It was that one too-comfortable moment that brought my entire house of cards tumbling down. A peek into my shadows that would become my demise. Because it remained a part of me.

In retrospect, telling Cody was a mistake, a huge one. I was pretty sure he in turn told his brother and Felicity. I didn’t have concrete evidence of this, but when Vera disappeared I suddenly saw judgment in their eyes—that I was the “crazy one” in the family. Capable of anything…like kidnapping their daughter. Or murder. It wasn’t a far stretch after what I’d already done.

While Cody stripped out of his clothes and bumbled into the shower, I glanced at my phone on my bedside table, as if the text I had received earlier burned a green thought bubble on the screen and in my head:

Vera isn’t coming back.

It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. It was never supposed to come to this. Vera was never supposed to disappear. Now I knew for sure that I was the reason she was missing. What I couldn’t figure out was why.

I needed answers, and there was only one person who could give them to me. Sliding off the bed, I grabbed my phone and shuffled to the window. An endless row of brick houses depressingly identical to mine stared back at me. My finger trembled as I found the number and pressed the call button. This was my last chance, the only person who could help me bring back Vera. After a single ring it went to voicemail. Of course it wouldn’t be so easy. I decided to leave a message.

“Hey, we need to talk,” I whispered. “Please. Call me as soon as you get this. It’s urgent.”

As I ended the call, Cody’s voice seized my last bit of nerves. “What’s so urgent at”—his gaze slid to the alarm clock—“two in the morning?”

The phone slipped from my hand, clattering on the floor. There was no way out of this now.

Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Marin

The hum of the lawnmower outside my bedroom window pulled me awake. I turned over and saw the clock blink a new minute: 8:06 a.m. My first thought was last night’s fight with Cody after I lied my way through an explanation about the “mysterious phone call” I had made. Eventually I convinced him it had to do with an errand my boss had asked me to run that I had forgotten about. He didn’t press for details after that, but I felt the lie widen between us as we climbed into bed, his body nearly hanging off the mattress to avoid even the slightest waft of heat from mine.