The Lost Sister (18 page)

Sisters.

Maddie knew that Cordelia was panicked when she received the phone call. She couldn’t believe that after all this time—all this heartache and anguish and fear—all of it ended with a quick phone call in the middle of the night. She wanted to rush right out and get Cordelia, whisk her away from whatever demons had been keeping her from returning all these months, but instead they made a plan to meet each other at Captain Potter’s Tavern—a place that was hidden and neutral—a place where Cordelia wouldn’t get spooked and slip away into the night like a fairy mist. Her voice was shaking on the phone. She didn’t sound like the crazy person that her mother had described her as in those last moments spent in Hawthorne. And yet there was a nagging feeling that wouldn’t go away.

Now here they were, driving in Abigail’s ancient station wagon, so many questions between them, so many things left unsaid. Maddie barely knew where to start.

Cordelia wasn’t ready to return and face the old Victorian and all of those memories at Mariner’s Way just yet. Instead they drove to the harbor, parking in a spot that overlooked Misery Island. Maddie ran into the coffee shop and grabbed two steaming cups and some muffins for the two of them. She raced back to the car, half expecting Cordelia to have vanished—for all of it to have been another one of her inexplicably real dreams.

Cordelia greedily ate the muffin and sipped at the coffee. They sat in silence, looking at the shifting waters for a little while before either of them said a word.

“I always thought you blamed me,” Maddie said quietly. “I thought that you would hate me forever.”

“You’re the one who should hate me,” Cordelia said with a laugh, but there was a sadness in her voice. “I had no idea all that would happen—how everything would just get so messed up when I left. With Tess, with my mom…” It seemed like she was trying to fight back tears. “I just thought that my leaving this town and making our father pay for what he had done—I don’t know, that somehow it would make things right again.”

“And what would killing our father have done to help any of us?” Maddie asked, almost scolding her half sister.

Cordelia shrugged. “I was just so angry. I wanted someone to pay.”

“If anyone should pay, it’s Kate Endicott,” Maddie said, and then added, “y’know, an eye for an eye?”

“With Kate it should be a heart for a heart,” Cordelia offered. “If she even has one.” They both laughed.

“Still, I was there that night. I could have stopped things. If there’s anyone to blame, it’s me,” Maddie offered quietly.

“No, no, not you. I’ve never, ever blamed you, Maddie. You have to believe that.”

Maddie wanted to head back to the house, but Cordelia was worried about facing Abigail. Maddie assured her that the coast was clear. Abigail was going to be tied up at Fairview for hours, trying to figure out how Rebecca had escaped from the facility, as well as fill out additional paperwork to make sure that it never happened again.

“How can you not blame me? I mean, they were my friends. I invited you,” Maddie insisted.

“You had no idea what was going to happen out there. Believe me, I probably knew more about the situation than you did.”

“But I…” Maddie couldn’t bring herself to say that she had struck Cordelia in the head with a rock—the horrific image that would remained burned into her memory forever. Perhaps Cordelia didn’t even remember.

They continued driving toward the house, an awkward silence hanging over them for a few minutes.

“You were doing what you had to do for your own survival,” Cordelia assured her. “I know that you’re strong, but there’s no way that you could have survived that night. I made the choice to be in your place. It was my choice, not yours.”

“But it was a choice you should never have had to make in the first place.”

Cordelia smiled as she looked out the window. “I know, but sisters have to make sacrifices for each other once in a while, right?”

Maddie smiled as she looked over at Cordelia.

Sisters. That’s what they really were. It seemed like she almost knew from the start. Tess knew. Maddie wondered if that was why she was so adamant that they stick together…“no matter what.”

They pulled into the driveway and Cordelia hesitated before unlocking her seat belt.

“Don’t worry, my mom isn’t here.”

“That’s not it,” Cordelia stammered. “It’s—it’s just…”

“Too many bad memories,” Maddie offered.

“Yeah,” Cordelia said, stilted. “Too many bad memories.” What she didn’t tell Maddie—or couldn’t—was that the pictures in her mind were not of things that had already happened, but of what was yet to come.

T
he night of the fires also marked another local tragedy. Bronwyn Maxwell was missing.

It was all over the news the next evening. It happened a week and a half after Darcy was killed and at the exact time Cordelia returned to Hawthorne. So, obviously, Abigail scrutinized Cordelia upon her return.

Even Maddie had her doubts. Could it have been just a massive coincidence that Ravenswood—now thought to be the result of arson—went up in flames the very night that Cordelia returned home? Had Cordelia sent those tarot cards? Was that some type of warning of what she planned to do?

“Why don’t you just come out and say it, Abigail?” Cordelia snapped at her aunt when she received a very bristly, cold shoulder after Abigail returned from her visit with Rebecca. Maddie noticed that Abigail’s demeanor had softened quite a bit since she began visiting Rebecca—only now with Cordelia back, all of her anger had a new target. “You think I’m to blame for all of this—for my mother’s institutionalization, for Darcy, for Bronwyn. Hell, you probably also think that I torched Ravenswood.”

Abigail held Cordelia’s gaze firmly. Neither one was going to back down. Maddie could feel it. They were like two dogs baring their teeth at each other, each taunting the other to make the first move.

“Don’t be silly,” Abigail scoffed. “I don’t blame you for any of those tragic events. What I do hold you responsible for are your actions. I just don’t think you realized how many people you hurt by taking off like that.”

“How many people I hurt? Me?” Cordelia yelled. “That’s hilarious coming from you. I guess the view must be pretty nice for you up there on your high horse. Or maybe it would better be described as a glass castle.”

Abigail smirked. “I wasn’t the one to throw the first stone.”

Maddie froze as her mother suddenly eyed her. What did her mother know about that night? Did Rebecca tell her? Could she have heard it from one of the Sisters of Misery? Maddie’s face turned red and she turned to leave. Cordelia grabbed Maddie’s arm protectively.

“If anyone is to blame for setting the wheels in motion of all that has happened, it’s you—and Kate Endicott. That’s some wonderful company to keep, by the way.”

Abigail smiled in a Cheshire cat sort of way. “If memory serves me right, it was your mother that really started all of this about seventeen years ago.”

Cordelia turned bright red. If steam could actually come out of someone’s ears, it would be happening right now. She turned on her heel, grabbed her coat, and raced out the front door.

“Mother!” Maddie scolded. “Cordelia had nothing to do with who her father is. You know that.”

“All I know is that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. I’d keep your Luke fellow far from Cordelia if I were you. Like mother, like daughter.” With her mouth in a grim, straight line, Abigail turned into the kitchen and started angrily slamming the cabinets.

Maddie took off after Cordelia, struggling to keep up with her, which was no easy task as Cordelia’s gait was much longer and faster than her own. She was a girl on a mission. Her hair flew wildly behind her as she hurried down the street.

“Wait, wait,” Maddie said, out of breath as she reached for Cordelia. “Where are we going?”

“We have to talk to Finn.”

“They won’t let us in to see him. You know that he and Reed are being held for questioning.”

Unfortunately, the prime suspects—Reed and Finn—were brought back in for questioning when Bronwyn disappeared. Only this time, the police weren’t as quick to release them. They were being held indefinitely and—from the looks of it—the police weren’t looking too hard for another suspect in the crimes. Cordelia hadn’t even had a chance to reconnect with them, but that wasn’t deterring her from getting in to see them, or from finding out the truth.

The walk to the police station wasn’t that far, but the sight of Cordelia back in town spread like wildfire. Maddie could hear the murmurs of surprise and anger and disbelief as the two girls whisked through the crowded streets of the annual Winter Festival.

Cordelia, dressed in her long black coat, hair now returned to its natural shock of red curls, stood out among a sea of washed-out onlookers.

Is that the girl who disappeared last year?

Yes, the one who drove her mother to try to kill herself.

I heard she had an affair with Bronwyn’s boyfriend. If you ask me, I think she had something to do with the girl’s disappearance.

I think she set Ravenswood on fire to get back at Kate Endicott. You know how girls can be. So catty. So vicious.

She’s a witch, you know. You can tell by just looking at her. She was sent to bring a reign of terror on this town. She can’t be stopped.

Maddie heard the women in town talking, so obviously Cordelia heard the harsh words being spoken about her. But she never seemed to let any of it bother her. She even seemed to enjoy it. In fact, she made a point of looking straight into people’s eyes when their paths crossed. Maddie had never been so proud.

“Let us in to see them, Sully,” Maddie demanded.

“Not happening,” he shot back in his typical smug manner. “Out of my hands now that they’ve called in the big guns from Boston. No one gets to see O’Malley or Campbell until the big bosses give the go-ahead.”

Cordelia asked, “Why are they even suspects?”

“Well,” said Sully, scratching his goatee, “Reed is Bronwyn’s fiancé, despite what you might think, Maddie.”

“What is that supposed to mean, Sully?” Maddie snapped. Sully held his hands up in the air as if to say he wasn’t going to get involved.

“And Finn?” Cordelia asked impatiently, ignoring Sully’s taunts to Maddie. “What about him? Why is he a suspect?”

“Well, because the last dead girl in town turned up wearing his jacket and if I recall correctly, he was held as a suspect in a missing girl case last year. Do you remember that, Cordelia?”

“Obviously, he’s not responsible for kidnapping me, Sully. I’m standing right here in front of you!” She stamped her foot angrily.

“Well, go on and plead your case to the Boston officers. I’m sure they’d love the chance to talk to the girl that wasted all the taxpayers’ dollars on a bogus statewide manhunt last year. I’m sure you’re at the top of their list right now.”

Cordelia glowered at him. “Well, you did a bang-up job at tracking me down, didn’t you?”

“Wouldn’t go down that road if I were you, Miss LeClaire. You and your mother aren’t exactly the toast of the town these days,” he said.

“Like we ever were,” Cordelia muttered. Realizing that they weren’t going to get anywhere with Sully, Maddie grabbed Cordelia’s arm and convinced her to leave. They would come back when the Boston police were available to take Cordelia’s statement.

“See you ladies later. Don’t go disappearing on us again,” he mocked.

Cordelia spun around ready to snap at him, but Maddie just pulled her out of the police station. “Come on, Cordelia,” Maddie said loud enough for Sully to hear. “We’ll come back and talk to a real policeman. Not an overgrown boy with a badge, playing cops and robbers.”

Sully started to protest and yell at them, but they were already out the door.

They walked back home, ignoring the Christmas carolers on the street corners and angrily stomping past the tree lot that remained unattended now that Finn was in custody.

“Looks like we’ll have to go about talking to them a different way,” Cordelia stated.

“How?” Maddie asked. “You heard Sully? We can’t ask the police again. We—you will get in trouble. We can’t risk that, Cordelia. Not now. Not after everything and all this time.”

“Whoever said anything about asking them to let us do anything? You’re going to take a catnap and I’m going to astral project into his cell.”

“Astral what? And how do you know about my dream—my whatever you call it?”

“I know about a lot of things that I can’t exactly explain. Let’s just say that you and I are coming into our powers, just the way Tess described to me. She didn’t say it in so many words—I mean, she didn’t draw me a detailed diagram of what we would be able to do. But the gist of what she said has come true for me. Hasn’t it for you?”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait, this is crazy, Cordelia,” Maddie said hurriedly. “I don’t think I have enough control to just jump into anyone’s dream whenever I want. How do I even know that he’s sleeping? I can’t control this dream jumping—or whatever you call it—anyway.”

“You’re right,” Cordelia said.

“Thank you!” Maddie said, hoping that Cordelia finally understood that she wasn’t as keen on all the magic stuff that Cordelia seemed to be born into.

“He’s probably not asleep yet. I’ll do my astral projection first and then later tonight, you go and visit him in his dream.”

“Okay, wait—no!” Maddie shouted. This obviously wasn’t sinking in for Cordelia. “I have no way of even knowing how to get into his dreams.”

“You got into mine.”

“How did you…?” Maddie hesitated. She just assumed that it was Rebecca’s dream she was tapping into, but perhaps it was Cordelia’s memories that she had somehow infiltrated. “We’re related. That’s probably why it was so easy for me. And even though I did before, who knows if I can do it again? Maybe it was just a fluke?”

“It wasn’t,” Cordelia said firmly.

“How can you be so sure?”

Cordelia turned. “Because it’s what you were meant to do. Besides, you can’t tell me that was your first time ever jumping into someone’s dream before. Haven’t you ever done it to someone that you weren’t related to?”

Maddie didn’t want to tell her about the nightmares and her vision of Darcy’s murder, but she knew she couldn’t keep that information to herself for too much longer. Why should she? If there was anyone who could help her control this weird power she seemed to possess, it was Cordelia.

Or Rebecca. But after she had jumped into Rebecca’s dream—something that she would never tell Cordelia—she feared going into the heads of people she cared about. Sometimes, seeing a person’s innermost thoughts and dreams gave you a whole new perspective. It allowed you to see things that should stay hidden. Things that no one should ever see or know about. Secrets that could change everything.

The girls bypassed Mariner’s Way and headed to the town library. It was empty because of the holiday celebrations taking place across the town. A murder and a missing girl wouldn’t get in the way of Hawthorne’s annual Winter Festival. “Maybe my power isn’t as strong as yours,” Maddie said quietly. Cordelia was busily flipping through the pages of the book in the Hawthorne historical archives. “And what exactly is—astral projection or whatever you called it?”

Cordelia looked up at Maddie in exasperation. “I can’t really explain it. I don’t know how to control it right now. It’s not something as easy as jumping in a car and taking off somewhere. It’s a defense mechanism of sorts.” Her voice trailed as her fingers ran across the pages of text in front of her. “It happened out on Misery Island. It’s the only way I survived.”

Maddie looked down at her hands, silently cursing herself for forcing Cordelia to recall memories of that night. But now that they were opening up, she asked another question. “Did it help you survive what happened with Trevor?”

Cordelia raised her eyes from the page and stared blankly ahead of her, as if weighing what she was going to say. She didn’t make eye contact with Maddie and then said quietly, “You know about that?”

Maddie nodded. Words failed her.

Cordelia inhaled deeply. “So now I guess you know all my secrets, don’t you, Maddie? Who told you? Reed?”

Maddie nodded again. The pain in Cordelia’s eyes was almost too much to take. But Cordelia quickly shook it off, choosing to busy herself in her research. “Well, it shouldn’t come across as too much of a shock how much of an asshole Trevor Campbell is. Not exactly breaking news, is it?” she said with a slight smile passing across her lips.

“Trevor Campbell? An asshole? Bite your tongue!” Maddie teased.

“Now if you could just tap into his dreams and we could get some proof that he’s responsible for Darcy and Bronwyn, then we could really nail him. It’s up to you, Maddie.”

Maddie felt butterflies in her stomach. It was magical and scary and made her feel completely off-kilter. She knew in her heart that what Cordelia was saying was right. She had a power. They both did.

But the million-dollar question was: how could she use it to her advantage, and how did she get it in the first place? Had she always had it? When she dropped off to sleep as a toddler and dreamed about playing with her friends, had she really been bouncing around in their dreams the night before? And even worse, the nightmarish dreams of seeing Darcy Willett being killed, was that from the mind of her actual killer? Did Maddie actually “witness Darcy being murdered? And could she actually use it to help find Bronwyn? Did she even want to?

It would make perfect sense if she had tapped into Trevor’s dreams. He’d have good reasons for both Darcy’s death and Bronwyn’s disappearance. Plus, both she and Cordelia knew what kind of a violent streak ran through Trevor. That, coupled with an overwhelming sense of entitlement and privilege, could turn even the most timid person into a monster.