AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Hey,” Joel said sharply. He looked at me in the moonlight, frowning. “Bayer punched Conor, remember? He swung first. If Dan doesn’t assault anyone, I’m sure he’ll be fine.”
But I was remembering Dan’s voice, shaking with rage as he stormed off into the night. And I couldn’t be sure he wouldn’t let his anger get the better of him, as Bayer had.
“I’m going to go down,” I said, making up my mind. “If nothing else—”
If nothing else, my presence might hold both Conor and Dan back from doing anything stupid, was what I was thinking, though that had hardly helped with Bayer.
“If nothing else?” Joel asked.
“Nothing. Just—just look after Santa. I’ll be back. Hopefully soon.”
Joel nodded, and I headed off into the dark.
IN THE CLEARING the moon had seemed astonishingly, almost preternaturally bright. But as I entered the forest, the palm trees and banana bushes blocked out most of the sky, letting only flickers of white light through in a confusing crosshatch of moonlight and shadow that was more disorienting than complete darkness. I found I was feeling my way, more than seeing, and it was a relief when I noticed a break in the trees and groped my way out of the thick cover onto the moonlit beach.
I had come out farther down the beach than I had meant to—I must have taken a wrong turn in the darkness—and now as I walked slowly along the sand I strained my ears to listen for any disagreement coming from the water villa, but I could hear nothing, just the rhythmic shush of the waves.
When I got to the jetty, I had to stop and steel myself for what was coming. The makeshift, gappy planks were bad enough by daylight, but now, in the shifting unreliable moonlight, they looked positively lethal.
“Conor?” I called across the wide stretch of water, but there was no sound from the villa. No door cracked open. No head appeared on the veranda. I took a deep breath and set foot on the first plank. It shifted and creaked, but held, and I stepped to the next.
As a journey, it wasn’t quite as terrifying as when Joel and I had swum across the roaring, wind-tossed stretch of water in the aftermath of the storm, principally because this time, if I fell in, I was fairly sure I could just swim back to land. But all the same, the idea of falling into the dark water, likely full of submerged pikes and broken debris from the storm-wrecked jetty, was not enticing, and I held my breath as I stepped from rocking plank to creaking pile, feeling the splinters and mismatched fastenings beneath my bare feet, never sure if the next step would be the one that drove a nail deep into my heel, or sent me falling into the black waves beneath.
I was shaking by the time I reached the water villa, wondering how Zana could bring herself to make the journey every morning. She must be terrified, every single time. Maybe once you’d done it a few times it felt better, but I had no fear of water, and the thought of making the same journey back was if anything worse, now I knew how slippery and bendy the jerry-rigged planks really were.
But there was no point in dwelling on that. I was here to find Dan, and for the moment at least, I was safely on the solid surface of the veranda. Stepping forward, I banged firmly on the glass door of the water villa.
For a long moment nothing happened. I banged again, and then cupped my hands around my face, peering into the darkness inside. Nothing was moving, and I felt a twinge of anxiety. Then I saw a shape rise from the bed, and a figure—it looked like a man—swing something white around his middle. He came over to the door, opened it, and I saw Conor standing there, his hair wet and tousled, a towel wrapped around his hips.
“Lyla?” He sounded genuinely confused. “Is everything okay?”
“I came to ask you the same thing.” My fears about Dan were ebbing away and being replaced with a very different kind of anxiety. “Have you seen Dan?”
“Dan? No. Why?”
“Because—” I stopped. Should I come out with it? Because he was marching over here to accuse you of stealing Santana’s insulin.
No. That wasn’t why I was here. I was here for Dan, to make sure he was okay. We could figure out the insulin tomorrow. Tonight was about making sure Dan and Conor didn’t come to blows.
“He was coming here,” I said instead. “To talk to you.”
“I haven’t seen him.” Conor looked puzzled. “I was asleep, as you can see.” He waved a hand at the interior of the villa, where I could just make out Zana sitting up in bed, the sheets clutched to her bare chest.
“Is everything okay?” she said. “Who is it?”
“It’s me, Lyla. Listen, are you telling me Dan didn’t come here?”
“He’s never set foot here,” Conor said. “I swear it.” He looked as bemused as I felt. “Did he actually say he was coming out here?”
“More or less.” I had turned away from the water villa, and was scanning the beach, feeling more and more worried by the second. “Where the hell could he be?”
“Maybe he changed his mind and turned back. The jetty isn’t for the faint-hearted at night.”
“Maybe.” I bit my lip, trying to figure out what to do. It was true the jetty had looked terrifying in the darkness. And it was also true that I hadn’t come the most direct route down to the beach. Had Dan and I crossed in the forest? Maybe he was back at the villa right now, wondering where I was. I half turned, ready to cross back to the island, and then paused and said, “Listen, if Dan does turn up here—”
I stopped. What could I say?
“Yes?”
