Meg Cabot - Awaken

It wasn’t the police, however. It was Alex, who loped inside, a backpack slung over one shoulder. He’d changed clothes since the last time I’d seen him. His dark hair was still damp on the ends, and he smelled newly showered.

“There you are,” he said casually, not noticing the tense looks John and I wore. “I’ve been calling you for ages. I don’t know why I bothered; you never answer your phone anyway.”

I’d remembered to slip my phone into the pocket of my dress. I’d forgotten, however, to turn it on.

“We, uh, just woke up a little while ago,” I said, sheepishly dropping John’s hand to hit the power button on my phone. “Where are Frank and Kayla?”

“They went to Kayla’s place to change, then to your friend Mr. Smith’s,” he said, with a meaningful glance at my mom. It was clear he didn’t think we should be talking about any of this in front of her. “They wanted to give Patrick his, er, car back. Then they said they’d meet us” — he lowered his voice, mumbling the next few words so only I could hear them — “at the cemetery.” His tone returned to normal. “Hi, Aunt Deb. Are you okay? You look like you’ve got a headache or something.”

Mom lifted her head. “I’ve been better,” she said. “Would you like some waffles?”

“That’s okay, I just took my dad to breakfast at Denny’s to get him out of the house.” Another meaningful glance at me. “Away from Grandma.”

Mom looked surprised. “Your dad? Oh, Alex, that’s great. How is he doing?”

“Still charged with murder, thanks, Aunt Deb. But I appreciate your bailing him out. Dad? Hey, Dad?”

To my surprise, Uncle Chris poked his head through one of the open sets of French doors. In one hand he was holding an enormous black plastic trash can. In the other, he was dragging a five-foot-long palm frond that had been knocked down by the storm.

“Oh, hey, Deb,” he said with a grin when he saw my mother. “Alex said he wanted to come over and I thought it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to get started on your cleanup. Cassandra was a mean one, huh? Lot of poinciana blossoms in your pool, which is weird, since I didn’t think there was one of those trees around here ….”

His voice trailed off as his gaze landed on me. Then his eyes lit up … until he noticed John. Then he frowned a little. “Piercey! And … you.”

John stepped up to him, his right hand extended. “John,” he said. “Remember? It’s nice to see you again, Mr. Cabrero.”

Uncle Chris didn’t look as if he thought it was so nice to see John again, but he stuffed the palm frond into the garbage can, then shook John’s hand.

“How you doing?” he asked. Then he took a deep breath and said, “Well, I’m going to get back to work. Lots to do if we’re going to get this place cleaned up.” He wrinkled his nose slightly. “Hey, uh, no offense, Deb, but it smells like burned toast in here.”

“Oh, no,” Mom said with a semihysterical laugh. “That was just Pierce’s boyfriend. He lit the carpet on fire with his brain.”

Uncle Chris looked at her as if she’d lost her mind — which I think she had, sort of — and nodded.

“Okay,” Uncle Chris said. “Just checking.” Then he quickly wheeled the trash can away, into the backyard.

Alex, who’d slid onto one of the kitchen counter stools, froze. Only his eyes moved as he cut his gaze towards my mother. “Wait … you know ?”

“Of course we know,” Mom said. “Why haven’t you told your father yet, Alex? This involves him. After all, Grandma is his mother, too.”

Alex glanced from me to my mother like we were both crazy. “I know. Why do you think I haven’t let him out of my sight since I got here? I’m keeping him as far away from her as I possibly can. But I can’t tell him about any of this. He wouldn’t be able to handle it.”

Mom’s glance came into focus. She frowned with disapproval. I didn’t exactly blame her — Uncle Chris was a lot cooler than many people gave him credit for — but considering her own reaction when she’d heard the news, I didn’t think she had much room to talk.

“Your father isn’t a child, Alexander,” she said. “He doesn’t need your protection.”

“You’re right that he isn’t a child,” Alex said, unzipping his backpack and reaching into it. “But you’re wrong that he doesn’t need protection. My dad needs a lot of protecting, because it doesn’t seem to me as if anyone’s ever bothered to protect him before in his life.”

Alex pulled a file from the backpack — a very similar file to the one he’d taken from Mr. Rector’s office in the spec house on Reef Key — and slapped it onto the kitchen counter. A photo slid out … a photo of my mom with my uncle Chris — both of them looking years younger, twenty years younger at least — and someone who could only be Seth Rector’s father.

When my mother saw the photograph, the color drained from her face. She reached out quickly to snatch it away, but Alex was too fast for her.

“No,” he said, his hand landing over it. “Let Pierce see. She has the right to know.”

“Know what?” I asked, moving towards the counter.

“Pierce,” Mom said. She looked as if she were going to be sick. “I can explain ….”

“I’m interested to hear that explanation,” Alex said. “I’m sure Pierce and John will be, too.” He passed the photo to me.

In the picture, my mom, Uncle Chris, and Mr. Rector were in swimsuits, standing on a sandy beach in front of some mangroves, the bushy kind of tropical tree my mom had always said roseate spoonbills liked to nest in. The three of them were laughing and holding something up for the camera as they mugged for the lens. The things they were holding were yellowish and long, and appeared to have been pulled from the sand. I could see the holes — not very large or very shallow — on the beach behind them, along with a lot of seaweed and driftwood.

There were more things like the ones they were holding sticking up out of the sand all around them. There were also more than a few empty beer bottles, and even an overturned bottle of Captain Rob’s Rum.

“That’s Reef Key, isn’t it?” Alex asked. “Before Mr. Rector and Farah’s dad developed it? Is Farah’s dad the person taking the picture?”

“Yes,” Mom said in a faint voice.

That’s when I took a closer look at what she and Uncle Chris and Mr. Rector were holding up as they laughed into the camera, and finally realized what they were: bones.

Not fish bones, or animal bones.

Human bones.

They built their city over those dead bones …

DANTE ALIGHIERI, Inferno , Canto XX

Mom,” I said, confused, squinting down at the photo. “I don’t understand. Why are you holding up fake bones and laughing? Was it Halloween? Were you guys pretending to be pirates?”

John took the photo away from me.

“Those are not fake,” he said. He put the photo back in the file Alex had laid across the counter and closed the cover.

I glanced from John to my mother. John’s expression was grim. My mother’s was mortified.

I was starting to feel mortified, too, now that I understood.

“We were so young,” Mom murmured.

“You looked like you were my age when that was taken,” I said.

I didn’t mean to sound judgmental. It’s just that no matter how old I was, I don’t think I would ever have picked up real human remains and waved them around, laughing, in front of a camera.

I couldn’t meet John’s gaze. His skeleton could easily have been one of those on that beach, if his body hadn’t ended up in the Underworld instead. The idea of anyone picking up his remains while drunk on a beach and waving them around was causing my blood to boil. A faint pink hue began to tinge the edges of my vision … but not enough to block out the fact that my mother had buried her face in her hands yet again.