Page 48 of Hidden Tide

“What happened?”

I look at the photographs. “They found a list, Willow. All our names are on it.”

Silence comes through the speaker.

Then Hazel asks, “What kind of list?”

“A surveillance list,” Ben answers. “It shows where each of you can normally be found.”

“That’s not creepy at all,” Ivy mutters.

Her voice sounds steady, but I hear the fear beneath it.

Keating gives them instructions. They are to pack only what they need for a few days. Deputies will escort them to a secured Coast Guard auxiliary station twelve miles north of the marina. No one outside this room and the law enforcement officers involved will be told where they’re going.

“What about Sea Whisper?” Storm asks.

Keating’s gaze shifts to her. “No one goes near the yacht until we’ve searched it.”

Storm stiffens. “That’s my home.”

“And whoever made this list knows that,” Ward says gently.

She looks as though she wants to argue, but she finally nods.

I understand what it costs her. Sea Whisper isn’t only a yacht. It’s the place Grandpa taught us to read the water, the wind and the sky. It holds memories of our father. It’s where Storm feels closest to both of them.

Now someone has taken away her sense of safety.

Keating ends the call after confirming the deputy’s name and badge number.

“What about Thomas?” Mom asks.

“I have officers on their way to his boathouse,” Keating replies.

“He’s sleeping in the other room, right now,” she explains.

Nathan steps forward. “I’ll go with them, so I can show them where it is.”

“No,” Keating says.

“I want to help.”

“And your name may not be written on that list, but you’re connected to everyone who is. Until we know who made it, you remain here.”

Nathan’s jaw tightens.

Mom touches his arm. “He’s right.”

Nathan looks at her, and something passes between them. Fear. Trust. Maybe the beginning of something neither of them is ready to name.

I glance at Ben and find him watching me.

Maybe I recognize it because the same thing has been growing between us.

Keating pulls the last photograph closer.

The handwritten words at the bottom look darker beneath the evidence-room lights.