Ahead of her, Helena was being stalked by sea mist.
Rebekah approached from the north, using a series of off-road trails instead of the easier, smoother asphalt of the Loop. She didn’t want to chance being seen by Hain and Lima. They were almost certainly at the forest by now, but she wasn’t going to take the gamble.
As she crossed to the open road of the town limits, she tensed. She could see two people on Main Street – but neither were the men who’d come back to bury her. One was pointing towards the front of the store, the door Rebekah had broken, and another was gesturing in the direction of the harbour. She tried to steer clear of them, conscious of being seen, but then one looked over and away again. He didn’t seem interested in her – probably assumed she’d come over on the ferry – yet every face she saw, every time someone glanced in her direction and made something as simple as eye contact, seemed like a huge moment. It felt like she’d been on the island for ever, trapped alone in this hinterland, silent, invisible, forgotten; a memory of a woman who went to Long Island one day and never came home.
She sucked in a breath, trying to focus on the only thing that mattered – getting home – and found a space on a sloping grass bank to the west of the town. She’d scoped it out in the days before: it gave her a clear, uninterrupted view of Helena, but it also had enough cover to step into, should she need to.
Her eyes fell on the harbourmaster’s shack.
She remembered, months ago, looking through its window in her search for a radio, unable to get inside. But now a man stood at its entrance, staring out at the docked ferry, the door propped open beside him. Rebekah followed his eyeline and glanced towards the ferry, its ramp open, its interior empty of vehicles, then back to the harbourmaster. He was in his fifties, silver-bearded, his belly resting on a belt that was holding up a pair of baggy denims. Then her eyes were drawn to his belt. Something was clipped to it.
She felt a flutter behind her ribs.
A cellphone.
She looked at the signs on the shack – IN CASE OF EMERGENCY CALL 911 and FIRST AID – and knew, even if he hadn’t had the cellphone on his belt, the harbourmaster would have access to a VHF radio. He’d have multiple ways of contacting the mainland, multiple ways of calling the cops, without delay.
No, stick to the plan, she told herself.
You don’t know who you can trust.
She ripped her eyes away from the harbourmaster and looked at the ferry again. It had emptied, foot passengers – if there had been any – gone, any vehicles, apart from two pickups in the harbour parking lot, already somewhere else. Was it possible one of the pickups belonged to Hain and Lima? She didn’t see them anywhere, and she remembered them saying they were going to bring a trailer with them so they could transport her Cherokee back to the mainland if necessary. It seemed much more likely that the pickups belonged to the two men talking outside the general store.
Or the harbourmaster.
She looked at him again. He’d reached inside the shack and had brought out a coffee cup.
He was now checking his phone.
He’s got a signal.
Rebekah looked along Main Street, out to where it connected to the Loop. There were no cars out there. No sign of Hain and Lima. She could make it to the harbourmaster, to his phone, in seconds. All it would take was one phone call for her to be rescued from this.
No. She closed her eyes. Stick to the plan.
A couple of minutes later, she unzipped her backpack and took out Stelzik’s alarm clock: 12:17. The ferry didn’t go until 5 p.m. Was she really going to wait almost five hours when there was a usable cellphone less than four hundred feet away? She looked at the harbourmaster again. She could call the cops on the mainland now. She could already have called them – and they could already be on their way. Fear, courage, indecision: it all hit her at once.
Hain and Lima aren’t here.
Stick to the plan.
They’re occupied on the other side of the island.
No. Stop it.
You’re not going to get this chance again.
You could grab that phone and make the call.
No.
This could all be over already.
No. It’s too risky.
This could be over and you could be speaking to your girls –
Her body was moving before her brain had caught up.
She sprang to her feet and took off, leaving the bike where it was on the grass bank, then headed down, onto Main Street, and in through the gates of the harbour. As soon as she did, the harbourmaster saw her. She was hurrying, almost stumbling. The closer she got to him, the more concerned he looked.
‘You all right, sir?’ he asked, but as she got closer, panic gripped her: she was disguised as a man, but the instant she spoke, her voice would give her away. She’d never practised for this. She’d never thought about having to make conversation. What was she going to do now? Put on an accent? Drop her voice an octave? You idiot. All of a sudden, she felt overwhelmed by her stupidity, her impulsiveness. You fucking idiot. You should have stayed where you were.
‘Sir? Are you okay?’
She looked at the harbourmaster. As she stopped short of him, breathless, tears welled in her eyes. The kindness in his face, in the smile at the corners of his mouth disarmed her. She hadn’t seen evidence of another person’s kindness for so long she was barely even able to remember what it looked like.
‘I, uh … My name’s …’ She stopped. Her voice had come out sounding exactly like her own. What do I do? How do I speak?
A frown bloomed on the harbourmaster’s face, and Rebekah realized that – despite her clothes, despite the hair, despite all the hours she’d put into the disguise – the instant she talked, he’d known she was a woman.
‘Uh …’ He didn’t know how to address her. ‘Miss?’
‘My name is Rebekah,’ she said.
It meant nothing to him, she could see that.
‘Are you okay, Rebekah?’ he asked.
‘No,’ she replied. ‘I’ve been trapped here.’
He put his coffee aside. ‘What?’
‘I’ve been trapped here for five months.’
He looked like he wasn’t sure if she was joking or not. ‘You’ve …’ He glanced out to the ferry. ‘You’ve been on the island since Halloween?’
She nodded, swallowed.
The harbourmaster looked floored. ‘Wha– How?’
Her breath stalled. Her eyes blurred.
Tell him.
You need to tell him.
‘Someone tried to kill me.’