Page 234 of Secrets Along the Shore

I missed what else she said as I staggered to my feet, nearly dropping my flashlight.

“I know,” I said, stepping into Scanlon’s bedroom. “But we don’t have much time. You need to read this. Downstairs where it is a little lighter.”

We sat at the kitchen table. She read in silence.

“So this is what he did to her,” she finally spoke. “To all of you.”

“We were part of something,” I said. “Livvie knew everything. Hypnosis didn’t take on her. They tried numerous times. That Fourth of July…she was killed to silence her. I know it. And all the others, too.”

Becca closed the journal, her eyes glassy.

“All these years. But now…now I know, too.”

I nodded. The air between us felt different. Not healed. But…open.

“We’re going to finish this,” I said. “We’ll reveal it all. Even if it destroys us, too.”

Becca jumped up from her chair, eyes wide. She looked at the back door. “Someone’s here,” she said, rushing to the window.

I followed to see Clarice Scanlon stepping from her car and walking up the gravel path with her phone’s flashlight. I opened the door.

“I’m told you’re ready to sell,” Clarice said, pushing past me. She dropped a bag on the table and faced me. “That’s good, because I already have a buyer.”

Stunned, all I could do was watch Clarice make herself comfortable at the kitchen table as though she still owned the place. The scent of her perfume—some heavy floral blend, likely expensive and old—permeated the kitchen.

She opened her briefcase to remove a set of papers. Placing them onthe table with a pen offered to me, she said, “Sign on the bottom line, and you’ll be free of this monstrosity once and for all.”

Free.

I thought of Tabitha saying the same thing. Clarice’s words should have brought comfort. Freedom was what I wanted.

But then why did it feel like I was being silenced instead of liberated?

“Didyou not understand what I said? I have a buyer,” Clarice said, slower and obviously shouting at me, as if that would make me hear better. “A corporation. Cash. No inspections. All they want is your signature, Scarlett, and you can be free.”

Free. I wondered why the woman thought I felt trapped. Did she know what happened in this house? More than just a hunch?

The contract was thick and full of legalese I would never understand. I held the pen in my hand, staring at the line with my name typed neatly beneath it.

Then I looked up. “Who owns the corporation?” I asked.

Clarice’s mouth twitched. Just for a second. Just long enough to cause me to question this transaction.

“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “It’s a pharmaceutical holding group. They’re interested in developing private retreats.”

Nothing about this moment felt right.

“What’s the name of the company?”

Clarice sighed like I was being difficult. “Redwood Biotechnica.”

Becca picked up her phone being used as a source of light in the dark room and typed the name out to do a search. “Hold on.” She caught my gaze and turned the phone to me.

Becca’s fingers hovered over her phone screen, the blue-white glow casting long shadows across the woodgrain table. My pulse hammered as I stared at the photo she pulled up.

It’s him. The man from the photograph in the study—the one standing beside Livvie near the edge of the dock. The one from my dream, holding the syringe.

“You recognize him?” Becca asked.