Page 40 of Totally Shipped
And if it's here, it’s a message. It says—follow me this way.
We’d agreed that we’d all split up and spend the night in the jungle, but meet back at the beach in the morning. Just in case we could hear Daisy call for us.
I stare at the necklace for a few moments more, then pick it up. Is this a Hansel and Gretel trail? Is she leaving me breadcrumbs?
A shiver creeps up my spine. If Daisy purposely left the beads, it means she was trying to show us where she was, or at least where she had been.
Like someone had taken her.
Someone like fucking Harvey.
I think I knew it was him hours ago, I just didn’t want to believe it. I wanted to convince myself she’d just wandered off somewhere, then lay down for a nap.
Nope.
I keep walking, looking for evidence of someone passing through this particular part of the jungle. Maybe I’m on a wild goose chase again, but these bushes look battered down, I’m not kidding. This has to be the right track. Before long I’m wading through the razor sharp grass of a bamboo grove, then, thank fuck, out on to a beach.
I haven’t been to this beach before.
There is nothing out of the ordinary to see. In the fading light, the piles of seaweed, drift wood and palm fronds give me no clues. It will be dark soon, and it’s impossible to move safely through the jungle in the dark, so I guess I’ll sleep on this beach.
I kick off my sneakers and run my fingers over my feet. From the ankles down, the skin resembles puckered cow-hide. The nerves are shot, I can barely feel my own hand on my foot.
Whatever.
I can’t be arsed to make a fire, and I’m fucking exhausted, so all I do it piss in the bushes, finish off the water from my bottle and hit the hay.
If hay is hard sand.
Tropical storms are something else.
In the early hours, a front has rolled in. I wake up to the force of wind and rain battering the small beach. I’m cold, tired, and sad.
When I was young, me and my brothers loved storms. Nanny Clark was from England, where the weather was always kinda boring, according to her. So when a storm front hit Vermont, we’d run out onto the lawns (yeah, we had plural lawns) and shout at the thunder. We’d turn into wild beasts under the lightning.
Until one night when the lightning forked down and struck the metal flag pole of Dad’s eighteenth hole. Malc, Jasper, and I were bouncing around the grounds. When that happened it was shocking—literally. Our hair stood on end, like Doc Brown inBack to the Future.Then, BAM! We were knocked off our feet. Afterwards, we were told we were on the edge of the lightning's ground current. Just far enough away to not get truly zapped, but still, a close call.
I can see lightning flashing far out at sea and it makes me shudder. Sure, they say lightning doesn’t strike the same place twice, but does it strike the same person twice?
Probably. Fucking bitch lightning.
What I wouldn’t give for Nanny Clark to be here now. She’d brew us a cup of tea, then help us figure out a plan.
Finally, the rain lets up, and I maybe get a few minutes more of sleep. When I open my eyes again, the sun is up. Handily, my water bottle got filled during the night, so that’s a plus.
I watch the waves roll up the shore and try to think logically. I have Daisy’s beads in my pocket, so I didn’t imagine that. If she was headed this way, she would probably have arrived at this beach. But this morning, there is no trace of heranywhere.
I don’t want to head back to our camp, though. The necklace is proof that she is, or at least was, on this side of the island. I’ll spend today trying to do a thorough search, though after the rain last night, her trail is going to be virtually impossible to pick up.
First things first; see a man about a dog.
It’s when I’m having a slash that I see a grubby, worn pair of familiar panties, caught on the limb of a tree.
DAISY
Groggy and blinking, I struggle to a sitting up position.
It’s quiet.
