Remi jogged down the dock, tickled that Brick’s footsteps picked up behind her. The man probably thought she was going to throw herself into a boat and take off. Briefly, she considered doing just that in Duncan Firth’s spiffy little runabout. Everyone knew he left the key under the life preserver. But the idea was discarded when she remembered she was here to save her friend, not push more of Brick’s buttons.

“Psst! Audrey?” she hissed into the dark.

Audrey’s head peeked around the weathered shed. She looked pretty and pissed off in cut-offs and a bright yellow tank that looked killer against her dark skin. Remi jogged to meet her, admiring Audrey’s new hair cut, tapered on the sides with tight curls at the crown. She was glaring at Remi through purple-rimmed glasses.

“Where have you been? I’ve been waiting— Oh, heeeey, Brick. Remi, did you bring my…calculus notes with you since we have that test to study for?” Like Spencer, Audrey also sucked at lying.

“It’s okay. He knows,” Remi told her. “He’s being the fun police and keeping us away from the actual police who are raiding Elle’s party.”

“You’re welcome,” Brick grumbled.

Audrey’s brown eyes widened, and her thick lashes fluttered. “Wow. Thanks, Brick. That’s really n…awesome of you.”

Remi bit her lip to hide her smile. Brick Callan had that kind of effect on women of all ages.

He grunted in response and, with a pointed look at them, turned to head back toward the street.

“Nawesome?” Remi teased.

“Shut up. He looked directly at me. What was I supposed to do? Form actual speech? Not everyone’s as brave as you are, you know,” Audrey muttered.

“Come on. Let’s go buy the big guy an ice cream cone,” Remi said, slinging an arm around her friend’s waist. “You can help me plan outfits around these shorts.”

Audrey looked down at Remi’s legs. “Why?”

“No reason. I just feel like wearing them for the rest of the summer.”

12

Remi watched transfixed as the thick, red liquid dripped onto the plastic on the floor, splattering in a macabre pattern over her bare foot.

Radiohead’s “No Surprises” blared from a wireless speaker on the table. Pulsing waves of oranges, blues, and rich purples shifted around the interior of the cottage. But instead of feeling comforted as she usually did, she was sick, almost dizzy as the red rolled like blood over her skin. The canvas in front of her taunted with its blinding white perfection.

Red. White. Blood. Snow. The shimmer of broken glass glimmering in headlights. Dark. Dark. Dark.

Despite the sunshine reflecting off the endless surface of the lake beyond the windows, she felt like she was back in the suffocating midnight black of that cold, horrible night.

The brush—a tool once so familiar—felt foreign and wrong in her left hand.

She shook herself forcefully.

“Don’t be a fucking baby,” she insisted, raising the brush like a wand. A spell to vanquish the darkness. To bleed color onto the canvas and, in the process, exorcise the terror, the helplessness.