1
It had been ten minutes since they’d passed the “Driftwood Harbor, Population 203” sign, and ten minutes since anyone had said a word.
Out one window, the Atlantic Ocean stretched out like a big gray void as far as the eye could see. Out the other, a fog so thick, you could choke on it hung over a dense forest of scrabbly pine trees. A few miles back they’d passed a tumbledown house with an old truck in the driveway, but they hadn’t spotted any actual life since they left the interstate more than an hour ago. (Unless you counted the seagulls that circled overhead, and even they looked like the type that would purposely poop on your head.)
It was desolate and depressing, and Beacon could tell from the way his twin sister, Everleigh, glared out the window that she was regretting not flinging herself out of the car when she’d had the chance.
“I hear they have fantastic lobster,” the twins’ dad said.
The tires’ whirring underneath the Ford Taurus came into focus. A breeze whistled through a cracked-open window, ruffling the fine brown hairs clinging to the top of their dad’s head and sending his tie over his shoulder.
“I love lobster,” Beacon said, just to break the tense silence.
From the front seat, Everleigh snorted.
She was part of the reason they were moving from Los Angeles all the way to the tiny fishing village of Driftwood Harbor on the Eastern Seaboard. Their dad was hoping that the fresh air and change of scenery would help her. Nothing else had.
That’s why Beacon tried to be optimistic about the move, even if he wasn’t actually happy about it. He’d had friends in LA. He had the skate park downtown, where he practiced his jumps until it got dark. He had his bedroom full of Tony Hawk posters and a spot under the floorboards where he hid private stuff from his nosy twin sister. But he just wanted his family to go back to normal. Or as close to normal as they would ever get, now. After. If this place helped, then none of that other stuff mattered.
“Where is the actual town?” Everleigh grumbled. “If there even is one.”
“Should be coming up to it soon,” Beacon said brightly. “Right, Dad?”
He’d been doing that lately. Saying everything as if it had an exclamation point at the end, as if his enthusiasm might be contagious. So far, it only seemed to make Everleigh more annoyed.
Beacon looked out the window at the forest blurring past. Suddenly a flash of movement caught his eye. A figure darted out of the trees. It was white and hunched, with a pair of huge round eyes.
And it was looking right at him.
Beacon gasped.
“What?” Everleigh said.
He was about to explain, but his words were cut short by a loud clunk from under the car’s floor. Before he knew it, the car was fishtailing wildly across the road. The kids screamed as their dad fought to get control, the forest and road spinning around them in a streak of gray and green. The car careened toward a thick pine. Closer, closer, closer—they were going to hit it!
At the last moment, their dad braked hard. The car jerked to an abrupt stop. Beacon’s head slammed against the window. Stars exploded across his eyes.
And then everything was still. The engine knocked over the ringing in Beacon’s ears. Beacon blinked away the spots in his vision, searching through the cloud of dust outside the window for the creature in the woods. But if it was there, he couldn’t see it.
“What. Was. That,” Everleigh finally said.
“I don’t know.” Their dad gripped the steering wheel with white-knuckled fingers. “I was driving along normally and then all of a sudden something just gave and I lost control.”
Beacon blew out a relieved breath.
“You okay, Beaks?” their dad asked, twisting around to check him over for injury. “Is everyone okay?”
Once he confirmed that no one was missing an arm or needed CPR, he climbed out of the car, briskly wiping the wrinkles out of his suit. The twins weren’t far behind. Smoke billowed from underneath the hood of the car like a huffing dragon. Their dad coughed and blew away the fumes as he tried unsuccessfully to open the hood. Everleigh released an annoyed sigh and nudged him aside with her hip, then she unlatched the hood with a practiced flick of her wrist and peered underneath at the tangle of metal and wires.
“What is it?” their dad asked eagerly.
“Radiator’s blown,” Everleigh said, hands balled on her hips.
Everleigh was practically a pro mechanic. She’d been fixing cars with their older brother, Jasper, ever since she was in diapers.
Now she fixed them alone.
“Can you fix it?” their dad asked.
“Not without some leak sealant, and we don’t have any on hand. If we were back at home . . . ,” she said meaningfully, “now that would be a different story.”
Their dad ignored the barb.
“We’ll need to call a tow truck, then.” He ducked away to the driver’s seat, and Beacon got out his cell phone. He tapped the screen, but the browser wouldn’t load.
“The Internet isn’t working,” Beacon said.
Everleigh snatched the phone from his hand.
“Hey, give that back!” Beacon said, but his sister twisted out of his reach to type.
Even though they were twins, Everleigh had at least two inches on her brother, a fact she used to her advantage at every opportunity.
“No reception,” Everleigh said. “That’s just great.” She shoved the phone back at Beacon’s chest.
Beacon grumbled and stowed the cell in his pocket. Then the twins looked down either side of the isolated road. That’s when Beacon realized just how late it was. It hadn’t exactly been bright and sunny before, but now the trees looked black against the bruised-fruit sky. It was so quiet, he could actually hear insects chirping and trilling in the long grass on the side of the road, instead of just cars and people like back in LA.
A fine mist sprayed off the ocean, and the air bit through Beacon’s thin sweatshirt with razor-sharp teeth. Everleigh rubbed warmth back into her arms, which were prickled with goose bumps. Their dad had warned them that it would be chilly by the water, but it seemed to be getting cooler with every passing second.
Beacon thought of the movement he’d seen in the woods before the car broke down, and a shiver scuttled down his spine. Those eyes had been huge. He didn’t even want to think about what kind of animal they belonged to.
“Well, I guess we’ll have to walk,” their dad said, jolting Beacon from his thoughts.
“I am not walking.” His dad and sister stared at him, and Beacon crossed his arms stiffly. “I saw something in the woods before the car broke down.”