The Secret of Markie Beach by Hannah Grieve

Author:Hannah Grieve [Grieve, Hannah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dragonfly House Press
Published: 2022-06-20T16:00:00+00:00

Nine

Afew hours later, I was sitting on my bed with a large coffee that was doing nothing to help me get anywhere. The envelope’s contents were laid out in front of me. There wasn’t much more there than what Addie had already told me, and I’d already googled just about everything I could think of in relation to the case. I still couldn’t find much and found myself wondering again who was keeping everything from the internet and why.

The longer I worked, the more ridiculous I felt. I wasn’t any sort of detective—what did I think I would achieve here? I sighed before taking a long sip of my coffee. It only heightened my jitters.

To get some distance from the situation, I texted Jamie and asked her to meet me at the coffee shop. I certainly didn’t need any more caffeine, but I did want a distraction. I also wanted to see if she was still in a weird mood. I was working up the nerve to tell her about my feelings for Eric and hoped that maybe that would be the day.

I pushed the papers into a pile at the end of my bed. I just needed to clear my head. I would get back to them later.

When I arrived, she was waiting for me, looking excited about something. I smiled, happy that she seemed to be in a better mood than the last time we had talked.

“Hey, what’s up?” I asked. She’d found us a comfy booth in the back by the window that overlooked the water.

“Eric finally texted me this morning.” She took a big gulp of her smoothie.

My smile instantly fell from my face.

“I mean, technically, he texted me back,” she said. “I apologized for overreacting the other night. I thought he was going to ghost me, but he finally responded and asked how I was.”

I would normally make a joke about her always talking about Eric, and how it was making us fail the Bechdel test. But I didn’t feel like joking. I just listened to her talk about what Eric had said selfishly, analyzing his words, wondering if he was regretting choosing me. It seemed like he was just being friendly and trying to smooth things over.

My phone rang, and as soon as I saw the caller ID, I snapped it up.

“Why is Rob calling you?” Jamie asked.

“I don’t know,” I said.

She watched my expression as I answered it.

“Have you seen Nina?” Rob asked, panicking.

“She said she had some family emergency to deal with,” I said. “I haven’t seen her since last night.”

Jamie gave me a quizzical look, and I realized that I’d have to answer for that.

“I can’t reach her,” Rob said. “It’s weird. She’s always on her phone—there’s no way she isn’t getting my messages. I called her mom, and she never came home last night. They thought she was at your house.”

In Nina’s family, boy-girl sleepovers were strictly prohibited. She had always used me as an excuse for the nights she was with guys.

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