Her mind spun. The facts she knew . . . thought she knew. Empty, as in no one there. Locked and off-limits to anyone. She had asked around. She made it her business to know who came on and off the island and why. How had she missed him?

She swallowed hard but it didn’t help. Her voice still sounded rusty. “You said something about a brother?”

Ben shook his head a bit and continued to stare at her. “Yes. His name is Connor.”

That would mean that she . . . She closed her eyes and reached for her last bit of control. Breaking down in front of Ben was not in her plans today.

“Is he okay?” She gulped in air now. She could feel it stuttering and rattling around in her chest. She was two seconds away from wheezing.

“Maddie, is there something I need to know here?”

She doubled over with her hands on her thighs and wondered if that blow-in-a-paper-bag thing she’d seen on television worked. “That Whitaker is about as safe as a medium-sized city right now,” she said, trying to make a joke.

He helped her into the kitchen chair without commenting on her current condition. “We’re not quite at that danger level yet.”

“If you say so.” She threw her head back and stared at her ceiling. After a slow ten-count, some of the nervous energy pinging around inside her vanished.

“Trust me.”

“His brother.” The words came out in a harsh whisper.

“Do you know what happened at the Rye brothers’ cabin?” he asked, sounding half like he’d formed an answer but wanted to test her anyway. “Were you there?”

Silence screamed through her. “Hmm?”

He shook his head. “I think you heard me.”

“Do you need to get back . . .” He never stopped shaking his head, so she figured she could not fake her way out of this. She pulled her scrambled thoughts together to form a sentence.

“Maddie.”

“What? You just told me about the cabin. I’m surprised. That’s all.” Not the best avoidance tactic, but it was all she had at the moment.

When she looked at Ben again, she found him staring at her with a look somewhere between concern and complete confusion. Of course he was. He had eyes. He had to recognize stress-lying when it played out right in front of him.

“I’m thinking someone sneaked into the cabin, heard Connor there, and panicked.”

She hated how close he was. “I’m sure it was a fluke thing.”

“Uh-huh.” He finally broke eye contact and glanced at the letter. “I’m going to bag this note up and get it analyzed.”

That’s not what she expected him to say, but she was grateful for the reprieve from questions. This part she knew by heart, unfortunately. “There won’t be any fingerprints. There weren’t on the others. No prints. Paper you can buy anywhere.”