you in danger, and these guys don’t fool around, Tess. Your dad’s MC probably won’t lay a hand on you just out of some shred of respect… probably. But these guys your dad’s dealing with behind their back? Who the fuck knows what they’ll do.”
“I’m texting him. Now hush.”
Hayley rolls her eyes as I pull out my phone, stand, and pace, too nervous to sit still. A few back and forth messages later, I set my phone down on the counter and turn to face her.
Hayley arcs a brow. “Well?”
“He’s agreed to meet me at eleven tonight.”
“Where?”
“Just a place.”
“What place, Tess?”
“All right, fine. Oakland Cemetery.”
She shakes her head. “You arrange a dangerous meeting with God knows who this guy is—could be a mobster, could be an ex-con, could be a psychopath for all you know—and you agree to meet him in a cemetery?”
“He picked the place, not me.”
“And that doesn’t clue you in to the kind of weirdo this guy might be?”
“No one said you had to go with me, you know.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s in the BFF rulebook. Accompany your friend when she’s about to do stupid, dangerous shit. It’s right after Don’t let her date a biker.”
I try to fight the smile, and my eyes end up flooding. Damn hormones. She takes me in her arms, and I cling to her.
“Of course I’m going with you, silly.”
“Thank you,” I blubber.
“Dry your eyes and go put some running-from-a-deranged-lunatic shoes on. Does your mom have any guns in the house?”
I pull back. “You think we need a gun?”
“You think we don’t?”
“You’re right.”
“Come on, partner in crime. Let’s go scope out the meeting place ahead of time.”
We roll up to the cemetery from a side street off the main highway. A stone wall surrounds the place, and the main entrance is a big brick archway with elaborate black wrought iron gates.
Hayley points up at the year engraved in stone above the arch. “Check it out. 1896. This place is old.”
“I pulled it up on my phone before we left. It’s the oldest one in the city.”
“Where are you supposed to meet him?”
“He said there’s a fountain with a statue of two children huddled under an umbrella.”
Hayley parks in a gravel, tree-lined lot across from the entrance.
“I don’t think this neighborhood is the greatest,” she says as we climb from the car.
“Come on.” I head toward the entrance. The gates are still open, but it closes at dusk, and it’s almost that now.
The entrance lane is paved but narrow. On either side are low-walled, terraced sections of graves. Some have small markers, some have mausoleums, some have elegant carved statues ten feet high, and some just a simple obelisk. Old brick paths lead off into the sections here and there.
This place is beautifully landscaped like a park with giant oaks, dogwoods, laurel trees, and magnolias, and I have to remind myself Oakland has been here for well over a hundred years.
“Wow, this place is huge,” Hayley murmurs.
“Almost fifty acres. Website said there are over seventy thousand graves.”
“Holy crap, that’s a lot of dead people.” She shivers. “This place gives me the creeps even in daylight. Imagine the field day the Long Island Medium would have in here.”
We finally reach a sign marked Visitor Center that points to a lane on the left.
“Let’s go that way,” Hayley says, and we walk until we see a white castle-like building rising above the trees and head toward it.
It’s air-conditioned inside, and there’s a man standing behind a counter.
“May I help you ladies?” he asks, smiling.
“Do you have like a map of this place?” Hayley asks.
“Of course.” He pulls one from a display and hands it to her. “Are you looking for anything or anyone in particular? Usually girls like you want to know where Margaret Mitchell is buried.”
“Who?” Hayley asks.
I jab her with my elbow. “She wrote Gone with the Wind, dummy.” I smile at the man. “Actually, I was told there’s an interesting fountain with a sculpture of children under an umbrella.”
“Ah, yes, it’s called Out of the Rain. It’s just down the way. Continue on the road past this building. You can’t miss it. It’s at the corner where several lanes converge.”
“Is the main entrance on the west side the only way in here?” Hayley asks, thinking way ahead of me.
“Well no, there’s the south pedestrian entrance, and a smaller pedestrian gate on the south side near the Jewish section, but that’s not used anymore.”
“What about on the east side and the north