Page 62 of The Unknown

“Sorry if I don’t buy that,” Heather says.

I’m not sure I do, either. Yes, my immediate assumption upon seeing Ronan step into Susie’s cottage was that she was trying to seduce him. But was he as unwilling as he claims? I stopped watching the cottage after that. I have no idea how long he was there. It might have been five minutes. It might have been all night. Even if he’s lying, it doesn’t mean he did something to Susie.

“Maybe Azra took her,” Julianne says, back in the grass and staring up at the tree. “Just like in the screenplay.”

Next to me, Heather scoffs. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“It’s not ridiculous,” Julianne says. “First Brad gets sick and has to be evacuated from the island. Loretta is nowhere to be found. Now Susie is gone, too.”

“She’s not gone,” Violet says, aiming for reassurance but coming off sounding uncertain herself. “She’s just not…here.”

“Was Susie angry when you left last night?” I ask Ronan, making the assumption that he’s telling the truth and nothing happened between them.

“I don’t know,” he says. “She seemed pouty.”

“Enough to want to fuck with your head?” Heather asks, refreshingly blunt. “Marin’s onto something. Maybe Susie did this herself, trying to get your attention.”

Ronan works his jaw, thinking. “To make me pay for rejecting her?”

“Maybe,” Heather says. “She hung her clothes in the tree and then left the island.”

I look to the wrought iron arch over the path. Beyond it is the way to New Avalon’s only dock. If Susie did get off the island, that’s where she would go. But in what boat? In order for her to leave, someone would have to arrive. And the most likely person—Loretta—makes no sense. If she made it back to the island, even briefly, surely she’d announce her return, if not to everyone, then at least to her sister.

Violet must be thinking the same thing because she says, “That’s highly unlikely. The rest of us would know if another boat was here. My guess is Susie is still around. Maybe she’s hiding somewhere. Or was trying to hide and got lost.”

“On an island this small?” Heather says. “That’s impossible. You reach the water, turn around, head back to the center.”

I’m hit with a sudden, horrible thought. “What if she can’t? What if she’s hurt?”

“Hiding or hurt, we need to find her,” Heather says, snapping into action like one of the supercompetent women she plays on TV. “Weshould spread out and search the island. In groups of two. No need for someone else to go missing.”

We all agree that’s a good idea and pair off. Heather and Julianne head south toward the dock, while Violet and I go north, toward the cliff. The plan is to work our way clockwise, heading inland as we circle the island. Because he’s the odd man out—and because none of us fully trust him—Ronan stays behind in case Susie or Loretta returns. That two women are now MIA makes me realize my initial impression about this endeavor was correct.

Coming to New Avalon was indeed a very bad idea.

A reasonable part of me assumes we’ll find Susie, she’ll cop to messing with us, and this will all be over by lunch. Yet another part of me—the one that heard a malevolent whisper during the séance and thought my dead sister was outside my window—fears something else is happening here. Something sinister.

The feeling only gets worse as Violet and I approach the woods behind Julianne’s cottage. All the trees that border the forest here also bear daisy wheels—a chilling reminder of Mrs. Semple’s mad father. I picture him knife in hand, blade chipping away at the bark, desperately trying to fend off the mangled ghosts of men killed by his cannons. Did he see them in these woods? Were they the dark force that took Daisy and the others? Have they now done the same with Susie?

“Something is wrong,” Violet says as we move past the daisy wheels and into the forest. “With Susie, of course. But also Loretta. It makes no sense that she’s not back yet. The only thing I can think of is—”

She stops herself from uttering the worst-case scenario, as if speaking it aloud will somehow make it real. I understand because it’s the same reason I’ve avoided even thinking about it. Now, though, it’s impossible not to assume the worst—that Brad is dead.

A tragedy like that would surely keep Loretta away for more than a day as she deals with the authorities, contacts Brad’s next of kin, informsthe studio, which surely has protocols to follow and insurance issues to contend with. Now there’s also this situation with Susie, which makes everything even more fraught.

“Do you think Ronan’s telling the truth?”

Violet sighs and reaches for a nearby pine branch, her fingers trailing through its needles. “I don’t know. You?”

“I hope he is,” I say, which is different from yes.

“For Susie’s sake? Or Ronan’s?” Violet gives me a sidelong glance. “I know you’re fond of him. Which is completely understandable. It’s easy to develop a crush on a director.”

“It’s not a crush,” I protest, even though that’s exactly what it is. Well,was. After last night, I’m not as enamored with Ronan as I used to be.

“Well, try to keep it that way. Trust me, I know how quickly an intense bond with a director can form—and how it can fall apart even faster.”

After that, we continue searching in silence. I scan the trees, seeing nothing amiss. The only thing that catches my eye is a group of trees fifty feet away that seem to form a wall around something. A fortress of wood. I peer past them to a circular clearing that’s eerily familiar to me.