Free Awaken by Skye Malone

her clothes from her
own bag. I turned away, giving her privacy to get dressed.
    “I was wondering,” she continued when she was
finished. “You want to head into town for some shopping? Maddox got
a job at this cool old bookstore I wanted to show you.”
    I grinned. Bookstores were a weakness of
mine, and the older the better. Over the years, stopping at them
had been one of the few bright points on the absurd trips my
parents had taken. “Yeah, that’d be great.”
    “Sweet,” she said, smiling.
    Tossing her pajamas back into her bag, she
headed for the stairs, leaving me to follow.
    The smell of breakfast permeated the first
floor and the sound of the morning news carried from the end of the
hall. Sunlight filled the dining room with the pearlescent glow
that only morning possessed, and as we walked into the kitchen, the
fresh sea air from the open windows joined the scent of baking.
    But standing by the kitchen island, one hand
to her mouth and her eyes locked on the countertop television,
Diane seemed to see none of it.
    I paused, and next to me, Baylie did the
same. My gaze went from Diane to the screen, the words and images
finally registering. A pair of scanned photographs were placed
side-by-side, each of a different teenage girl with reddish-brown
hair. Headlines about kidnappings played across the bottom of the
screen, as well as a ticker displaying snippets of commentary from
the police. The newscaster was listing off locations the girls had
last been seen, one by the pier and the other in a neighborhood
near the oceanfront, and asking anyone with information to call the
hotline below.
    “They could be sisters,” Baylie
whispered.
    Diane jumped at the sound and then clicked
off the television before turning around. “Girls. You’re up.”
    She sounded breathless, and looked it too.
Swallowing, she scanned her kitchen as though trying to remember
what she’d been doing. “You want breakfast?”
    “There’s another girl missing?” Baylie
asked.
    Diane hesitated. “Yes.”
    “Was it like the last one? Did it look like
she’d been hurt?”
    “How did you–”
    “I heard you and Peter in the front room last
night, talking about what your reporter friend said.”
    Diane grimaced. “Marlene called half an hour
ago. She wanted Peter to ask the commissioner to speak with her.
But… yes. They think it’s the same people who took the last
girl.”
    Baylie looked away.
    Drawing a breath, Diane headed for the oven.
“We’ll just have to keep our eyes out for anything suspicious,” she
said, her assured tone sounding more than a bit forced, “and hope
the police find some leads. But in the meantime… breakfast.”
    Retrieving a tray of scones, she set about
transferring them to a cooling rack with a determination like she
was restoring order to the world by that action alone. Beside me,
Baylie looked like her appetite had long since fled, and I didn’t
feel far behind. But with the food presented to us, and Diane’s
almost adamant expression urging us on, we forced ourselves to
eat.
    Diane hovered nearby the entire time, as if
worried someone would come into the kitchen to steal us away.
    “You still want to go shopping?” I whispered
to Baylie as Diane walked over to the sink with our empty
plates.
    “What?” Diane interrupted, turning back to us
before Baylie could respond.
    Baylie winced. “We were thinking of going to
the bookstore where Maddox works.”
    Diane’s gaze slid toward the black screen of
the television, and something in her expression made me wonder what
else Marlene had told her.
    Baylie didn’t seem to notice it, though.
“We’ll be careful,” she insisted. “Please, Diane? We’ll drive
straight there and back again. He just told me about it yesterday,
and I wanted to show Chloe the place before she had to head
home.”
    Still looking hesitant, Diane set the plates
in the sink.
    “Have my parents called?” I asked into the
silence. Whether or not Diane agreed to