The next text didn’t come until eleven in the morning.
Pip’s dad was working from home. He came to Pip’s bedroom at around eight and told her that they were going off on another search and would be back at lunchtime.
“You stay here and finish up your essay,” he’d said. “Leave Barney to us.”
Pip nodded. She was relieved, in a way. She didn’t think she could walk alongside her family, calling out his name, knowing that Barney wasn’t there to be found. Because he wasn’t lost; he was taken. By Andie Bell’s killer.
There wasn’t time to waste hating herself, asking why she hadn’t listened to the threats. Why she’d been stupid enough to think herself invincible. She just had to get Barney back. That was all that mattered.
Her family had been gone for a couple of hours when her phone went off, making her flinch and slosh coffee over her duvet. She read over the text several times.
Take your computer and any USBs or hard drives that your project is saved on. Bring them to the tennis club parking lot with you now and walk 100 paces into the trees on the right side. Do not tell anyone and come alone. If you follow these instructions, you will get your dog back.
Pip jumped up, spattering more coffee onto her bed. She moved fast, before the fear could congeal and paralyze her. She changed into a hoodie and jeans, then grabbed her backpack and upturned it, spilling her schoolbooks and planner onto the floor. She unplugged her laptop and slid it into the bag. The two memory sticks she’d saved her project on were in the middle drawer of her desk. She scooped them out and shoved them in on top of the computer.
She ran down the stairs, stumbling as she swung the heavy bag on her back. She slipped on her boots and coat and grabbed her car keys from the side table in the hall. There was no time to think this through. If she stopped to think, she’d falter and lose him forever.
Outside, the wind was cold against her neck and fingers. She ran to the car and climbed in, her grip shaky on the steering wheel as she peeled out of the drive.
It took her five minutes to get there.
She turned into the parking lot beyond the tennis courts and pulled into the nearest spot. Grabbing her bag from the passenger seat, she got out and headed for the trees that bordered the lot.
Before stepping off the concrete, Pip paused for just a moment to look over her shoulder. There was a kids’ club on the tennis courts, shrieking and whacking balls into the fence. A couple of moms with squawking toddlers standing beside a car, chatting. There was no one with their eyes fixed on her. No car she recognized. No person. If she was being watched, she couldn’t tell.
She turned to the trees and started to walk, counting each step in her head, panicking that her strides were either too long or too short and she wouldn’t end up in the right place.
At thirty paces her heart throbbed so hard that it jolted her breath.
At sixty-seven sweat broke under her arms.
At ninety-four she started muttering under her breath, “Please, please, please.”
Then she stopped, one hundred steps into the trees. And she waited.
There was nothing around her, nothing but the shade of half-bare trees and leaves from red to pale yellow covering the mud.
A long high whistling sounded above her. She looked up to watch a bird fly over, a sharp outline against the gray sun. Then she was alone again.
It was almost a full minute later that her phone buzzed from her pocket. Fumbling, she pulled it out and looked down at the screen.
Destroy everything and leave it there. Do not tell anyone what you know. No more questions about Andie. This is finished now.
Pip’s eyes flicked over the words. She forced a deep breath and put away the phone. Her skin seared under the gaze of the killer’s eyes, watching her from somewhere unseen.
On her knees she slid her backpack to the ground and took out the laptop and the two memory sticks. She laid them out on the autumn leaves and opened the laptop lid.
She got to her feet, and as her eyes filled and the world blurred, she stamped down on the first memory stick with her boot heel. One side of the plastic casing broke and sprang away. She stamped again and turned her left boot onto the other stick, jumping on them both as their parts splintered off.
Then she turned to her laptop, the screen glinting with dim sunlight. She watched her reflection in the glass as she drew up her leg and kicked out. The screen flattened over its hinge, a large crack webbed across it.
The first tear dropped to her chin as she hit it again, at the keyboard this time. Letters came away with her boot, scattering into the mud. She stamped right through the glass on the screen into the metal casing.
She jumped and jumped again, tears chasing each other as they snaked down her cheeks.
The metal around the keyboard was cracked now, showing the motherboard and the cooling fan below. The green circuit board snapped to pieces beneath her heel, and the little fan severed and flew away. She jumped again and stumbled on the mangled machine, falling back in the brittle leaves.
She let herself cry there for a few moments. Then she sat upright and picked up the laptop, its broken screen hanging limply from one hinge, and hurled it against the trunk of the nearest tree. With another thud it came to rest on the ground in pieces, lying dead among the roots.
Pip sat, coughing, waiting for the air to return to her. Her face stinging from the salt.
What was she supposed to do now? She’d done everything they asked; was Barney about to be released to her? She should wait and see, wait for another message. She called his name.
More than half an hour passed. Nothing. No message. No Barney. No sound of anyone but the faint screams of the kids on the tennis court.
Pip pushed up to unsteady feet and picked up her empty backpack. She walked away, one last lingering look back at the destroyed machine.
“Where did you go?” her dad said when she let herself back into the house.
Pip had sat in the car for a while in the parking lot. To let her red eyes settle before she returned home.
“I couldn’t concentrate here,” she said quietly, “so I went to do my work at the café.”
He nodded. “Sometimes a change of scenery is good.”
“But, Dad.” She hated the lie that was about to come out of her mouth. “Something happened. I don’t know how. I went to the bathroom for just a minute, and when I came back, my laptop was gone. No one there saw anything. I think it was stolen.” She looked down at her scuffed boots. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have left it.”
Her dad shushed her and folded her into a hug. One she really, really needed. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Things are not important. They are replaceable. I only care that you’re OK.”
“I’m OK,” she said. “Any sign this morning?”
“None yet, but Josh and Mom are going back out this afternoon, and I’m going to call the local shelters. We’ll get him back.”
She nodded and stepped back from him. They were going to get him back; she’d done everything she was told to do. That was the deal. She wished she could say something to her family, take some of the worry out of their faces. But she couldn’t. It was another of those Andie Bell secrets Pip had found herself trapped inside.
As for giving up on Andie now, could she really do that? Could she walk away, knowing Sal Singh wasn’t guilty? Knowing a killer still lived in Fairview? She had to. For Barney, the dog she’d loved since she was a child, and who loved her back even harder. For her family’s safety. For Ravi too. How could she convince him to give up on this? He had to, or he could be the next body in the woods.
This wasn’t safe anymore. There was no choice. But the decision felt like a shard of glass through her chest. It cracked every time she breathed.
Pip was upstairs at her desk. On it a sheet of paper with Personal Essay scribbled at the top and four different beginnings crossed out. The day had grown dark and blustery when someone knocked on the door.
“Yep,” she said, spinning in her desk chair.
Her dad came in and closed the door behind him. “You working hard, pickle?”
She nodded.
He walked over and leaned against her desk, his legs crossed out in front of him.
“Listen, Pip,” he said gently. “Someone just found Barney.”
Pip’s breath stuck halfway down her throat. “Wh-why don’t you look happy?”
“He must have fallen in somehow. They found him in the river.” Her dad reached down and took her hand. “I’m sorry, honey. He drowned.”
Pip wheeled away from him, shaking her head.
“No,” she said. “He couldn’t have. That’s not what…No, he can’t be…”
“I’m sorry, Pip,” he said, bottom lip trembling. “Barney died. We’re going to bury him tomorrow, in the backyard.”
“No, he can’t be!” Pip jumped to her feet now, pushing her dad away as he stepped forward to hug her. “No, he isn’t dead. That’s not fair,” she cried, the tears rushing down to the dimple in her chin. “He can’t be dead. It’s not fair. It’s not…it’s not…”
She dropped to her knees and fell back on the floor, hugging her legs into her chest. A black chasm opened up inside her.
“This is all my fault.” Her mouth pressed into her knee, stifling her words. “I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”
Her dad sat down beside her and tucked her into his arms. “Pip, I don’t want you to blame yourself, not even for a second. It’s not your fault he wandered away from you.”
“It’s not fair, Dad,” she cried into his chest. “Why is this happening? I just want him back. I just want Barney back.”
“Me too,” he whispered.
They sat that way for a long time on her bedroom floor, crying together. Pip didn’t even hear when her mom and Josh came into the room. She didn’t know they were there until they fitted themselves in, Josh sitting on Pip’s lap, his little head on her shoulder.
“It’s not fair.”