“I didn’t want to tell you this, but another girl got raped last week.”
“That was in Smith Town, not Genoa Cove.”
“Smith Town is only ten miles away.”
“It’s a dirt hole.”
“When did you become an elitist?”
“We’ll be totally safe at Kaitlyn’s.”
Darcy raises her hand to cut Jennifer off.
“No, you’re going to listen. The latest rape happened after a party like the one Kaitlyn is holding. One girl walked home alone, a bad idea at night. Even when two girls walk together, a pair of males can overwhelm them. When I was with the FBI—”
“Mom, stop. You’re so over-dramatizing everything. Everyone knows about the rapes in Smith Town. But nothing like that happens in Genoa Cove.”
“Rape happens everywhere, Jennifer. It’s not a socioeconomic problem.”
“Mom, it sucks. I get it. What happened to that girl was terrible, but my friends and I are careful. There will be like fifty people at the party.”
Fifty people. That doesn’t comfort Darcy.
“The police never caught the rapist. He wore a mask so she couldn’t see his face. The girl was only sixteen.”
“Yeah, yeah. She was sixteen, and I’m fourteen, so lock me inside the house for the next four years to keep me safe. Or better yet, put me in a convent.”
“Don’t raise your voice, Jennifer. It’s perfectly reasonable for me to check with Kaitlyn’s parents and see the lay of the land before I decide.”
“It’s perfectly reasonable for you to be a bitch whenever I want something that’s important to me. Why do you fuck my life up every time I’m happy?”
The words stun and sting. Darcy’s fingers twitch as she remembers her mother slapping her across her face for cursing during an argument. She still feels the slap, red and burning. No, she isn’t her mother and won’t strike Jennifer, even if her daughter deserves punishment.
“You don’t talk to me like that,” Darcy says through gritted teeth. “Go to your room.”
But Jennifer is already down the hall, stomping hard enough to jiggle the glassware. The bedroom door slams.
What the hell just happened?
Darcy sniffles and drops onto a chair at the kitchen table, running her hand through her hair as she remembers the fight with her late-mother. Was she this nasty as a teenager? Hormones at that age mess with a girl’s mind, leave her edgy with a twisted belief the world is out to make her miserable. No doubt Darcy was a handful. Yet she doesn’t recognize Jennifer’s vicious streak as one of her own. Times like these make her wonder if Tyler’s death affects Jennifer as much as it does Hunter. At least he has memories. She has nothing, just an empty hole and stories of who her father was.
Between Jennifer’s blow up and Darcy’s worries about Hunter and the football team, she loses track of time. Darkness creeps over the window. Hadn’t it been sunny a moment ago? She checks the clock. After sundown.
At the kitchen window, she sweeps the curtains shut and hurries down the hall to the bedroom. The anxiety isn’t as bad as it was a year ago when she couldn’t step outside at dark without a heavy dose of medication, and the pills turned her into an empty husk. One pill became two, then three, and forced the kids to fend for themselves while Mom slumbered on the couch like a strung-out addict. It kills Darcy that her kids saw her like that. They haven’t forgotten and never will.
Sliding a chair in front of her laptop, she scrolls through her bookmarks and locates the link she seeks. It’s a website which allows the public to search the prison system by inmate ID or a criminal’s name. She chooses New York from a menu and types Michael Rivers’ ID. After three years of searches, she can type the number blindfolded.
He must be incarcerated. If the state released the Full Moon Killer, or he escaped, the news would dominate the headlines.
But she needs to know.
Only one girl escaped the serial killer: Amy Yang, a fifteen-year-old high school student who broke free of Rivers’ grasp during a failed abduction behind a closed Starbucks. A resourceful girl, she ran into traffic and flagged down the first vehicle willing to stop. The killer had been new to the game then and hadn’t honed his technique. Amy was lucky.
After the murderer’s capture, Darcy and Amy stayed in contact for over a year, battling their demons and leaning on each other for support. The weekly phone conversations ended abruptly. Though Darcy wondered about Amy, she didn’t pursue the girl, figuring Amy needed to put the horror behind her. If only Darcy could do the same.
She clicks send, and the browser churns through the data. And churns.
The search never takes this long. Something is wrong.
Darcy backs up one page and reenters the data. Studies the murderer’s number until she’s positive it’s correct.
Enter.
Her stomach falls. In a moment, the database will return zero results, and she’ll know he’s free.
Finally the information loads. She slides down in her chair and releases her breath.
Michael Rivers is behind bars.
CHAPTER THREE
Hunter can’t look more uncomfortable dressed up. He’s buttoned the wrinkled white shirt to his neck, and a black tie flops over his belly like a dead eel. He tugs at the collar, neck red, a choked grimace contorting his face as he fights to pry his fingers under the top button.
“You have to keep it buttoned to the top,” Darcy says while she turns up the hill toward Genoa Cove High School.
“I can’t breathe. This shirt is so tight it’s cutting off my circulation.”
“The more you fight it, the worse it’s going to feel. Relax. Breathe.”
He punches the door. Not hard, but it’s enough to make her jump.
Reflected in the mirror, Jennifer sulks in the backseat. She hasn’t spoken to Darcy since the fight and won’t even look at her. This morning she stomped through the kitchen while Darcy scrambled eggs on the stove. Darcy offered her breakfast, but the girl whipped open the refrigerator and snatched a yogurt off the shelf before retreating to her bedroom.
“So stupid we have to do this,” says Hunter, chewing on his thumbnail. “What’s the point? How am I going to play better if I can’t suck air into my lungs?”
“It’s about team building,” Darcy says, sweeping the hair out of her eyes. “When I played varsity field hockey, everyone had to dress up on game day. Did we like it? Not really. But when we passed one of our teammates in the hall, we kinda knew we were all in this together, and I think that made us successful. Coach Parker wants you to look the part and represent the school. Give it a chance.”
Jennifer gives an exasperated sigh and jumps out of the car the second Darcy stops behind the buses.
“She’ll get over it,” Hunter says, dragging his bag over his shoulder.
Darcy, who’d been watching Jennifer shove through the crowd toward the main entrance, twists her head toward her son.
“I’ll text you after I speak with the coach.” She leans across the seat and kisses him on the cheek before he can escape. “Love you, Hunter.”
He mutters the words back to her and flies out of the car as though his seat caught fire.
Merging with the crowd, he pops his earbuds in and follows Jennifer’s path. Darcy waits beside the curb in case the football players harass Hunter again. A line of cars circles the lot, and the other parents will expect her to move. A tall boy with a high fade gives Hunter a cautious nod, which he returns. But a small, muscular player with spiked hair slaps his friend on the shoulder and points at Hunter. They share a laugh at her son’s expense.