Kelsey felt a shiver work its way up her spine. “And they never had any ideas at all? Not a single suspect?”

“No, and I guess they thought of everything, too. Even checked out the local mental hospital to make sure none of the patients had escaped. A mental hospital in the same town as the school—I find that extremely appropriate somehow.”

Kelsey laughed but it sounded strangely hollow. Her eyes moved again, restlessly, over the rocks, the wind-worn path, the scrawny plants.

“You seem awfully nervous,” Donna said uneasily.

“I am.”

“Me, too. I’m scaring myself. Let’s go.”

Donna led the way up again so she was several yards ahead when Kelsey let out a yell.

“Don’t do that!” Donna scrambled back, watching dubiously as Kelsey squatted down. “I almost killed myself! What is it? Oh, God, I can’t look—”

“Come on, Donna, it’s not a body.” Kelsey moved her hands in a wide circle along the grass. “But it’s been here, don’t you see? Look at all this grass, all flat like this—it’s been here! We didn’t imagine it, Donna. It was right here in this exact spot!”

Donna stared down at the vague imprint on the ground, her face pale and blank. “Then where is it? If it was here, where did it go?”

“I don’t know,” Kelsey retorted grimly. “But unless it got up all by itself, something—or somebody—had to move it.”

They stared at each other in silence, horrible possibilities washing over them in icy waves. At last Donna sank to her knees and clamped cold fingers onto Kelsey’s arm.

“What…what if it was Beth?”

“What if it wasn’t?”

A mocking wind howled up over the edge of the cliff. Far below, the ocean hurled itself furiously against the jagged rocks.

Kelsey raised her eyes and stared at the lighthouse, its broken shell resolute and guarded.

“Well, whoever it was,” Kelsey said softly, “she sure didn’t drown way up here.”

Chapter 8

THE LIFEGUARD LEANED HIS head against the wall, trembling.

It was strange, he thought, how sometimes now he couldn’t even remember what he’d done…how sometimes in the morning now he’d have to leave the house very early to make sure if he had had some dream or if it had all been real…

This last one had really scared him.

He’d picked her out special—a runaway with no real family who cared about her, no friends, no one to miss her or report her gone—and he’d been so careful, so careful to do it right, do it fast…

And they had found her—Donna and Kelsey had found her, even while he was racing to get back there because he’d finally remembered…and they found her before he could do anything about it…

He didn’t understand how he could have forgotten and left her there.

He had really known then, what it was like to be afraid.

But he wasn’t afraid now.

Now he was safe because she was here with him, hidden where no one would ever find any of them again.