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Back The Missing Season Save as PDF
Chapters (36)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Epigraph
  4. One
  5. Two
  6. Three
  7. Four
  8. Five
  9. Six
  10. Seven
  11. Eight
  12. Nine
  13. Ten
  14. Eleven
  15. Twelve
  16. Thirteen
  17. Fourteen
  18. Fifteen
  19. Sixteen
  20. Seventeen
  21. Eighteen
  22. Nineteen
  23. Twenty
  24. Twenty-One
  25. Twenty-Two
  26. Twenty-Three
  27. Twenty-Four
  28. Twenty-Five
  29. Twenty-Six
  30. Twenty-Seven
  31. Twenty-Eight
  32. Twenty-Nine
  33. About the Author
  34. Books by Gillian French
  35. Back Ad
  36. About the Publisher

Bree stands on the stoop. Strands of hair blow loose from her ponytail, phone in her hand like she’s forgotten it’s there, or like maybe she’s forgotten how to speak to me.

I stare, hurry to swallow. “Hey.” Wait. Carefully: “How are you?”

Thinking, This is it, we’re finally going to talk. But what she says is, “I can’t find Hazel.”

Twenty-Six

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“WAIT, WHAT—?”

“I don’t know where she is.” Barely restrained ferocity, no time or patience to wait for me to catch up. Bree comes in, making me step back against the door, pacing as far as the table before seeming to remember that she’s Bree and would never be comfortable barging in anywhere. Gestures with her phone. “I’ve texted, called her like fifty times. She’s just not answering.”

Does chocolate slow mental processes? I can’t seem to produce coherent thought, still so shocked by her being in my kitchen. “Well, where’s she supposed to be?”

“Home! She had some party with her dance class right after school, and then she was catching a ride back here. I made her promise”—sharp, dismissive gesture—“because of what happened to you the other night. I figured maybe the party ran long, or she stopped by Jasmine’s after and left her phone in the car—”

“So she did get a ride with Jasmine’s mom?”

“Probably. She usually rides with them. But I can’t get ahold of anybody. Jasmine’s not answering, my mom won’t pick up—”

“Call her work—”

“No, she’s off tonight. She’s pissed at me and not answering, that’s all. I’ve left, like, three messages.” Her phone chimes then, and she swears in relief—“Jasmine, finally”—scanning the text, fingers flying over the keypad in response. A couple seconds later, she looks up at me, expression dull. “They dropped Hazel off around four.”

I stare, unmoving, no clue what to say.

Bree texts again, reading Jasmine’s response off the screen: “Dropped her off at the turn-in to the Terraces. She said she had to check the mail.” I think of the two outdoor pedestal mailbox units down there. “That was an hour and a half ago.”

I feel the spike of fear that shoots through her, my empathy on overdrive, thinking of Hazel. My mouth’s gone dry, and it’s hard to swallow. “Okay. Then she must be in the Terraces somewhere. Where would she go?”

Bree’s shaking her head, hard and fast. “Nowhere. Her friends don’t live here—”