Sadie. A nearly silent voice echoed through the stillness of the midnight hour.
Goose bumps broke out over my skin, spider-crawling over my bare arms and legs, leaving behind an itchy, creepy feeling in their wake. The voice was low, sort of scratchy. Ominous.
Wake up, Sadie. Get ready.
The hair on the back of my neck stood on end. Despite the goose bumps and the cold feel to my skin, a fine sheen of sweat broke out over my entire body.
He’s coming for you, Sadie.
My stomach turned violently as if I were in a boat that made a sudden dip over a giant wave.
He’s tired of waiting for what’s his.
I gasped so deep my body flew up off the mattress. Pressing a hand to my frantically beating heart, I told myself everything was okay. It was just a dream. An eerie dream filled with nothing but a voice, a voice nightmares were made of.
I wasn’t sure what was worse—the voice or the warning it gave.
The urge to get up and dust away the sudden icky feeling clinging to my body was strong. After a quick glance at Eddie, I slipped from beneath the covers and padded over to the window.
I was completely naked, but I didn’t bother to cover up. It was just me, and the cool night air was relief against my flushed skin.
The windows were covered with curtains, and even though I was scared to pull back the fabric (even just a little) because of what might be there looking back, I reached for it anyway.
Without realizing, I held my breath and peeled back the curtain at an embarrassingly slow rate. Squeezing one of my eyes closed and looking with the other, I peeked out.
Of course nothing was there, just the yard, the moon, and the lake. Telling myself I was beyond dramatic, I opened both eyes up and pulled the curtain back to stare down to the water.
The waves shimmered beneath the moon, glittering like diamonds.
I let out a cleansing breath, trying to exhale the horrible dream. I was so lost in thought I didn’t hear Eddie behind me until his body heat announced him and his own nakedness pressed against mine.
“What are you doing over here?” he whispered, groggy, into my ear.
Desire stirred in my lower belly. His voice in my ear and the feel of him against me was intoxicating.
“Couldn’t sleep,” I whispered, sliding my hands along his arms and hugging him closer.
His voice was still sleepy when he softly spoke again. “You’re drawn to the water just as I am.”
“It definitely has a pull.” I agreed.
I felt restless, as though something were niggling at the back of my mind, but I didn’t know what. Even though I opened up to Eddie, things still felt unsettled. Maybe they would always feel that way. Until I knew. Where I’d come from, what brought me to the shore of Lake Loch months ago.
Was I Sadie? What was my connection to Widow West.
Leaning my head back against Eddie, I stared out the window, letting the questions consume me.
Way out in the distance, a light caught my eye. So small I probably shouldn’t have noticed it. But I did, and once in my line of sight, it was all I saw.
Gasping, I moved forward, laid my palm flat against the cold glass of the window, and stared out.
“Do you see it?” I asked.
“Yeah.”
“There’s someone out there,” I murmured, almost an afterthought. Like an idea that didn’t occur to me until it was already out of my mouth. The words didn’t sink in until after I spoke them.
My breath caught, the pads of my fingers pressing harder against the glass. “That’s it,” I told myself.
“What is?” Eddie asked, moving forward to keep us pressed together. His chin settled on my shoulder, the unshaven roughness of his jaw slightly prickly against my skin.
I turned my face just slightly, angling toward him a bit more. My eyes slid back out toward the island, searching for the mellow light captivating me.
“What if Widow West really was taking me back to Rumor Island? What if there really is someone else out there, him?”
The sleepy quality to his voice vanished, and a fine, humming tension coiled beneath his skin. “Him who?”
“The man I keep remembering, but never actually seeing. The one who kidnapped me. The one who wants me back.”
“The police searched that island, Am. So many times.”
“Yeah, nearly twelve years ago. What if he left, went into hiding until the search ended, and I—Sadie—was presumed dead? Have they been there since?”
Eddie fell quiet.
The words tumbled out of me, the tone of my voice hollow, almost haunted. “What if he’s there now? Wandering the island at night, waiting for the widow to come home. Waiting for her to bring me back.”
“There’s no way a man could live out there all this time and no one know.”
“There’s also no way a girl could disappear in the lake and then wash up eleven years later.”
His arms pulled me snug against him. I knew he didn’t like the path my thoughts were taking me, but I couldn’t stop. I wouldn’t. I felt this sense of… truth.
“That man out there,” I whispered. “He may know who I am, Eddie.”
“If that man out there knows who you are, I’ll kill him.”
I craned around, my eyes searching his face. The azure of his stare was deadly. It was the same look he’d had at the paintball field when that guy shot me.
“If that light out there is the man who kidnapped you all those years ago… held you captive and abused you, it won’t matter if he knows your name, Am. I’ll kill him, and no one will be able to stop me.”
There was no bravado in his voice. Not even passionate anger. This was a vow. A vow from a calm, collected man. The promise of someone who also had been held captive by questions with no answers, by guilt and by… love.
I laid my hand against his cheek. His eyes lowered to half-mast. “If you kill him, he’ll win. We’ll be separated. Something I honestly don’t think I could bear.”
Deadly calm, almost methodical, he replied, “Not if no one knows.”
“You won’t kill him,” I said.
“How do you know that?”
“Because I’m asking you not to. I need answers, and I can’t get them from a corpse.”
His eyes shut briefly. I felt the rise of his chest with his inhale. Moonlight streamed in the window, hitting the expanse of his torso. I shifted around totally, putting my back to the window to focus fully on him. After smoothing my palms over his chest, I leaned down and kissed him there.
“I’ll never do anything to hurt you, sweetheart.” His hands splayed out over my hips.
I lifted my head, answering definitively, “I know.”
The warmth of his lips brushed my hairline, and I smiled.
“We talk like we know someone is out there. Truth is that light could be anything… or nothing at all.”
“Have you ever seen it out there before?” I asked.
He was silent a while. His body shifted, gathering me close. “No.”
“It’s something,” I whispered. “Someone.”
“We don’t know that, Am.”
“I need to know. I have to find out.”
“What are you saying?” he asked, pulling back to look down.
“I’m saying I want to go out there. I want to go to where the widow was trying to take me that night… I want to go to Rumor Island.”