Keeper of the Shadows - By Alexandra Sokoloff Page 0,34

Editing techniques and digital animation and special effects being what they were, there was very little that couldn’t be fixed in film. But the very thought of it, of what it meant...

She stammered, “You never said anything, all these years....”

“Didn’t want anything more to do with it—ever.” The captain’s face was dark. “Those movie people are always playing a big game on everyone else. Thinking they’re putting something over on us by mocking something that’s real. But I’m not blind. I know what’s out there in the night. I know some people aren’t what they seem.”

Barrie felt a chill. She also understood why the old man had been cast: he had a power that just resonated, in person and on-screen. Mick was being very silent beside her, and she glanced over to him—and was unnerved by the look she saw on his face. Either angry or disturbed or both, she couldn’t tell, but something had come over him.

He didn’t seem inclined to speak, either, so she swallowed and turned back to the captain. She spoke carefully. “Do you think someone...hurt Johnny?”

“Hurt him?” The old man looked at her directly.

“Killed him,” she whispered.

The captain’s eyes turned bleak. “I couldn’t say. But someone was up to no good, and they ruined that kid.” He looked defensive and defiant, and his voice trembled as he spoke. “He was just a kid, and he was a good kid, no matter what anyone says.”

Barrie leaned forward and put her hands on his. “I believe you.”

* * *

Barrie and Mick left the boat in silence, with Barrie tendering their thanks and appreciation to the captain. Mick was still in that strange silence, brooding, sunk into himself.

“You knew.” She confronted him once they reached the boardwalk, out of earshot of the boat. He looked for a moment caught.

“I didn’t know,” he countered. “I’d heard something—”

“From one of your sources,” she said in total disbelief. Does he ever tell the truth? Ever? She felt faint, even sick.

“I’d heard about the closed set. There could have been any number of reasons why Mayo and Branson closed off the set for the last scenes. The captain isn’t an Other, so of course he didn’t know everything that was going on. There was a whole other level of reality that was being kept from him.”

“They didn’t keep it from him very well.” She recalled the old man’s eyes as he’d stated, I know some people aren’t what they seem. She was fairly certain that he knew there were more things in heaven and earth than most people dreamed of.

Mick was silent, maybe knowing there was nothing he could say to her right then that would calm her. The water rippled behind them, a lulling and yet somehow ominous sound.

“Is there anything else you’re not telling me?” she demanded.

Mick looked at her but didn’t speak.

He knows too much, she thought. He wants too much. I don’t know why he cares about this...the way he does.

She was suddenly acutely aware that they were completely alone on the pier. There might have been any number of people out on the boats tied up in their slips all around them, but no one was visible. She was out on an island in the middle of the night with a shifter, one of the least reliable beings on the planet, and suddenly she doubted every single thing he’d ever said to her. More than that, she was afraid. And she didn’t like that feeling at all.

“All right,” she said, and managed to keep her voice from shaking. “I’m going home now.”

As she turned on her heel he caught her wrist, and she gasped. She swiveled around to face him, her heart in her throat, and he looked at her. “I wish you wouldn’t,” he said, barely audible.

And then he was pulling her forward and his mouth was on hers, and she felt herself turn to liquid at the touch of his lips, melting and burning and freezing all at once as she kissed him back, and felt the warmth of him and the smell of him enfold her....

She pulled back with a gasp, staring at him.

“Barrie,” he said, his voice thick, and she knew in the core of her that whether she trusted him or not, whether he was telling the truth or not, if she let him pull her forward, she would be lost for all time. Then she jerked her arms away from him and fled, running all the way back to the ferry