What Lies in the Dark Read online

  “Yeah, I think we should. After we talk to Legend, we can drive out there. To the shore,” I emphasize when Kennedy frowns. “See if we can see what I saw in the dream.”

  Kennedy and Embry agree, while Ev has a bit more reservations, but in the end, she agrees.

  Chapter 14

  LOCATION: CORONER’S OFFICE

  TIME: 8:06 AM

  DATE: WEDNESDAY, MARCH 24th

  When we pull up to the coroner’s office, the parking lot is mostly vacant, except for a couple of cars parked out back. As an extra bonus, the building doesn’t have the symbol on it. Both are good signs. Now, hopefully, Legend won’t be busy, and I can ask him a few questions without the worry of being overheard. Unless, of course, one of the security cameras is inside.

  I frown at the thought. Man, I’m going to have to be extra careful about what I say and keep a low profile while we’re here.

  “Hey, Ken, how about you drop us off, and then go park somewhere else?” I slip on my jacket.

  “Why?” Kennedy asks as she pulls up to the front entrance of the small brick building.

  “I just want to make sure we’re careful.” I zip up my jacket and pull the hood over my head. “You never know who is watching.”

  Nodding, she leaves the engine running as she parks beside the curb.

  Noting my lame-ass, desperate-times-call-for-desperate-measures disguise, Embry follows my lead and pulls her hood over her head, as well.

  “Hopefully, by the time you guys get out, I’ll have gained access to Dixon’s computer.” Ev picks up her coffee mug from the cupholder and takes a sip.

  “How intense is his security?” I pat my pockets to make sure I have my phone and can of pepper spray, just in case this plan takes a turn for the worse. Not that I don’t trust Legend. I’m just really starting to not trust this town.

  “He has some pretty state of the art security software on it.” Ev sets her coffee mug back down. “But nothing I can’t handle. Although, it makes me wonder what he has on here to have such high security access programs.”

  “Hopefully, we’ll find out soon.” I push open the door.

  “Wait. What should I do while you’re in there?” Kennedy asks as I start to get out.

  I stick my hand into my pocket, grab the bottle of vitamins, and hand them to her. “See if you can figure out what these are.”

  Nodding, she takes the bottle from me, and then I hop out of the car.

  “I’ll call you when we’re done so you can swing back by and pick us up.” I start to close the door as I say, “Be careful.”

  “You, too,” she calls out.

  Nodding, I close the door, round the back of the car, and meet Embry on the sidewalk. I wait until Kennedy drives away before I approach the entrance.

  “So, what’s our game plan?” Embry whispers.

  “Well, I’m going to chat with Legend for a few minutes and see if he’ll just answer my questions about Bria’s death. If he refuses or seems like he might be lying, you distract him while I excuse myself to the bathroom so I can sneak into his office and break into his files.”

  “What should I talk to him about? Like, dead bodies and stuff?”

  “Talk to him about that SC Shadow of the Undead Inc. I think he’s into that stuff. And you never know; maybe you’ll learn something new from him.”

  “All right, that’s doable.” She slips her hands into the pocket of her black jacket that’s embellished with silver buckles. “Is he a cool guy, then? This Legend dude, I mean?”

  “Yeah, I met him a handful of times when I was working with my dad.” I yank open the door. “He’s pretty chill, so I think we’ll be fine, even if we get caught.”

  She gives me a pressing look. “Unless he’s working for the society.”

  “Doubtful,” I say as I step inside. “And there’s no mark on the door.”

  Embry nods as she follows me to the front counter where a woman with short, dark purple hair and square-framed glasses sits. She’s the receptionist here, but I can’t recall her name. Well, either that or she never gave it to me.

  She eyeballs us as we approach. “Can I help you?”

  I rest my arm on the counter. “Yeah, I was wondering if I could talk to Legend.”

  Her gaze flits to my hood, and then she reaches for the phone. “Hold on.” She dials a couple numbers then puts the receiver to her ear. “Hey, there’s a girl here who wants to talk to you.” She bobs her head up and down, then her gaze zeroes in on me. “I don’t know. Hold on.” She covers the receiver with her hand. “He wants to know who’s asking and the reason behind your visit.”

  “It’s Mak. You’ve met me a couple times,” I say as Embry moves up beside me. “And I’d just like to chat with him for a bit, like he used to do with my dad.”

  Her expression flashes with annoyance as she removes her hand from the receiver and repeats what I said. Then she nods, her irritation growing. By the time she hangs up, she’s glaring at me.

  “You can go on back to his office. Just make it quick. Legend is a busy man.”

  “Are those your words or his?” I can’t help asking.

  Her eyes flash with fury. “Just make it quick.”

  Smiling sweetly, I start toward the narrow, fluorescently lit hallway that leads to the backroom where Legend’s office is located. Embry strolls beside me, peering around at the filing cabinets cramming up the space and the strange, skeleton-like wall art.

  Embry leans in and whispers, “What’s up with the bitchy secretary?”

  I give a half-shrug. “I’ve only met her a couple times before, and she’s always been like that. I think she might have a thing for Legend, but Legend’s never been into her. I think she thought I was here to, like, see him, see him, and was being territorial.”

  “How old is Legend?” Embry asks. “Young, I’m guessing, or hoping since you’re seventeen and she thought he’d date you.”

  “I think he’s twenty-two.”

  “Holy shit, I thought he’d be, like, seventy and bald with a beer gut and a creepy mustache.”

  I chuckle. “Why?”

  “Stereotyping from movies, I guess. And doesn’t take like a long time to become a coroner?”

  I stop in front of the office door and knock. “I think he was super smart and went to college really young. And FYI, I don’t think he’s going to fall into your stereotype at all.”

  “Why? What does he look like—” She cuts herself off as the door swings open.

  Legend is standing on the other side, decked out in a pair of black pants and a matching button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up. The outfit is topped off with a vest, the pockets decorated with chains, a series of steel and leather bracelets, and thick black boots. His black hair is a bit longer than the last time I saw him, reaching chin level, and like always, his dark, long eyelashes give the impression he’s wearing eyeliner.

  “Mak,” he greets me with a small smile, motioning for us to come in. “Long time, no see.” He eyeballs my hood drawn up over my head. “Nice get-up. Playing hooky, huh?”

  “Nah. School’s actually canceled today because of some security maintenance thing.” I step inside his small, cluttered office. “Sorry I haven’t stopped by. I’ve been meaning to, but just got caught up with other stuff.”

  “No worries.” His gaze lands on Embry and question marks flood his eyes. “Who’s this?”

  “Oh, this is Embry,” I introduce. “She’s a friend of mine.”

  “Hey.” Embry gives him the barest of smiles.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Embry.” He smiles at her before redirecting his attention to me. “Mak, I just want to say that I’m so sorry to hear about your dad, but I have faith that he’ll show up again.”

  “Really?” I scratch my neck. “Because no one else seems to think so.”

  “Well, screw what everyone else thinks.” He heads toward his desk that’s covered with stacks of papers, files, and folders. “I knew your dad pretty w
ell, probably better than most of the people in town, and I know he’s not the sort of man who would just up and take off like that with no plans on coming back.” He drops down in a chair.

  “He didn’t say anything to you about leaving, did he?” I plop down in a chair on the other side of the desk.

  Embry takes a seat beside me, her gaze skimming the room.

  He shakes his head, strands of hair falling across his forehead. “No, but I’m not surprised he took off.”

  My brow pops up. “Why? Because I sure as hell was.”

  He presses his lips together then slants forward and lowers his voice. “How much do you know about the story your dad was working on before he disappeared?”

  “You mean, his theory that this town was covering up murders and stuff?” I lean forward, too. “Because that wasn’t a story. That was an obsession he had with trying to solve Sawyer’s death.”

  “That’s not what it was.” He shakes his head, his gaze flickering in Embry’s direction.

  “She’s cool,” I assure him. “I promise.”

  He nibbles on his bottom lip, considering something. “Your dad was on to something big, Mak. Not just about Sawyer’s death, but about a lot of the deaths here in Shadow Cove. Deaths not everyone knows about. Deaths I don’t even get called in to investigate. Deaths that no one is supposed to know about.”

  “Then how do you know these deaths even exist?”

  He nervously looks from Embry to me. “Because of the destroyed files your dad found.”

  “What destroyed files?” I ask. “And how did he find them if they were destroyed?”

  “Because they weren’t really destroyed.” He sweeps his hair out of his eyes as he slants closer. “Someone—he never said who—was supposed to destroy the files, but they gave them to your dad instead so he could hide them. I’m not positive on all the details in those files—he never showed them to me—but he said a lot of the papers contained undocumented deaths in Shadow Cove. And not just that, but the cause of the deaths was strange.”

  I glance at Embry, who raises a brow. I’m fairly certain I know what she’s thinking. That strange is becoming a common theme the further we dig into this.

  “Strange how?” we both ask.

  He looks back and forth between the two of us. “He never told me; said it was too dangerous.”

  “Are you just saying that to protect me?”

  He shakes his head, but I still wonder if he’s lying.

  “I really don’t know. And I only mentioned the files to warn you that you need to be careful.” He slumps back in his seat. “Your father was chasing a dangerous trail, and he may have pissed some pretty powerful people off. You and your mom need to be careful.”

  I rest my arms on the desk. “Do you know who the people are?”

  He shakes his head, but again, I have the feeling he is lying.

  “But, considering we live in Shadow Cove, it could practically be anyone.”

  I search his eyes, questioning if he knows more than he’s letting on. If he does, he doesn’t want to cave. “What about Bria Brookenrose?”

  His frown deepens. “What about her?”

  “Is she one of the strange deaths?”

  His lips part. “Mak, I really don’t think you should go down this road. It could be dangerous.”

  “I’m not going down any road,” I lie. “Look, there’s a rumor going around school that Sawyer and Bria died the same way, and I want—no, need—to know if it’s true, because people are saying awful things.”

  He massages the back of his neck tensely as he studies me, then lowers his hand and leans forward again. “Sawyer and Bria’s deaths were very similar, but I don’t believe they did it to themselves—never did. They may have had morphine in their systems, but they also had these scratches all over their bodies.”

  I swallow down the vomit burning at the back of my throat, feeling sick to my stomach.

  “What caused the scratches?” Embry wonders, slanting forward. “Were they, like, animal scratches?”

  Legend shakes his head. “See, that’s the thing; it looked like an animal, but I couldn’t identify the scratches myself, so I was going to get an expert’s opinion.” He shifts in his seat. “Then the mayor and Don Jennings showed up and took the files from me. They told me I was no longer to look into Bria’s or Sawyer’s deaths. They took my files on a couple of other similar cases, as well.”

  Nerves bubble through my stomach. “You think they were all killed by … by the same animal?”

  “If it was an animal, it’s rare as hell,” he says, “since I couldn’t match up the scratches to a species.”

  “What else could’ve done it besides an animal?” Embry asks with a bit of fear in her tone.

  “That’s what I’d really like to find out,” Legend replies, his gaze landing on me. “Mak, I don’t want you to go looking further into this. I just want you to be aware that something odd is going on in this town and possibly something dangerous. You need to keep your guard up, okay?”

  I nod, promising him I will. Well, at least keep my guard up. As for not looking into it, Ev said it best. Now that I know this sort of stuff exists in our town, I can’t just pretend it doesn’t, especially when the people I care about could be in danger.

  After we leave the office, I call Kennedy to come pick us up. When she pulls up to the curb, Embry and I hurry into the car.

  The moment Kennedy speeds off down the street, she says, “Well, the pills aren’t vitamin B.”

  I take the bottle as she hands it to me. “What are they, then?”

  Kennedy trades a worried look with Ev, and then Ev says, “They’re laced with jade.”

  “Those sorts of pills actually exist?” I ask in horror.

  “Illegally, yes,” Ev replies quietly. “And the pills were manufactured here. Look at the bottom of the bottle.”

  I glance under the bottle, and my eyes widen at the Made in Shadow Cove stamp.

  “Why the hell would Scarlett try to get you to take jade pills?” Embry questions, slipping off the hood from her head.

  I shrug, lowering my hood, as well. “But I need to find out before she realizes I haven’t taken them and tries more drastic measures.”

  I have to wonder if I already took some since Embry said they can be linked to necromancy and I can sometimes talk to the dead. But, since I’ve never taken them knowingly, that means someone had to have given them to me without my knowing.

  Chapter 15

  LOCATION: SHADOW COVE LAKE

  TIME: 10:36 AM

  DATE: WEDNESDAY, MARCH 24th

  “I don’t know … It doesn’t look very green to me,” Kennedy says as she, Embry, and I stare out at the rippling lake.

  Ev is sitting in the car just behind us, working nonstop to access Dixon’s computer and Liam’s phone while Kennedy, Embry, and I have spent the last ten minutes attempting to spot any sort of greenish tint to the lake, but we haven’t had any success yet.

  Clouds cover the sky, a thin fog laces through the forest enclosing the lake, and the air smells similar to the slime we found last night. Not to mention we’re the only ones here.

  The entire scene is beyond eerie and brings back memories of yesterday, when I woke up here all alone. I half expect Lispy Larry to pop out from the trees and attack me again. After all, I’m still digging around into other people’s business. Although, I haven’t done much that involved Lispy Larry … yet. As soon as I find a way to do it safely, I’m going to find out what he’s hiding in that damn ghost house of his that seems to be the town’s hotspot to where people vanish.

  “Maybe it’s because it’s cloudy.” Embry tips her head up toward the sky. “If the sun was out, the water might not look so dark and we could get a better view.”

  “Or maybe we’re going about this all wrong,” I mutter, wrapping my arms around myself. “Maybe the only way to see what the lake truly looks like is to go up there.” I lift my gaze to the mountains acros
s from us.

  Kennedy hastily shakes her head. “There’s no way in hell I’m climbing up that mountain. Sorry, Mak, I love you, but I despise hiking.”

  “I’m not a fan, either, but I think I might eventually have to.” My gaze scans the lofty trees around us. “The forest poses a bit of a problem, though.”

  Her brows scrunch. “Why?”

  I lift my shoulders. “Because, if what Legend told me is true, then Bria and Sawyer were killed by some strange, unknown animal. And since their bodies turned up in the lake, the animal could very well be in these trees.”

  Tension ripples through her body. “Dammit, why did you have to say that while we are standing out here?” She whirls around and hurries back to the car, her heels getting stuck in the dirt.

  After she’s safely inside, Embry says, “You really think that’s a possibility? That some strange animal is in these woods attacking people?”

  “It’s part of my theory. But, since Bria and Sawyer also had morphine in their systems, I don’t think an animal was the only cause of their deaths.”

  “So, you think what? That someone doped them up, and then left them here by the lake and this animal got ahold of them?”

  I swallow a shaky breath. “Maybe. Or maybe someone doped them up then hauled them in the forest for the animal to attack.”

  She drags her fingers through her fiery red hair. “Then, that would mean someone knows about this unknown animal. And that this unknown animal is dangerous.”

  “I know.”

  A moment of understanding fear passes between us that gets shattered by Kennedy squealing, “Guys! Get your asses in the car. Ev just busted into Dixon’s computer and Liam’s phone.”

  And just like that, my fear goes poof as eagerness rushes through me.

  “You ready to do some snooping on the rich kids lives?” I ask Embry.

  “You know it.” We bump fists then hurry to the car and climb into the back seat.

  “What do you have?” I ask Ev as I shut the door.

  “Well, I’ve only had time to glance through Liam’s phone, but I did find a couple of texts that were interesting.” She hands me his phone. “Read through the message thread I left open.”