Page 81 of Half the Summer's Night

My phone chimes, and I startle, dropping the files across the desk.

Penelope

What’s up, girlie?

I stare down at the message, my fingers hovering over the keypad. It’s a relief to hear from her, even though I don’t know what to say. She’s my best friend, but I can’t tell her anything that’s happening to me. It would make her an accomplice?—

Like I’m an accomplice

And I can’t do that to her. I can’t. But god, I also don’t want to be alone right now.

I need a video chat like rn

I got you. Usual link?

I send back a heart as an affirmative, then slide behind my desk and flip open my work laptop. I know I ought to do this on my personal laptop, but I feel safer down here. The office and the exam room are closed tight, like a cocoon.

This is also the first place I ever encountered Nameless. The first place he?—

“Abi! What’s up?”

Penelope grins at me through the laptop screen. Her background has changed from the blank wall of her sister’s apartment; she’s outside somewhere, a wall of alpine trees behind her.

“Where are you?” I ask.

“Colorado.” She leans forward. “I’m here to protest that new pipeline RTI is putting in.”

I have no idea what she’s talking about; I haven’t exactly been paying attention to environmental injustices the last few days. But I still nod, trying to act normal. “That’s cool.”

“I mean, it’s gonna be intense. No cell service, much less Internet.” Penelope frowns. “I told y’all about it? How my car broke down in Nebraska?”

Heat burns in my cheeks. She did, actually—there had been a flurry of messages over the last few days, the two of them talking to each other. “Yeah, sorry, I’ve been distracted.”

Penelope’s frown deepens. “What’s wrong?”

Everything, including me. I wonder what Penelope would say to me fucking a killer, not that I can tell her over Zoom. She’s about as non-judgmental as you can get, but I don’t think she’d understand that. Neither of them would.

Still, I have to tell hersomething. It’s a relief, hearing her voice, not feeling so alone.

“There was another murder,” I say. “Um, my lawyer from when I was a teenager?—”

“Jesus Christ,” Penelope says. “She was the one killed?”

“Yeah.” I feel sick to my stomach, my fear twisting around tight in my guts. “Yeah, in the same way as Olivia Pearce.”

“Oh my fucking god.” I hear clacking through the speakers; Penelope’s already diving into Google. “I found a story, but it’s not really saying anything?—”

“Yeah, it just happened last night.”

Penelope’s eyes scan across the screen. Reading the story, I guess. “Forget the protest,” she says. “I’m coming down to Rosado. You can’t be alone.”

I stiffen. “No, that’s not necessary,” I say, a little too quickly. It’s not that I don’t want her here, her or Chloe. But I already have someone watching over me, and I don’t want to put either of them in danger. “The cops are giving me a guard.”

Penelope scoffs at that. Rolls her eyes. “Why the fuck would you trust the cops?”

“They have guns,” I say weakly.

“Yeah, and we know who they usually shoot with those guns. The second they see this asshole is a white guy, those guns are staying right in their holsters.”