they kind of do.”

Instead of going down that road, Sabrina decided to change the subject. “I have a question for you.” She slammed her locker shut. “When you were at Sadie Webb’s apartment, how did you make yourself hear her thoughts? How did you summon it?”

They began walking toward the exit of the building, dodging the other students and keeping their voices low.

“I don’t know. I guess I just blocked out all the other noise and it happened.”

It was the opposite of what Andrew had suggested. But Andrew’s advice hadn’t really panned out.

“It was that easy?” Sabrina asked.

Z hesitated. “I wouldn’t call it easy. I think it made my nose bleed.”

“Really? Has that happened before?” Sabrina asked, concerned because she could tell Z was trying to play it as no big deal.

“No.” Z was quiet for a moment, then added, “But it could’ve been that chick’s apartment. It smelled like she lit an ammonia candle in there.”

Before Sabrina could ask another question, Z spotted Gabby ahead of them and called out for her. Gabby smiled shyly and waited for them to catch up.

“Have you heard from Patricia or Nash?” Z asked Gabby.

“No, why? Did something happen?”

“Nothing they’ve told us,” Z answered. “But it’s hard to believe they haven’t found out more about Devon Warner. Think about it. He’s a violent psychopath who stole Sadie’s gun and her bracelet, which ended up at Lily’s cabin with her blood on it. He’s got to be our guy. But they’re just keeping us on the sidelines.”

“We don’t know that for sure,” Sabrina interjected, a new theory forming in her mind. “What if Devon is just a middleman. He could’ve stolen the gun and bracelet from Sadie and sold them for a few bucks to someone else — maybe the real killer.”

Z cocked her head, unconvinced. “Maybe. Regardless, he’s our one lead and we need to find him. But we’re just sitting here pretending things are normal. I called Patricia yesterday and she never called me back. Nash and Patricia aren’t telling us everything, I just know it.”

“They could be getting their facts together before they fill us in …” Sabrina said. It did bother her slightly that Patricia had never returned Z’s phone call.

“What did Nash say after you told him the guy’s name was Devon Warner? Or, more importantly, what did he think?” Gabby asked.

Sabrina sighed. If only she had the ability to tap into Nash’s brain.

“Nada. And it wasn’t for lack of trying. There’s something off with him.”

Gabby agreed. “I know. He’s so serious.”

“Yeah, and when I tried to hear what he was thinking when we left Sadie’s apartment, it was like I heard white noise instead,” Z said, taking off toward the parking lot. “Maybe he’s undergone Navy SEAL training or something. They teach them all kinds of Jedi mind tricks so they won’t give anything up if they’re ever tortured for information.”

“Probably,” Sabrina agreed. Somehow none of this surprised her.

“When Patricia didn’t call me back last night, I realized we’ve been way too naive, trusting everything they say, even though this whole thing started as a lie in that fake therapy meeting,” Z said. “So why are we so quick to take them at their word now?”

Sabrina suddenly felt as innocent as Gabby. She’d been so caught up in the adventure of it all — and the magnetic pull she felt toward Nash — that it never occurred to her not to trust him.

“I think we should look into Devon Warner ourselves,” Z announced.

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” Gabby said quickly. “It could be dangerous.” They both looked to Sabrina at the same time.

“Why don’t we give it one or two more days?” Sabrina finally said. Z’s theories might actually have some merit this time, but that didn’t mean she was ready to go rogue. “If they don’t contact us by then, we check out Devon Warner ourselves.”

*    *    *

Later that afternoon, Sabrina unearthed her running shoes from the back of her closet and wiped off the thick layer of dust that had accumulated on them.

She whistled for Rocket, who ran over when he saw Sabrina wielding the leash. The houses on her street backed up to the dense wooded forest of the Cedar Springs nature reserve. Sabrina used to run the trails all the time, but she hadn’t been out there for years.

She surprised herself when she took off like a bullet on the wooded path behind her house, the orange and red leaves crunching underneath her pounding feet. But it was the only idea Sabrina had left for how to “block all the noise out” as Z had managed to do at Sadie’s apartment. At this point, she was willing to try anything. Sabrina had never had much luck with meditation or even yoga. The harder she worked at silencing her mind, the more it spun out of control.

Wasn’t that why she started with drugs in the first place? For the first few years after Anthony’s death, she’d carried the weight of her pain around while figuring out how to take care of herself. Sabrina handled the pressure and sadness and forging of signatures and grocery buying all while managing to do well in school. She’d become a bit of a loner in the process, not wanting to invite anyone over to her house for fear they would discover she was basically an orphan. But even that was okay with her. She had a few satellite friends at school and that was good enough.

And then on her sixteenth birthday, she decided to go to a party. She figured she deserved to go out and celebrate since her parents hadn’t acknowledged her birthday with so much as a card. It was only a few seconds after she took that hit off the bong that she felt as if someone was giving her brain an amazing massage. Some people did drugs to feel something. Sabrina did them to feel nothing.

She reached a fork in the running path and stopped, out of breath. She’d done it — completely zoned out while she ran. Except she hadn’t realized how fast she’d been going, and now she couldn’t figure out how to get back to where she started.

The sun was setting, and even with sweat dripping down her forehead, Sabrina felt chilled from the drop in temperature. She looked around for familiar landmarks. Nothing. Rocket peered up at her expectantly, his tongue hanging out the side of his mouth.

Sabrina closed her eyes and tried to retrace her steps.

As soon as she opened them, a cold blast of air hit her and her skin began to crawl.

It’s happening again.

Someone was coming. And something told her it wasn’t Anthony or Lily.

Her breath — coming out in short, anxious spurts — formed tiny clouds of fog in front of her. She could hear the sounds of faint whispers and Rocket’s ears went up, his hair on end. He could feel it, too.

And then she saw the ghost.

Standing in front of her was a teenage girl, her skin glowing the way Anthony’s had. She was close enough to reach out and touch. The girl was sopping wet from head to toe, water dripping from her long black hair, off her rumpled purple dress and onto her muddy bare feet.

She opened her mouth to say something, when Rocket began aggressively lunging for her.

The girl quickly vanished. Rocket took off — spooked — and the leash was wrapped so tightly around Sabrina’s wrist that he yanked her along with him.

“Rocket, stop!” she commanded as she tried to keep up. Her screams were swallowed by the wind, and she became vaguely aware that her feet were sinking into the ground. Rocket had gone off the path. Without the sun and with only a sliver of the moon, she could barely see in front of her.

She had no idea whether they were going the right way or falling deeper into the woods, but she didn’t have a choice in the matter. Rocket wasn’t slowing down.

“Rocket!” She tripped over some stones and tumbled to the ground face-first. Something jabbed into her leg and a sharp pain shot up her body. She didn’t have time to register how badly she was hurt, though. Rocket dragged her through the dirt and debris. She managed to spring up, her arms and legs now caked with mud, as the dog propelled her forward again.

There was a dim glow through the trees fifty feet in front of her. A street lamp. Sabrina broke out of the woods and found herself at the end of her street. Rocket knew where he was going, thank God. The relief gave her the last burst of energy she needed to make it all the way home. She threw open her front door and sank to the ground, gasping, trying to breathe through the stifling air of her own home.

Who was that girl? Was she related to Lily Carpenter somehow? She looked to be about Sabrina’s age. Was that the age she was when she died?

Just when she’d almost caught her breath, there was a banging on the door. She jumped to her feet, her heart racing again.

“Sabrina? Are you there?”

Nash.

She opened the door. “What are you doing here?”

“Jesus, are you okay?” he said without any formal greeting as he entered the house. How did he know what had just happened?

“What do you mean?” she asked, instantly guarded.

“You’re bleeding.”

She looked down to see what he was talking about, and the color drained from her face. There was a gash on her left leg so deep that it was spurting like a geyser and blood had puddled on the floor underneath her feet.

“What happened?” he asked, looking closer. “Were you in the woods?”

She nodded. “I was running and I tripped …” She tried to steady herself, but a whoosh of dizziness overpowered her and she swayed. Nash scooped her up before she hit the ground.

“Breathe,” he commanded as he walked toward her bathroom. “We need to clean that.”

Now she was even more light-headed, but not because of her leg. The sudden physical contact with Nash overwhelmed her. His arms felt as strong and chiseled as they looked and his body radiated heat like a furnace against her. The closest they’d come to actually touching before was when he sat next to her outside of Lily’s cabin. But now she was so close that she could smell the spicy, oaky scent of his aftershave. Was this what the term “animal attraction” meant?

Her cheeks suddenly reddened. What if Nash could tell she was smelling him? Oh God. He must be able to smell her. She was muddy and sweaty and probably stunk like the inside of her running shoes.

He sat her down on the edge of the tub and reality set back in — along with a searing pain where the gash on her leg was. It throbbed so much that she couldn’t believe she hadn’t felt it before. Nash placed a damp towel right below her knee.

“You don’t have to do this,” she told him. Helpless wasn’t comfortable on her. “I can clean it myself.”

“You know how to properly disinfect and wrap a puncture wound so it heals correctly?”

“I can look it up.”

“Since I’m already here, how about I just do it?”

“What are you doing here?” she asked, suddenly aware that this was seriously weird.

Nash hesitated for just a beat before he dug a small bottle out of his pocket. Pepper spray. “I came to give this to you.”

“I don’t think that works on ghosts,” Sabrina said.

“It works better on aggressive bartenders.”

She looked up and saw there was no humor in his eyes. “Z told you.”

“You didn’t think it was worth mentioning that someone tried to assault you?” His eyes flashed with anger.

“I’m sorry.” She hated that she felt like a girl being chastised by her parents. Even worse, she realized in all the commotion of the past few days, she’d never called and reported that guy to the police. “I was planning to report him. I just —”

“It’s handled.” He didn’t explain what that might mean. “Just keep this with you from now on.”

He cleaned off the debris from the wound with some rubbing alcohol he’d found under her sink. “You must have been running pretty fast.” She could only nod.

He locked eyes with her, his large hands completely wrapped around her leg. “The stinging will be over in a second. Hang on.”

“I’m fine.”

He patted her leg dry, then pressed the towel over the gash. “Something sharp cut into your leg. Probably the end of a branch.”

The stinging finally subsided enough for Sabrina to remember her conversation with Z. “Hey, have you found Devon Warner yet?”

“No.” He repositioned the towel. “But I think we’re getting close. We’re a few days away from needing your assistance again.”

Maybe Z was getting in her head, but Nash’s vague answer annoyed her. How were they supposed to help if they were being kept at arm’s length? Had Nash and Patricia given up on them, too?

“Give me your hands,” Nash instructed.

She held out both hands in front of her. He wiped off the thick layer of dried mud on them, then carefully inspected them for scrapes. As soon as he had touched her hands, she felt her entire body ignite again as if it had been lit with a match. There was no use fighting it. And her mind and body were too exhausted to try. His face was inches from hers, and for the first time, she saw the small gold flecks that outlined his blazing green irises. He looked up and caught her staring at him.

“Were you scoping me out that day at Sonic? For the FBI?” she asked, forcing herself not to look away.

“Scoping you out?”

“Doing recon or whatever you call it. Gathering information on me for Patricia.”

“Maybe I just wanted a burger.”

“You don’t strike me as the fast-food type.”

He looked back up sharply. “You don’t strike me as the type who doesn’t know the answer to that question.”

So he was there to scope her out. “What did you see?”

Nash concentrated on securing the bandage. “Everything.”

He’d seen her drunk, high, probably partying with people she’d never see again. Until she needed another fix. But that wasn’t who she was anymore. “You know everything about me, but I don’t know anything about you.”

“What do you want to know?”

This caught her off guard. “Where do I start? I don’t even know if Nash is your first name or your last name.”

“Last.”

“So what’s your first name?”

He paused. “Ryan.”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty-two.” Only a few years older than Sabrina.

“What else should I know?” she asked.

“I kept your number. In case you weren’t chosen.” He stood up abruptly before Sabrina could even relish this tiny piece of information. “Tell me what happened in the woods.”

Back to business.

“I went for a run and got turned around, so I stopped for a second to figure out where I was.” It was such a short time ago, but it already felt blurry. Like something that happened to someone else. “And then there was this —”

She stopped, the breath knocked out of her.

The teenage girl from the woods was standing right behind Nash, staring at Sabrina.

The girl raised a thin finger to her lips.

“Shhhhh.”

Sabrina heard Nash say something, but his voice was muffled, as though it was being filtered through a tunnel. She couldn’t take her eyes off the ghostly girl. This time, Sabrina could see something in the girl’s almond-shaped eyes. Urgency, yes. But something else, too … compassion.

The girl looked at Nash, then she whispered something that took Sabrina a second to process.

“You can’t trust them.”

The girl was gone as quickly as she’d appeared, and Sabrina was left staring at the empty spot behind Nash.

“Sabrina? What’s going on? Are you okay?”

“Nothing. I … I …” she trailed off lamely. Sabrina couldn’t explain it, but there was something protective about this girl’s presence. Something she trusted. But how could Sabrina believe this girl over Nash?

Nash’s confusion immediately turned to frustration. “Sabrina, whatever you saw, you need to tell me.”

Sabrina bristled at his commanding tone. She’d done it again — gotten caught up in her feelings for Nash and let them cloud her judgment. Z’s words echoed in her ears, in chorus with the girl’s. They had no reason to trust Nash and Patricia.

“Are you telling me everything?” she challenged.

His expression barely changed, but the energy in the room shifted to something adversarial. Nash’s eyes bored into hers, but he didn’t say anything except, “Your leg should heal fine now. I’ll show myself out.”

Eventually Sabrina stood up, wobbly on her feet. She limped into her bedroom, sat down on her bed and grabbed her phone. She had to tell someone about this.

“What’s up?” Z said, answering on the first ring.

Sabrina took a deep breath. “I agree. We should look into Devon Warner ourselves.”