Page 110 of Secrets Along the Shore (Beach Read Thrillers #1)

CHAPTER

SIXTEEN

The scent of rosemary was so strong I could taste it.

In my dream, it hung heavy in the air, clinging to the walls, seeping into my skin.

I stood in a brightly lit room. The walls pulsed like a heartbeat, and my ears ached.

Not from sound—not exactly—but a pressure, a phantom pain that built and throbbed as if something was pressing against my skull from the inside out.

I turned toward the feeling, the discomfort sharpening into fear.

A man was there. Young, maybe early twenties, clean-cut hair and pale skin.

I didn’t recognize him, and yet my body recoiled like it did.

His face was oddly calm, serene even, as he raised a syringe in one hand.

It had a plastic, hollow point and inside the base held a golden liquid that glinted like sunlight and amber.

He didn’t speak. He never needed to. I knew what he wanted to do.

I tried to move, to scream, but my limbs were sluggish, heavy. That scent—rosemary—clogged my senses. The man leaned in, the syringe mere inches from my head.

I snapped awake with a gasp, my heart slamming against my ribs.

The sun streamed through the dusty window of Livvie’s room.

It cut lines across the floor, filtered through the slatted blinds.

For a second, the warmth of it tricked me.

I could almost believe I was back at the lodge, safe, before the memory crashed into me.

The handcuffs on my wrists, the ache in my ankles, the knowledge that I was still a prisoner. Still Becca’s prisoner .

My throat was dry. My arms burned from being bound so long.

“Becca,” I croaked.

The door creaked open after a moment, and Becca entered. She carried a tray, metal and old, the paint chipping off the handles. On it sat a plate of scrambled eggs, toast, and a chipped mug of coffee. The smell of it turned my stomach.

“Breakfast,” she said simply.

“I’m not hungry,” I told her. “I need water.”

Becca frowned but set the tray down on the nightstand. She didn’t leave.

“I saw someone,” I said. “In a dream. A man I didn’t know, holding a syringe with a heavy scent of rosemary. I think he was one of them. I think he did something to me…to all of us.”

Becca stared out the window.

“I need to go back to the lodge,” I said, hoping to convince her.

“Not to run. I swear, I’m not trying to escape.

But there’s a room, Becca. Off of Scanlon’s bedroom.

A secret study. He documented everything.

It’s all in there. There’s one cabinet that’s locked.

I don’t know where the key is. I’ll show it all to you.

You’ll have your answers. In fact, I think I might have seen a picture of this man from my dream in there. ”

Her gaze snapped on me. “What man?”

“I’m not sure. I had a dream, and I remember a young man doing something to me with a plastic syringe. If we want answers, that’s where they’ll be. Not here. Not in a child’s old diary pages. Scanlon had files on everyone.”

“He wrote it all down?”

“Yes. He thought he had found a cure for deafness. He thought he would be rich. Of course, he would have documented his findings.”

She hesitated.

“Plus, there’s a body in my basement,” I added. “I need you to call the sheriff. Please. Right now. My phone is broken. We have to go in the daylight while we can see. The lodge has no electricity. I was blind in the dark. Deaf and blind, Becca. That was done on purpose.”

Her mouth opened, then closed, but I could see I was reaching her.

“Please. Come with me,” I said. “Or let me go. I won’t tell the sheriff what you did. I won’t tell him you tied me up or kept me here. We both want the same thing. The truth. That’s all we want, isn’t it? For Livvie?”

Becca walked to the bed slowly. Her fingers reached out and touched the frayed edge of the rope binding my ankles. She didn’t untie it.

“You think the truth will fix this?”

“No,” I said honestly. “But it’s the only way forward. Livvie didn’t survive what happened. But we did. And we owe it to her to find out what happened that night. Someone silenced her for a reason.”

Becca stared at me for a long time. Her expression flickered, her lips tightening like she was holding back something too sharp to speak aloud. She moved to the nightstand and picked up the diary.

“I used to think this would be enough,” she whispered. “That her words would tell me what I needed to know. I’ve memorized them all, but they’ve only made things worse. I’m sorry, Scarlett.”

“We’ll find the truth together,” I promised. “But not like this. We need each other now. I need you, Becca. I can’t do this alone. I don’t want to. I want you beside me.”

She closed her eyes. When she opened them, her face was wet with tears that she didn’t bother wiping away.

Without a word, she kneeled and untied my ankles. Then she unlocked my wrists. The pain from returning circulation made me cry out softly, but I didn’t move. Not until she helped me sit up.

“We go together,” she said. “But if you lie to me…if you trick me in any way…”

“I won’t,” I said. “I promise.”

And I meant it.

The rowboat rocked as we crossed the lake. Morning mist still clung to the water in long silver ribbons. Becca rowed in silence, her face tense, her arms strong and practiced. I sat behind her, my hands tucked into my lap. My wrists still throbbed .

A crowbar was beside Becca. She had brought it and placed it there. A silent message in case I ran? I wasn’t sure.

“When did you find her notebooks?” I asked quietly, keeping her mind on her plan.

She turned to look back at me. “They were hidden under a floorboard in her bedroom. I wasn’t supposed to find them.

My parents said Livvie drowned because she went out on the lake alone.

She took risks. Always did. I believed them until I read what she wrote.

After that, I didn’t believe anything they said anymore. ”

I nodded. “I think they knew. I think they approved the experiments on her. Probably why they can’t bear to be here anymore.”

Becca didn’t respond and faced forward again.

I waited until we reached the shore before saying anything else.

The moment we stepped onto land, I felt the dread settle again. The lodge loomed ahead, still and quiet. The windows glared in the sun. The memory of that body in the basement, the feeling of that boot under my hand, rushed back like a punch.

“Sheriff McNealy’s not here yet,” I said. “I don’t want to go back in until he’s here.”

“I want to see the secret room,” Becca said, walking up the porch steps, the crowbar in one hand. “You promised.”

I resolved to show her that one room only and followed a few steps behind. We didn’t speak as we entered the lodge and climbed the stairs to Scanlon’s bedroom. I moved to the far wall bookcase, removing the large book and opening the hidden door.

Becca’s mouth dropped wide. “I don’t believe it. It’s true. I mean, I’d heard…” She rushed past me to enter first.

Behind the bookcase, a soft beam of sunlight leaked through the small window, lighting our path, but it was still dark without electricity.

The desk, filing cabinets, shelves upon shelves of journals, and medical documents were important, but I needed only the photograph I had seen in here, while the image of that man from my dream was still fresh in my mind.

I stepped to the shelf and paid close attention to the framed photos this time and not the yearbooks. I scanned down the shelf until I found what I was looking for. I reached for it and brushed away the dust .

The man from my dream…with Livvie. I knew I had seen him somewhere. That somewhere was right here.

I turned to Becca, my hands shaking. “He experimented on us,” I whispered, staring at the photo in my hand.

“He was in my dream. Scanlon had a partner, and it was him.” I said, choking on the words while another memory surfaced.

“He made me forget. He’s the one who hypnotized me.

I know it now. I see it. I see him. It’s coming back to me. ”

I lifted my face to Becca. She had all the file drawers opened, pulled wide, and now struggled with the locked one.

“I don’t have the key to that cabinet,” I told her.

She placed the crowbar into the handle, and with one attempt, ripped it open, pulling the middle drawer out. She tossed the crowbar behind her and lifted something from the inside of the cabinet.

A plastic syringe.

I rushed forward to see there were rows of them. Identical to the one in my dream.

“This is what he used,” I said. “This is what he injected into my ear.”

I reached for one, knowing they all needed to be tested. Perhaps there was residual evidence of the substance.

“We have to bring this to the sheriff,” I said. “Everything.”

Becca nodded slowly. Her eyes were glassy. She lifted her head and looked to the window.

“Someone’s here.”

“The sheriff. Come on.”

She pushed the drawer closed, and we left the study. Neither of us said anything until we reached the main floor, stopping at the door.

I opened carefully, expecting the man from last night to still be by my car. But it wasn’t a man. And it wasn’t Sheriff McNealy.

It was the gardener. I searched my memory for her name.

“That’s Tabitha Rooney,” I hand spelled the woman’s name while I spoke. “She said she would return to tend the plants and bushes.”

“Get rid of her. She can’t be here. It’s not safe.”

“You’re right,” I said, thinking of the dead man below. I opened the door about a foot. “Today’s not a good day,” I told Tabitha. It was best to send her away.

But Tabitha took out a large pair of trimming scissors and approached a bush on the other side of the porch railing. She smiled up at me as she cut twigs as though my words meant nothing.

“The bushes need to be pruned, or they won’t produce. I won’t be long.” Tabitha snipped.

“That smell,” I thought I said to myself, but I must have spoken out loud. “What is that smell?”

Becca pulled me back inside and closed the door. “I don’t like that woman. Stay here until the sheriff arrives.”

“What’s wrong with Tabitha?” I asked. “Becca, you’re afraid of everyone. That’s why you haven’t left your house in fifteen years. I need to know what that smell is. Let me out. Tabitha’s not going to hurt me.”

Becca backed away, still holding me back and shaking her head.

I pulled free and reopened the door. “What is that smell?” I asked before Becca yanked me back inside.

Tabitha snipped while locking her gaze on me. “Don’t you remember, Scarlett? Why, it’s rosemary. Mr. Scanlon’s favorite.”