Page 107 of Death of a Grill Master

They coasted past lobster buoys and seaweed-laced rocks, hugging the shore and ducking beneath an outcropping where cormorants blinked at them from their nests. The cliffs loomed higher than she remembered, streaked with shadow and seaweed.

“Did you tell anyone where you were going?” Hannah asked.

“Bruce,” Hayley said. “And Leroy, but I don’t think he grasped the details.”

The approach to the sea cave came into view—those same dark rocks slick with spray, the opening like a mouth waiting to swallow them. Hayley tamped down her fear and pushed forward.

Inside, the cave was cool and echoing, every drip of water off a stalactite sounding like a gunshot. Hayley felt the hairs rise on her arms, even under her windbreaker.

The police had found nothing here a week ago.

But now …

She pulled out a waterproof flashlight and swept the beam across the floor.

Hannah pointed her flashlight at a crumpled sleeping bag in the corner, a pile of empty granola bar wrappers, and a half-crushed can of Bud Light.

“Someone’s been back here after the cops,” she whispered.

They paused.

Hayley stopped breathing.

A sound. Soft. Indistinct. The faintest shuffle behind a rock shelf, barely louder than the drip of seawater off the cave walls.

Hannah turned slowly, the beam of her flashlight quivering. “Did you—”

“Shhh.” Hayley’s whisper cracked in the thick air.

She raised her flashlight again, sweeping the rocky crevices. Shadows danced across wet stone and seaweed. The cave had a way of playing tricks—echoing back your own movements, making still things seem to flicker.

But this … this was something else.

There it was again.

A scuff.

Closer this time.

“Is someone there?” Hayley called out, trying to sound firm, but her voice warbled, echoing off the cave walls with eerie distortion.

Silence.

Then movement. A subtle shift, just past a curtain of limp, kelp-like algae hanging from a rock face.

Hayley took a step forward. “We know someone’s in here,” she said, louder this time. “We’re not leaving.”

No reply.

The shadows thickened behind the curtain of seaweed—then twitched. Hayley and Hannah both jerked backward, instinctively huddling closer.

The seaweed rustled. Slowly.

Then—something emerged.

A figure stepped through the green veil of algae fast and low, arms raised, face wild in the sudden beam of the flashlight.

Both women screamed. Hannah nearly dropped her light.