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Chapter Nine

Luckily, he was in good shape because, even so, Ellery was out of breath and sweating by the time he jogged back to the Crow’s Nest to grab his car. He quietly cursed both September and Dylan as he started the VW’s engine.

The VW zipped through the narrow streets of the village, winding up the hillside as street lamps winked on.

September was renting a place two streets over from Jack’s, which Ellery hadn’t realized until that evening. When he pulled up in front of the yellow and white bungalow, all the lights were off and the curtains were closed. September’s golf cart sat in the front drive, but she did not appear to be home.

Unless she’d gone to bed early?

Maybe the entire point of this exercise was to enjoy dragging Dylan away from the festival for nothing more than the pleasure of making him jump through hoops. That scenario made more sense to Ellery than one where September knowingly risked her life.

But Dylan seemed sincerely worried, and he knew September better than Ellery.

It was not the kind of thing he wanted to be wrong about, so Ellery turned off the engine and got out of the car. Cozy lights shone in the windows of the neighboring houses. It was a quiet street. Down the hill, he could see the deep blue of the harbor and the distant glow of the lamp at North Point lighthouse.

And,veryfaintly, he could hear what sounded like a dog’s shrill bark carried on the sea breeze.

“Yikes,” he murmured. “Surely not.”

He strode briskly up the brick walkway to the front door and rang the bell.

He was not surprised when nothing happened.

He rang the bell again, but he couldn’t hear it ring, so maybe it wasn’t working. He tried knocking on the door.

Again, there was no response.

He sighed, took a step back to study the front of the cottage. On the roof, a whale weather vane spun aimlessly in the wind. The shutters creaked.

It was tempting to wash his hands of the situation and phone the police. Maybe the embarrassment of having Pirate Cove’s finest darkening her doorstep would put an end to September’s games. The problem was, that solution would be equally embarrassing for Dylan, which was why he hadn’t gone that route in the first place. Ellery understood only too well. It was no fun being the object of village gossip.

Well, no fun being the object of any gossip, really.

He checked his phone. It was now nearly eight o’clock. Hard to believe September would go to bed this early, even to make a point. It was equally hard to believe she’d be sitting in the dark, waiting for Dylan to show up. Unless she really was a sociopath, which…maybe.

He returned to the front door and knocked so hard the wreath of shell and twigs bounced. “September? Are you in there? It’s Ellery.”

The stubborn silence persisted.

As much as he didn’t want to be any more involved than he already was, what if somethinghadhappened to her? What if shehaddone something stupid?

Ellery walked around the side of the bungalow to a small cement courtyard with a variety of potted plants and an iron bench. He knocked on the back door.

Nobody home.

The curtains to what was likely the bedroom were not pulled tight. He climbed onto the bench—hoping none of September’s neighbors chose that moment to look out their windows—and tried to peer through the opening. As he searched for recognizable shapes within the dimness, he hoped with all his heart that September was not taking a nap and about to wake to the sight of him looming outside her window.

The interior was even darker than the surrounding night.

He hopped down and went back to the door, trying to see beneath the scalloped bottom of the curtain.

In the gloom, he could just make out the outline of table and chairs—and maybe a tiny flickering light? A candle on the table?

Tentatively, he tried the doorknob. To his surprise, the knob turned. He opened the door, but then caution—instinct?—held him motionless.

“Hello?” Ellery called from the doorstep. “September?”

He didnotlike the feel of the silence on the other side of the door.