Sydney stared at Jason across the rainsoaked path. Get up! her mind screamed at him. Get up!
Jason didn’t move.
With a groan, Emma flung the shovel away. She dropped to her knees in the mud beside Jason.
Go over there! Sydney told herself. Jason might be bleeding. He needs help!
But Sydney didn’t move.
Her feet felt frozen in place.
“Emma?” she called out in a hoarse whisper.
Emma slowly raised her head. Her blond hair fell in wet tangles across her face. Her frightened eyes peered between the strands.
“He’s … he’s dead!” Emma moaned.
The woods seemed to tilt and grow even darker. Sydney’s stomach flipped over.
She clamped her hands over her mouth and staggered as if she’d been punched.
No! He can’t be dead! she thought in a panic. Please! Please! He can’t be!
She closed her eyes and took a deep, shuddering breath. Then another.
When she looked again, Jason still lay facedown in the mud.
And Emma still gazed up at her, a horrified expression locked on her face.
It’s true, Sydney told herself. Jason is dead.
“Why were you fighting?” she choked out, still not moving from the path. “What happened?”
“He wanted all the money,” Emma replied. “As soon as we uncovered the bag, he grabbed for it. He was going to take it and run, Syd! Just take the bag and run off with all our money!”
Sydney gulped in some more air.
Greedy Jason, she thought. Emma was right.
Emma was right all along.
“I tried to talk to him,” Emma continued. “I told him he could have more than a third. I said he could have half. That you and I would split the other half.”
“And he said no?” Sydney murmured.
“He laughed at me!” Emma declared. She pushed her hair out of her eyes, leaving a streak of mud across her forehead. “He wanted all the money! He was desperate for it.”
“And then what happened?” Sydney asked. She had to ask. She had to know.
“I started to pick up the bag. And then … he swung the shovel at me!” Emma cried. “He almost hit me, Sydney! He would have killed me!”
Emma paused, gasping for breath.
“And then?”
Emma swallowed hard. “I grabbed hold of the shovel and … I guess you saw the rest.”
Sydney nodded.
Her stomach churned again, and she had to swallow before she could speak. “Now we have no choice,” she finally whispered.
“What do you mean?”
“We have to call the police,” Sydney declared.
“No!” Emma jumped up and hurried over to Sydney. “We can’t do that! We can’t let Jason ruin both our lives!”
“But Emma, we haven’t just taken a bag of money,” Sydney argued. “Now … we’re murderers!”
Murderers. The ghastly word echoed in her ears.
Murderers … murderers …
“No. Only me,” Emma said. “I’m the murderer. I fought with him, Sydney. I hit him. I killed him—not you.”
“Emma, listen to me,” Sydney insisted. “We have to call the—”
Emma gripped Sydney’s arm. “I’ll take care of everything, Syd. You won’t have to do anything. Really.”
“I don’t understand!” Sydney cried. “What can you do? We can’t just leave him lying here!”
“I know.” Emma bit her lip and glanced around. “The lake!” she announced. “I’ll sink his body in Fear Lake. He won’t be found for months.”
An image of Jason’s body deep beneath the cold, dark waters of Fear Lake rolled through Sydney’s mind.
Murderers … murderers …
She wrapped her arms around herself and shuddered violently.
“Syd, I’ll take care of everything,” Emma repeated, squeezing Sydney’s arm. “You’re practically in shock. Just stay right here, okay?”
Sydney nodded, her teeth chattering.
Emma hurried back to the willow tree. Working frantically, she filled the hole with dirt again and tossed the shovel onto the path.
Sydney couldn’t stop shaking. Hugging herself tightly, she stumbled to a nearby tree and braced herself against its cold trunk.
She watched, horrified, as Emma rolled Jason onto his back and grabbed him under the arms.
Emma grunted and yanked.
Jason slid a few feet. His arms dragged in the mud and his head fell back.
Emma yanked again. Jason’s feet made a thudding noise as she dragged him over tree roots.
Sydney squeezed her eyes shut. If only I could shut out the horrible sounds, she thought as she heard Emma’s ragged breathing and another thump of Jason’s feet.
If only I could shut out this whole night!
Bushes rustled and twigs snapped.
Sydney opened her eyes a slit and saw Emma dragging Jason into the woods. In seconds, they were out of her sight.
Murderers … murderers …
The rain had stopped. Sydney heard the drip, drip of water from the leaves. And the quiet lapping of Fear Lake as the wind blew across it.
Then she heard another sound.
A loud, sickening splash.
Emma shoved Jason in the lake, she thought with another violent shudder.
Sick to her stomach, Sydney leaned against the tree and tried to blot the horrible picture from her mind.
It’s over, she kept telling herself. It’s over. No one will know it was us.
She waited, tense and shaking, for Emma to return.
Emma will tell you it’s over, Sydney thought. She’ll tell you everything’s going to be all right.
“Sydney!” Emma’s voice cried out.
And Sydney knew something was wrong. Horribly wrong.
Because terror filled Emma’s voice. “Help!” she cried. “Sydney—help me!”