Page 29 of The Engagement Party

She shifted her weight from foot to foot to keep the blood pumping. She couldn’t affordnotto be ready. “Are you worried they’ll blame you if something else happens?”

He stepped in closer, blocking the entry light behind him and her path to the door. “I’m worried because the best way to get to me is through you.”

She put aside the sensation of a trap snapping shut and pinning her inside and focused on his face. She could barely make out his features, but the grim line of his mouth stuck out. So did the concern in his voice. “Mitch . . .”

“I can’t deal with you being hurt or—”

“Hey.” She rubbed her hands up and down his arms. “I’m fine.” That wasn’t true in any sense but asking him to take on her fear on top of his escalating panic was too much.

He scanned the area around the house, never fully relaxing or stepping off informal watch duty. “Whatever’s happening here is more than a warning. It’s been planned and more of us are going to get hurt. I can feel it.”

She wanted him to be wrong. Shereallywanted to chalk the warning up to his general paranoia and ongoing belief that bad luck followed him around in a cloud, enveloping and infecting the people he cared about. She’d become an expert at brushing off his warnings, but she couldn’t laugh this one away.

She swallowed a sigh and shoved aside every lesson she’d learned over the years about how to tiptoe through the emotional land mines of his past. “Tell me.”

He frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Whatever secret you’re keeping. Whatever piece of you, or thing you did that haunts you or makes you feel dirty and won’t let go. It’s time to let it out.”

“Sierra, I—”

“It’s just us talking, but you need to share so I can be prepared. So we can formulate a plan to get out of here without more bloodshed. I won’t judge you.” She stumbled over the last part. The most honest version: she’d try not to judge. She hoped that would be possible.

“I told you the worst. I would have killed Tyler for what he did to my dad. Not just years ago if I’d run into him. Hell, I probably would have done the unspeakable if no one had been around on that copper refinery job a few weeks ago. I wish I could tell you my humanity, or my father’s voice in my head, or even thoughts of you would have stopped me but that’s not how hate works. It sits there, waiting for an opportunity to kick back to the surface.”

She ached for him because she believed him. She knew him as a good man. Hardworking, careful, practical, devoted to their business and to her. The idea of him blowing the trust of his uncle—the man who’d rescued Mitch from years of bouncing around foster care—in return for a fleeting moment of satisfaction both didn’t make any sense and did.

Every horror, every death and detail, shaped Mitch. With her, he acted differently. Lighter and more generous. Open to trying some new things and willing to share the workload. She’d twisted that around to believe she meant something to him and fed off every emotional crumb he dropped for her over the years.

But in this moment, on this island, she felt hollowed out and starved of hope. She desperately needed him to care enough about her not to lie to her.

“Please.” She could hear the begging in her whisper. “If you know anything else, please tell me right now.”

“I don’t.”

He stared at her without blinking or looking away. That either made him an exceptional liar, a psychopath like his mom, or the unluckiest person she’d ever met.

She tried again. “Maybe a joke went wrong or there was an accident.”

“None of that happened.” He lowered his head, bringinghis mouth close to hers. “I’ve fucked up a lot in my life. After Dad . . .” He shook his head. “In addition to my uncle and aunt taking me in, what saved me was that scholarship to Bowdoin funded by my dad’s old office. I ignored the opportunity for two years while I pretended tofind myself,which really meant drinking until I couldn’t feel anything, but my uncle convinced me that was a shitty way to honor my dad.”

She adored Uncle Bud and knew he’d done his best in a terrible situation. He was a practical man who loved fishing and ATVing and Mitch but didn’t trust doctors of any type. Desperate to make up for the sins of his baby sister, Uncle Bud didn’t make Mitch go to therapy. It was his one big mistake because Mitch’s trauma festered and grew and instead of combatting it, he pushed it into a dark corner and suffered when it whipped out without warning.

“I didn’t blow that chance, Sierra. I didn’t run around college in a murderous rage.”

“That’s not—”

“I put the bottle down and enrolled, older than most of the students in my year, but I went. Even experienced being normal for a few years... and then that was taken away, too,” Mitch said.

“You are normal.”What did that even mean and who got to decide?“You should be a mess and unable to function with your history, but you’re not.”

“You’re confusing being able to go to work every morning with being okay.” He exhaled. “We both know I’m not like other people.”

The desire to dive deeper into what made Mitch be Mitch lost out to needing to know more about what could save their lives today. “We have these disparate pieces. You, Tyler, Emily,possibly Jake, and those threatening notes. What ties them all together?”

“I don’t—”

Adrenaline coursed through her. “Youdoknow. Buried in there, under that blanket of horrors you’ve taught yourself to shove aside and ignore, you have an idea.”

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