31

BRIDGER

MAY 6, 2013

“Have you seen Alora?” I ask Grace when I get downstairs. I checked her room first, but it was empty.

Grace looks up from her phone. “She went for a run. I was just texting her because she’s late. She was supposed to be back ten minutes ago.” Grace tries to keep her voice light, but worry is etched across her face.

A nervous flutter fills my stomach. “Did she take the river trail?”

“No, she said she was going to run along the highway.”

“I’ll look for her,” I say. It’s all I can do to keep from tearing out of the house.

As I run down the driveway, I wish I could just shift to the highway already. Horrible thoughts race through my mind. All pertaining to that dickhead and his obsession with Alora. I tried to make Alora feel better by reminding her that someone else could’ve murdered that ghost. But my gut was telling me the whole time that it had to be Trevor. Yet one more mistake I made back in my time. I should have studied every homicide around here in the months prior to Alora’s death date to see if there was a pattern.

I’m a failure. Dad wouldn’t have made that kind of mistake.

I don’t see Alora when I get to the end of the driveway. I activate my DataLink tracker. Red dots blink on the holographic image, but they’re all concentrated in housing units. A dot is speeding toward me from town. I look up to find an auto heading my way.

I study the dots again. Alora wouldn’t visit one of her neighbors. She’s never done that in the time I’ve been here. She doesn’t have any other friends. But it doesn’t make sense for her to not be around here.

Unless someone took her.

I walk a short way along the side of the road toward Willow Creek. Then I freeze. Skid marks streak the side of the road, along with torn grass where someone sped away.

I run back the inn to let Grace know what I’ve found. And I swear, if Trevor has Alora, I don’t know if I can stop myself from hurting him.

“I’m gonna kill him,” Grace says again as we hit the city limits.

We’re heading to the police station. Even though we don’t have proof, we’re both positive Trevor took Alora. He must have seen Alora on the side of the road and forced her to get in his auto. But where did he take her?

We pass Alora’s school, but soon reach a stalled line of autos snaking up the road ahead of us.

Grace frowns. “Good grief, I should’ve taken one of the side streets.” She stretches her neck forward and then peers over her shoulder. “There’s no way I can turn around.”

I roll my window down and lean out. The air smells of smoke and gasoline. I can barely make it out, but it looks like a pile of twisted metal is sitting under the traffic light. Flames lick at the sides. Several firefighters hose it with jets of water. People in the other autos are gawking out their window. A few are standing at a barricade that’s been set up.

Grace rolls down her window and gestures to an older woman coming back from the barricade. I recognize her from the bakery Alora took me to a few times. “Hey, Mrs. Randolph,” she says.

“Oh, hello, Grace.”

“What’s going on up there?”

Mrs. Randolph shakes her head. “It’s terrible. A truck ran the red light and was broadsided by a car. So sad.”

“Do you know who they were?”

“Well,” Mrs. Randolph says, looking back at the wreckage. “The man who was in the car died on impact. He was just passing through town. But the other was the Monroe boy.”

I’ve experienced moments twice before when it feels like time has stopped. Both times I couldn’t breathe. The first was when I found out Dad was dead. The second was when I found out Vika had died.

And now.

Grace’s voice is shrill as she asks, “You mean Trevor Monroe?”

“Yes. He ran the red light.”

A red hovercraft-type vehicle appears overhead. Its blades roar and pulse the air. It lands in the parking lot just ahead of us.

Grace tears out of the truck and runs toward the barricade. I follow close behind, my heart feeling like it could explode from my chest. Grace tries to push through, but an officer blocks her.

“You don’t understand,” Grace says, tears running down her cheeks. “I think my niece is in there.”

“Ma’am, if you’ll calm down, I’ll see what I can find out. But I can’t let you go up there. Do you understand?”

She nods and turns to me when the officer walks away, talking into an antiquated handheld communication device. “I should’ve made her stay at the house. This is all my fault.”

“Don’t jump to conclusions. We don’t know for sure she was in there,” I say, hoping that’s true. But I can’t suppress the feeling of dread that’s gripped me.

This can’t be happening. If Alora is dead, that means I’ve changed history. I’ve screwed up the timeline. I want to die. I run my hands through my hair and try to force myself to calm down. To breathe slowly. Grace and I, along with the other nosy ghosts, watch as the medics push a stretcher covered with a white sheet and load it onto the ambulance. Another stretcher is loaded on the red aircraft.

But if Alora wasn’t in there, where is she?

The officer strides back to us, his face hardened in irritation. “Ma’am, I don’t know where your niece could be, but she was not in the truck.”

Grace blinks a few times. “What? I’m positive she was with Trevor.”

Tires squeal somewhere behind us. Everyone turns around, trying to locate the source of the noise. A white auto has just parked behind us and three people spill out.

The rest of the Monroes.

They run up to the barricade, looking frantic.

The man yells, “Where’s my son?”

I recognize the woman and girl with him as Trevor’s mom and sister. Both are sobbing uncontrollably and don’t even glance our way. Officers usher them to a group of medics huddled near the ambulance.

After the red aircraft lifts off, a few people head back to their own autos. Most stay. Grace is still as a statue. She’s fixated on what’s left of the autos lying in the intersection. It’s a miracle Trevor survived.

The Monroe family staggers from the ambulance shortly after the red aircraft departs. The man has one arm wrapped tightly around Celeste and the other around Kate. It’s so strange seeing Celeste like that. I think back to a few weeks ago. When she wilded out and accused Alora of trying to ruin her son. And yet I feel sorry for her. For all of them. I know what they’re going through.

Grace must think the same thing. She steps forward and says, “Celeste, Rob, I’m sorry about what happened. If there’s anything I can do for you, please let me know.”

They stop and look at Grace as if she’s something that should be scraped off the bottom of their shoes. Rob says, “I’ll tell you what you can do. If I find out your niece is responsible for this, you better get yourself a lawyer.”

“Wait, what? How could she be responsible? I was on the way to the police station because she never came back from her run and we found skid marks by the side of the road. I figured your son must’ve forced her in his truck.”

“That’s funny,” Rob says, his eyes slitting together. “Because the paramedic told us the first thing Trevor said when they pulled him out was it was Alora’s fault.”

I swear, I’d punch this jerk if I could. Now I see where Trevor gets his arrogance. But before I can say anything, he leads Celeste and Kate back to their auto.

Grace stares after them. “I don’t understand. If they claim this is Alora’s fault, then where is she?”

“I don’t know.” At least I’m not lying, because I’m positive Alora shifted if she was in the truck.

But where did she go?