Page 86 of Paranoid

But this—what they’d planned tonight—had crossed a line.

Another line, she reminded herself as a bat flew toward the old tower.

The hairs on her arms lifted and her pulse pounded in her ears.

“Are you here?” she whispered.

She waited.

No response.

Just the wind rustling a piece of paper that danced across the broken concrete walkway.

Annessa was already tense.

She’d read about Violet Sperry’s death, seen the report on the news, heard gossip in the coffee shop.

All she knew was that Violet had been killed by an unknown assailant, murdered in her home. Here in sleepy Edgewater, where the news was so slow that the local paper had to dredge up the fatal accident that had taken the life of Luke Hollander. Her insides turned to ice. She’d been there that night, in the cannery. The noise. The confusion. The sounds of firecrackers booming, or had it been real gunfire? Along with the steady click of pellet guns, the shouts and screams. She’d witnessed Luke go down, seen him bleed out, thought his sister, Rachel Gaston, had actually shot him until she realized she hadn’t been sure. Hadn’t the spark from the real gun been off to Rachel’s side . . . or had she been mistaken? She hadn’t been certain then, and she sure as hell wasn’t now.

She pulled her jacket around her more tightly and wondered how long she would have to wait.

Not long.

She wasn’t going to waste her time.

Creeaak.

The sound echoed through the yard and she shot a quick look over her shoulder to spy the broken, lopsided merry-go-round slowly spinning, rotating on its ancient spindle, casting a moving shadow beneath the solitary lamp.

What the hell?

The merry-go-round was turning from the wind?

But the breeze was slight, not strong enough to push the old structure on its rusting pivot. For a second she thought of the ghost stories they’d told one another as kids, insisting that the chapel was haunted.

“Just kids being kids,” she whispered now, but her skin was prickling and her nerves were strung as tight as the strings of Sister Catherine’s cello.

It’s nothing.

But she decided it was time to go. This was a ridiculous place to meet, anyway.

Why had he even suggested it to begin with?

Why had she agreed?

Oh, yeah, because they each had a connection here, to this complex, and they’d both gone to elementary school here.

So what? She was out.

She reached into her pocket for her keys.

The merry-go-round slowed, groaning to a stop.

Her heart began to race.

She started for the door to the school and heard the clank of chains. What?

Turning quickly, she swept her gaze over the entire yard to land on the pipe structure from which the swings were suspended. Of the three swings, one was broken, missing its seat, the second unmoving, and the third swaying slightly, its chains rattling as if someone had just gotten off.