Page 70 of This is Why We Lied

The ties were neatly bound together with a bungee strap. Will couldn’t bind them back with one hand. He felt guilty leaving the ties loose in the drawer, but there were more important things to worry about. Six of the larger ties went into his back pocket. He shoved the roll of tape into a deeper pocket in the leg of his cargo pants.

He was shutting the drawer when he thought about the knives on the wall. Will took the smallest one, the bait knife, and tucked it down the side of his boot. He didn’t know how sharp the blade was, but anything could puncture a lung if you rammed it hard enough into a man’s chest.

“What’s this?” Sara asked. She had cupped her hands around her eyes as she tried to see through the slats in the back wall. “Looks mechanical. Maybe a generator?”

“We’ll check with the family.” Will found a padlock underneath some hanging metal baskets. He pulled at the hasp, but it was firmly in place. “Bears?”

“Guests, probably. There’s no internet or TV. I imagine a lot of late-night drinking goes on. Help me with this.” Sara had located the paddles. They were high up to the ceiling, hanging like shotguns on a rack. “The blue one looks like the right size.”

Will was surprised by the light weight when he lifted the paddle off the hook.

She said, “Bring two in case one gets lost in the water. I’ll get the life jackets.”

Will didn’t think it was a good idea to wear bright orange as they approached the campsite, but he wasn’t going to fight that battle.

Outside the shed, he followed Sara’s lead flipping one of the canoes off the rack. There was nothing for Will to do but stand by as she maneuvered the paddles into the hull and tossed in the life jackets. She pointed out the carrying handles around the gunwale, told him where to stand, how to lift. She went silent again as they carried the canoe to the lake. Will tried not to pick up on her anxiety. He had to focus his mind on one singular purpose: bringing Dave to justice.

Sara kept the splashing to a minimum as she walked into the shallow water. Will lowered the boat when she told him to. She lined up the back end so that it was anchored in the mud. He was about to get in when Sara stopped him.

“Hold still.” She helped him into one of the life jackets, then made sure the clips were secure. Then she leaned down and held the boat steady so that he could get in.

Will felt needlessly fussed over, but climbing in with one hand was harder than he’d anticipated. He sat on the bench at the rear of the boat. His weight lifted up the bow. Sara’s weight only brought it down slightly when she climbed in. She didn’t sit on the other bench. She got on her knees and used the paddle to push them out onto the water. She started off using shallow strokes until they’d put some distance between themselves and the shore.

By the time they reached open water, Sara had established a steady rhythm. When it came time to leave the Shallows and navigate into the larger part of the lake, she shifted from one side of the canoe to the other to make the turn. Will tried to keep an idea of where the diving platform was as the boat glided across the expanse. The equipment shed disappeared from sight. Then the shoreline. Soon, all he could see was darkness and all he could hear was the paddle working and the sound of Sara’s breathing.

The moon peered around the clouds as they reached the middle of the lake. Will took the opportunity to check the bandage around his hand. Sara was right that the gauze was dirty, and probably also right about the infection. If someone had told Will there was a chunk of white-hot coal inside the web between his finger and thumb, he would’ve believed them. The burning slightly lessened when he lifted his hand to chest level, resting it on the edge of the life vest.

He reached down to his boot, checking on the bait knife. The handle was thick enough to keep the blade from sliding down to his ankle. He pulled out the knife, testing the motion. He hoped like hell Dave wasn’t tracking their progress across the water. Will wanted the knife to be a surprise if things went sideways. The neon orange vests felt like they were glowing. He scanned the horizon, searching for the shore. It came into view slowly. First some lighter patches among the blackness, then he could make out rocks, then eventually what looked like a sandy beach.

Sara glanced back at him. She didn’t have to say it. A sandy beach meant they had found the campgrounds. It was in bad shape. Will saw the remnants of a rotted-out dock, a partially submerged boat launch. A rope dangled from a towering oak tree, but the wooden seat that had turned it into a swing had dropped into the water long ago. There was something haunting about the place. Will wasn’t one to believe in ghosts, but he had always trusted his gut, and his gut was telling him that bad things had happened here.

The canoe started to slow. Sara reversed the strokes as they approached the beach. Up close, he could see weeds growing through the sand. Broken bottles. Cigarette butts. The edge of the boat made a grinding sound as it banked onto the shore. Will unclipped his life vest and let it drop. Again, he thought about the bait knife in his boot, but this time it was in relation to leaving Sara unprotected. The best thing to do was send her back to the shed. He could hike to the lodge with or without Dave.

“No.” She had a bad habit of reading his mind. “I’ll wait for you ten yards out.”

Will got out of the boat before she told him she was going to supervise the search. Nobody would’ve called his dismount graceful. He tried to keep the splashing to a minimum as he righted himself onto solid ground. Then he used the steel toe of his boot to give Sara a firm push back onto the water.

He waited until she started working the paddle before he scanned the forest. First light had yet to break, but the terrain was more visible than it had been when they’d left the equipment shed. He turned to find Sara again. She was paddling backward, keeping her eyes trained on Will. He thought about watching her swim toward the floating dock in the Shallows only a few hours ago. She was doing the backstroke, inviting him to join her. Will had felt such elation that his heart had turned into a butterfly.

And across the water, Dave was raping and stabbing the mother of his child.

Will turned away from the canoe and walked into the woods. He tried to get his bearings. Nothing looked familiar from their earlier search for the campsite. It wasn’t just the lack of light. Before, they had approached from the back end of the Shallows. They’d stopped when they’d reached the circle of rocks. Will slipped his phone out of his pocket and tapped open the compass app as he headed in what he hoped was the right direction.

The forest was dense and overgrown, more so than the uncleared areas around the lodge. Using his flashlight app would be tantamount to lighting a beacon. He turned down the brightness on his screen as he followed the compass. After a while, Will realized that he didn’t need it. There was the musty scent of smoke in the air. Fresh, like a campfire burning, but with a revolting undertone of cigarettes.

Dave.

Will didn’t immediately move toward the target. He stood absolutely still, focusing on regulating his breathing and quieting his mind. Any worries about Sara, the pain in his hand, even Dave, were pushed to the side. The only thing he thought about was the person who truly mattered.

Mercy McAlpine.

Only a few hours ago, Will had found the woman clinging to the last few moments of her life. She had known it was the end. Refused to let Will go for help. He was on his knees in the water, begging Mercy to tell him who was responsible for the attack, but she had shaken her head like none of it mattered. And she was right. In those final moments, none of it really did matter. The only person she cared about was the person she had brought into the world.

Will silently repeated the message he would relay to Jon—

Your mother wants you to get away from here. She said you can’t stay. She wanted you to know it’s okay. That she loves you so much. That she forgives you for the argument. I promise you that you’re going to be okay.

Will continued forward at a deliberate pace, careful not to step on any fallen branches or piles of leaves that might alert Dave to his presence. As he got closer, the silence of the forest was broken by the soft beat of “1979” by the Smashing Pumpkins. The music was turned down low, but it offered enough cover for Will to move more freely toward the source.

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