Page 59 of The Haunting of Paynes Hollow

When I eye her, she says, “I like vintage, okay?”

“No judgment. I just wasn’t sure whether that was sarcasm.”

“I am never sarcastic about tie-dye and bell-bottoms.”

“You can have them if you want. They’d be my grandmother’s, and she was about your size.”

Josie crawls over and picks up a plastic box. “There. I have my treasure.” She peeks over the top. “Unless you see something you want.”

“I doubt it.”

“Nope, you will. Or I’ll find you something. I’ll clean everything up, get my mom to help with any repairs, and once you’ve put in your month here, we are going barhopping, seventies-style. On you, of course, ’cause you’ll be loaded.”

I laugh softly. “I will be, and we will definitely go out and celebrate. I will even wear bell-bottoms, just for you. Now let’s finish looking through this stuff.”

Finding nothing else in the crawl space, we retreat upstairs with our treasures, me holding the book on Great Lake legends and Josie with her box of vintage clothes.

As we circle to the front of my grandparents’ cottage, Josie tells me the story of her last bar night and the guy she’d picked up.

“So I’m leaving his place afterward, and I see this photo of two little kids, and I’m like, are these yours? Nieces? Nephews? And he says, oh, those are my grandkids.”

I snort a laugh. “Underestimated his age, I take it?”

“Hey, it was dark. At the barandat his place. Also there’d been drinking. So he was a little—lot—older than I thought. No big deal. Then I see a photo of his grandchildren’s father and…” She glances at me. “I dated him in high school.”

I start choking on my laugh. “Seriously?”

“Seriously. He was, like, my first boyfriend. Which means I’d also known his dad… the guy I just slept with.”

“Did he know who you were?”

“I wasnotgoing to ask. I got out of there so fast. From now on, I’m taking my big-ass flashlight with me so I can get a good look at any guy I go home with. Also, pro tip? Always check the family photos before you hop into bed.”

I’m laughing. Then I spot the pickup outside my cottage, Sheriff Smits standing beside it, and everything rushes back, and shame courses through me.

My aunt has been missing for less than a day, and I’m already finding things to laugh about.

If Smits sees anything untoward, he gives no sign of it, only takingoff his hat in a way that has my stomach dropping. I pick up the pace and soon I’m running toward him.

“You found her,” I say as I stop short in front of him.

He looks startled. Then he seems to realize what he’d done, taking off his hat, the way cops in movies often do before delivering bad news. He quickly puts it back on.

“No,” he says. “I’m sorry. We haven’t found anything.”

He doesn’t ask where we were or what we have in our hands. Josie puts the plastic storage box down by the porch, and I set the book on top.

“I just wanted to update you,” Smits says. “I know it’s hard on families when they don’t hear anything, but mostly, that’s because we have nothing to tell.”

“Okay.” I wipe sweaty hands on my jean shorts. “So… nothing?”

He shakes his head. “We’ve checked the lakeshore. I wanted to get a diver out, but there’s a strong current, and it’s stirring up the bottom too much to see.”

“Do you think that current had anything to do with Gail disappearing?”

“I hope not. But I’ve notified departments all along the lake. They’ve scouted the shoreline and taken out boats.”

“And the sonar?”