Page 170 of It Happened on the Lake

She started at the house closest to the swim park and town. Harper already knew there were people in the Sievers’ place. She adjusted the focus and sipped from her glass until the images on the other side of the lake were crystal clear.

From her vantage point, she saw glimpses of a round woman as she walked in and out of what appeared to be a kitchenette. A teenaged boy with a mop of reddish hair sat at a table and scowled at the open books and notebook open in front of him. In a gray sweatshirt and jeans, he twiddled with a pen as he read the books and every once in a while stopped to take a note or sip from a Big Gulp on the table near his homework.

He didn’t look up as the woman, his mother, presumably—Francine, according to Beth—opened the slider and walked onto the back deck. Short, with curling auburn hair, pulled into a topknot, she switched on an exterior light. Immediately her deck and dock were illuminated, and the light was bright enough to light several neighboring yards.

Harper watched and sipped, her glass draining, a buzzy feeling settling warm inside her, her frayed nerves finally calming.

In faded jeans and an oversized sweatshirt, Francine pulled on a pair of kitchen gloves, then carrying two buckets, she stepped onto the dock and sat on a plastic chair that was positioned on the dock’s edge. She adjusted her topknot before using a knife and cleaning the buckets of crabs.

All the while, the kid worked at the table inside. Supposedly he had a brother or sister. Beth had mentioned two kids, but Harper saw no one else in the house, and as the kid picked up his drink, she hoisted up hers. “Cheers,” she said, then swung the telescope to Rand’s house again.

Tonight the A-frame was dark, no light emanating through its sharply angled windows, and she felt a little pang of disappointment.

Oh, puh-leez, Harper. Just how pathetic are you?

She moved the telescope to focus on the Hunts’ cottage. It, too, was dark, showing no signs of life.

Another letdown.

Are you serious? Is this how you’re going to get your jollies, by watching people you knew twenty years ago? For God’s sake, get a life.

“For God’s sake, shut up.”

She took another long swallow and swung the telescope to the Alexanders’ split level. No lights there. She didn’t even see the dog that sometimes ambled out onto the deck.

“Strike three.”

As for the last house on the point, there were no lights on and the shades were drawn, just as they had been twenty years earlier when it had been occupied by the rotating group of college students. Then she’d seen silhouettes of people backlit by the shifting, eerie light from the lava lamps and candles they had throughout the house.

Tonight? Nothing.

She took a long, final swig from the glass and was about to go downstairs in search of dinner when she took one last peek at the dark Hunt house. For a second she thought she saw someone on the deck but, after staring at it long enough, decided it was just a trick of light, a shadow cast by some of the tall trees surrounding the area.

Then the figure moved, catching a wink of light. A tall man. Broad shoulders. Light hair catching in the breeze.

“Chase,” she whispered, her heart soaring.

In the wispy, foggy light she saw the sharp features of his profile.

She dropped her glass and fell to her knees. A small sob escaped from her throat.

He was alive!

After all this time—oh my God—Chase Hunt was alive!

Her heart skipped an elated beat, before she realized she was wrong.

Of course she was.

Her imagination had got the better of her.

Chase wasn’t at the Hunts’ house.

The man walking across the deck was Levi.

But, here in the dark, he could have been his brother’s twin.

As kids, the two boys had resembled each other and as teenagers even more so. Now she couldn’t help but wonder. If Chase were still around, would they still look so much alike? Or would they have grown into men who only slightly resembled each other? Their coloring was slightly different, of course, but other than that . . .