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I rise and squeeze her shoulder. “I know, and I appreciate it. Now let’s get dinner.”
Over dinner, I decide to confide in Shania. She really is the right choice. Jin is too close to this and to me, and I’m not eager to tell him what happened twenty-two years ago, especially if he mightconsider it a secret Keith didn’t trust him enough to share. I’d rather keep the details to a bare minimum, and that’s awkward with a good friend. I’m sure as hell not talking to Cirillo. I’m already nervous that he’ll dig up my past. More fodder for his funding.
After dinner, there’s a break before the next séance. Cirillo slips off to prepare for that, and I ask Shania if she’ll walk with me. Jin takes the hint and offers to do the dishes, which doesn’t quite seem fair when he picked up dinner, but when I say so, he’s quick to reassure me.
“There’s a reason I offered to get dinner,” he says. “I am seriously low on my espresso quota so I hit a coffee shop for a double shot. Now I need to work off the caffeine.”
I smile. “Okay, but tomorrow, you’re chilling.”
“Er, actually, that’s another reason I’m being so helpful. I need to head back to Toronto tomorrow for an emergency meeting I can’t do over video chat. Is it okay if I take your car?”
“Sure,” I say. “Do you want to just stay and come back Friday with Keith and the kids? Tomorrow is our last full day here.”
“It’s also our last séance,” he says. “I want to be here for that. I should be back by dinner, but if I’m not, I need you to promise you won’t start without me.”
“Keith’s rule?”
Jin shrugs. “Keith’s request, and my agreement. Shania is a good kid, but she’s a believer. You need someone to join you in playing skeptic.”
“Fair enough. Okay then. Enjoy the dishes, and I’ll see you in an hour or so.”
TWENTY-FOUR
Shania and I stand near the cliff edge. I’m not as close as I was the other day—not after what happened on the stairs and in the bathroom. As we gaze out, I squint at what looks like a funnel cloud.
“Tell me those aren’t bugs,” I say.
Shania swats a stray one from her face. “These definitely are.” Then she sees where I’m pointing and groans. “I thought they were almost gone.”
“Hopefully they’ll make landfall someplace else.”
“I never knew bugs could, well,bugme so much.”
I laugh. “It’s right there in the name. But yes, I keep wondering why I can’t just ignore them when they aren’t biting.”
I look out over the water. “Once I get an idea in my head, it’s just like these damn midges. I can’t ignore it, even when I want to. What we’re doing—the séances—they’re triggering something from my past, and the more I think about it, the more the two events start to overlap and merge.”
“That can happen.”
“There’s a commonality, too.” I cross my arms and gaze out at that cloud of midges. “When I was in high school, some friends and I held a séance. Things went wrong, and a girl died.”
“Oh my God.”
I pass her a wan smile. “Yep. I don’t talk about it. Even Jin doesn’t know.”
“Did Anton?”
“That’s… the problem. Remember I said we were classmates briefly? In high school?”
“Oh!” Her eyes round. “He was there? He went to the same school, I mean?”
I consider how to word this, being honest while not divulging too many details. “My friends and I held two séances. At the first one, we heard voices that seemed to mean we’d contacted the dead. Apparently, it was Anton and his friends.”
“Ah. They pranked you.”
“Yep, though I didn’t know it until a few years ago. But it was the second séance where my friend died.”
“Was Anton there?”
