Outside on the upper deck, the wind hits me, and I duck my head and hurry down the stairs to the lower level. Icy currents billow my robe around my legs, skating up my bare skin and prickling in my nose with the scent of moss and pine.

I think of Paul, conquering the hills on the other side of our house, and shiver. A hundred bucks says he didn’t think to take his gloves.

I’m careful navigating the hill’s steep steps, pressed gravel held together with reclaimed railroad ties. The treads are uneven, and the snow has coated the ties in slick patches, making the descent slow going.

Above my head, a hawk calls out, and I look up to see him tracing lazy figure eights just above the tree line. There must be something dead nearby, because an animal with any sort of sense would be hunkered down somewhere warm.

The dock is a skating rink, and it doesn’t help my balance any that it’s floating, the waters here too deep to drive in stakes. I grip the posts and move across it with cautious, steady steps. There’s good fishing under this dock, but things that fall in here don’t always come back up, not until much later. It’s called Skeleton Cove for a reason.

My teeth are chattering and my fingers numb by the time I lower myself onto the boat. Paul left the keys dangling in the ignition, and I jiggle them loose and drop them into my pocket. The drawings are right where I left them, a little damp but not soggy, thank God.

I feel around the bottom of the cubby until my fingers connect with a smooth, icy object. My cell phone. I pull it out and poke at the screen, but nothing happens. The battery is dead, probably frozen to death. I slip it in my pocket with the keys, grab the drawings and step to the bow.

I’m hoisting myself onto the dock when I see it. Something long and white in the water below me, drifting like seaweed on the surface.

I lower one foot back onto the leather seat, then the other. Bend down and look again.

I shriek and scramble backward.

Not seaweed. Hair. Human hair. It fans out from the back of a blond head, twisting and swirling in the water like smoke.

I take another step backward, putting some space between me and the corpse, but there’s nothing behind me but air. My body pitches off the seat and onto the carpet of the bow’s cockpit, my back slamming into the opposite seat. I land on my right hip with a thud. Automatically, my hand goes to my belly.

Don’t you come unstuck, little guy. Don’t you dare.