“Two places,” Yarnell spat. “In the woods north of Highway 563, south of Rosetta.”

I glanced at Ethan, to see if he’d caught that, and he nodded, scribbling on the notebook he kept in his back pocket. Then I turned back to Yarnell. “Where else?”

“Why does it matter?” he demanded, obviously riding a new surge of rebellion. “He’s dead. You need to dig him up to believe it?”

“Yes.” I didn’t hesitate. He could say it once every second for a year, but I wouldn’t believe Marc was dead until I’d touched his lifeless body with my own hands. I needed to see their burial site so I could prove to the others that Marc wasn’t in it. “Where’s the second site?”

“In the woods east of White Apple.”

Ethan’s pencil scratched on paper behind me, and Yarnell’s eyes flicked his way. “But you’ll never find either of them. The roads are pissy little dirt paths, and the woods are dense. You won’t find his grave, but you’ll never find him, either.” The stray’s eyes flashed with renewed, vigorous anger, and he lunged at me. Parker and Dan caught him by both arms, but still he strained forward. “You’ll live the rest of your life never knowing what happened to him. You’ll wake up crying, empty inside from not knowing. From never knowing…”

I threw one last punch, and it landed squarely on the left side of his chin. Yarnell’s head rocked back, and he let it hang there for a moment before meeting my gaze. “Maybe,” I had to admit, though the very thought killed some small, vulnerable part of me. “But if you ever come near me or Marc again, we’ll all know exactly what happened to you.”

We left Yarnell bleeding in his living room, and on the way across his front lawn, Ethan threw one arm over my shoulder. “Damn, boys, my sister is badass!”

I forced a small smile, knowing he was trying to cheer me up. But I couldn’t forget the fact that, though I was sure he wouldn’t be there, we were about to embark upon a search for Marc’s body. There was no good cheer in me to be found.

I slid into the front seat of the car again and concentrated on reversing my accidental partial Shift. Then, as Parker drove off, I grabbed the atlas from the pocket on the back of my seat and twisted in my seat so I could see everyone. After flipping a few pages, I found a map of Mississippi. Unfortunately, there was no close-up of the Rosetta area, so I couldn’t see the smaller roads. “Okay, White Apple is ten or twelve miles north of Rosetta, off of State Highway 33. We’ll go back to Marc’s and split up. Parker, you and Dan head toward White Apple, and Ethan and I will go south on 563. Keep your eyes open. There will probably be a break in the woods wherever they usually enter, but it’ll likely be faint.”

I paused, and closed my eyes while I uttered a silent prayer for Marc. Then I looked up to find Parker alternately staring at me and the road. “What?”

He hesitated. “Do you really think we’ll find him either of those places?”

“I certainly hope not.” I spent most of the rest of the drive giving my dad another, somber update, pretending I didn’t hear hopelessness in his every exhale.

At Marc’s house, I used the restroom and traded my leather jacket for a heavier coat I found in his closet, then grabbed a box of protein bars and several bottles of water from the fridge. As I split the supplies among two backpacks, I heard voices speaking softly from the front yard.

Through the front window, I saw Ethan and Parker standing side by side, each stuffing something into the backs of their respective vehicles. Rolls of black plastic. Ethan held an unopened roll of duct tape, and the handle of a shovel stuck up over the backseat of Parker’s car when he closed the back hatch.

I was hoping for the best, and they were preparing for the worst.

Sighing, I blinked unshed tears from my eyes and kicked the kitchen cabinet closed, then joined them outside, where Dan stood on the porch, both hands stuffed into the pockets of his own light coat.

“I think you’re right,” he said, steadily holding my gaze. “I think Marc’s still out there somewhere, alive. But you can’t blame them for bein’ ready, in case we’re wrong.”

“I don’t blame them.” I handed one of the loaded packs to him. “But we’re not wrong.”

I waved goodbye to Parker and Dan as we pulled out of Marc’s driveway, a better map of Mississippi on my lap, the heater blowing full blast into my face.

“You okay?” Ethan glanced at me briefly, then back at the road.

“No.”

He sighed, lips pressed together, hands gripping the wheel so hard his fingers had gone white with tension. “Faythe, I know you want to believe Marc’s still alive. And I hope to hell you’re right. None of us can handle losing him. But you need to be prepared for the possibility that he’s really gone. Or that Yarnell’s right, and we may never find him.”

“That won’t happen.” I clenched my hands in my lap to keep from putting a fist-shaped indentation in his glove compartment. “I’d know if he were dead, Ethan.”

“How?”

I closed my eyes and ground my teeth together. Damned logic… “I just would. Wouldn’t you know if something were wrong with Angela?”

Ethan chuckled. “Yeah. She’d call every five minutes, like she’s done all day long.”

“Your phone’s on silent?” I couldn’t resist a grin.