The older one crept forward first. The elfling followed suit.
After pointing out the suspect, I asked, “Is this the man who brought you here? Did he kill you?” It was a horrible thing to say, to have to say, but there was simply no delicate way of putting it. One thing I’d found to be a truth 99 percent of the time was that the departed handled their deaths better than the living did.
The older one leaned in, squinted, then shook her head. But the elfling nodded vigorously.
“That’s not him,” the older one said.
“Is so. Look.” The elfling pointed, but when she did, her finger traced over the news column until it came to a figure in the background. It was a cop or a deputy of some sort, and he was standing off to the side and talking to a woman, possibly a reporter. The photographer had snapped the shot just as the man looked over his shoulder toward the camera.
“Oh,” the older one said. “That is him. He came to my house after school before my mom got home. He said she was in an accident and I had to go with him to the hospital, but we didn’t go to the hospital.”
The elfling bowed her head. “I was at a party and tried to walk home by myself because Cindy Crane threw up. Then I didn’t feel good, so I left. But I got lost. He said he would help me find my mom.” When she glanced up at me with those huge green eyes, my heart constricted. “He was so nice at first.”
I slammed my lids shut. I just didn’t get it. Why was there so much evil in the world? What had any of these precious girls done to deserve such a horrifying fate? I couldn’t help but think of my own daughter, of what she would have to deal with. To face. It was not a pleasant thought.
Forcing myself to keep calm, I took in a deep breath, then continued. “Do you know about the people who were killed here? They were setting up for a summer camp when they were attacked.”
The elfling pointed toward the cabin. “There. They were killed there.”
“Do you know by whom?” I asked.
She pointed to the picture again. To the deputy.
“He brought Vanessa out here,” the older one said. “They saw him.”
Ah, they’d caught him burying one of his victims, so he killed them all. “Do you know where you are buried?”
“Of course,” the elfling said. She pointed to the tree line surrounding the retreat. “We’re over there by that big rock.”
At least I could tell Kit where to look. She would, of course, question everything I told her, but she knew enough about me to follow through anyway. Each one of these girls deserved a proper burial, and their families deserved closure.
“Except for Lydia,” the older one said.
I thumbed through the file again. “Lydia Weeks?” I asked, scanning the notes. “The girl from the camp? They never found her.” I looked up at them.
“Yeah, he took her off somewhere else. She’s not with us. She sticks to the trees mostly.”
That time, they pointed in the opposite direction, at the girl in the turquoise shorts.
“That’s her?” I asked, standing.
“That’s her.”
I bent to the girls. “I’ll be right back, okay?”
They nodded before trying to catch particles of light again, like dust motes in the sun.
Though Jessica seemed totally distraught, I asked her for a favor. “Would you mind watching them until I get back?”
“What? Me?” She acted as though I’d asked her to shave her head. “I – I can’t – I mean, I don’t know anything about children.”
I winked at her. “Join the club.”
Before heading toward Lydia, I glanced at the cabins. Kit was explaining something to Reyes in front of the main lodge, her back to me. Accepting that as my cue, I took off in a dead sprint, barely catching the glare on Reyes’s face as I put even more distance between us.
Lydia sank farther into the shadows as I neared. At eleven, she was actually a bit older than the other girls in the area. Her brows formed a hard line. She looked part Asian with dark, almond-shaped eyes and straight black hair that hung past her shoulders.
I slowed and eased up to her, afraid she would disappear before I could ask her anything. “Hi, Lydia,” I said. Fighting my already burning lungs and racing heart, I pasted on my best smile and tiptoed closer. “I’m Charley.”
Without uttering a word, she took off in the opposite direction.
“Wonderful,” I said, ducking past a branch and hurrying after her. “I suck at tag. I was always It.” My breaths came in quick, shallow bursts as I tripped on a leaf or something. “I contemplated changing my name to It when I was a kid to make playing tag more ironic.”
She zigzagged past a log for my benefit, then cleared a fallen tree in one graceful leap. I, however, did not. After scraping my shins on the thick bark, I scaled the obstacle instead, huffing and puffing as I jumped over the other side. Before I could rant much more, I caught up to Lydia. She’d stopped running and was staring at the ground. I struggled to get oxygen to my red blood cells as I stumbled forward. When I got closer, I realized there was a distinct impression in the dirt. Leaves and debris had accrued, but on the edge of what looked like a shallow grave were the remains of a small, skeletal hand.
“I’m so sorry, Lydia,” I said between gasps.
“I wanted you to see.”
I knelt down and wrapped my fingers around the bones of hers before looking back at her. “I’ll make sure they find you.”