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‘Later. After dark. I’ll tell you all a bedtime story.’
        ‘We might not be here after dark,’ Vivian said.
        ‘As long as nobody’s around,’ Cora said, ‘we might as well stay.’
        ‘Somebody has been here,’ Abilene reminded her.
        ‘That doesn’t necessarily mean anyone’ll show up while we’re around. And whoever it is might be perfectly harmless.’
        ‘Well, we’re trespassing.’
        ‘Just doing some innocent exploration. And the door was open, after all. It’s not as if we broke in.’
        ‘Besides,’ Helen said, ‘it wouldn’t be fair to quit. This is my choice, and I’ve always gone along with you guys - whether I wanted to or not. I didn’t complain all the time, either,’ she added, eyeing Vivian.
        ‘I’m still here,’ Vivian pointed out. ‘I’m not a quitter.’
        ‘Just a complainer,’ Cora said.
        ‘We do have to be realistic,’ Abilene said. ‘I mean, it’s great to have our little adventures, but on the other hand we don’t want to get our asses killed. Things do happen, you know. And this place looks a little hinky to me. I’m not saying we should call it quits, but we’ve gotta be damned careful. Someone was here within the past few days. Someone might be here right now.’
        ‘Oh, I hope so,’ Helen said, leering.
         This from the gal, Abilene thought, who is petrified by the idea of taking a shower alone .
        Helen hadn’t changed much, in that regard, since her encounter with the phantom hand in her freshman year at Belmore.
        After the night of Finley’s escapade, Helen had taken showers frequently. Not always with Abilene, but always with someone. Often, she’d returned dry, having turned back after discovering the shower room to be deserted. Better to wait than to risk the lights going off, an extra hand touching her in the dark.
        Later, during the three years when they all share a rented house on Summer Street, she hadn’t insisted on having a companion in the tub with her. She hadn’t even asked. It would’ve been tight quarters, for one thing. She’d admitted it. And she’d always locked herself in the bathroom.
        Even last night at the Wayfarer’s Haven in Burlington, Helen had insisted that either Abilene or Finley remain in the room while she bathed. Abilene had stayed behind. Finley had gone ahead without her to have drinks and snacks in the room shared by Cora and Vivian.
        So she was a young woman pursued by terror, and yet here she was, putting on a show of bravado about the more immediate threat of running into a stranger in a desolate lodge in the middle of nowhere.
        Well, Abilene thought, there are five of us. She damn sure wouldn’t be acting this way if she were alone.
        But Abilene wondered if any of this was real to Helen. The phantom hand in the shower room had been very real. Whenever Helen was in the midst of an adventure, however, she behaved as if she considered the dangers imaginary. As if she were a character in a movie or something, and nothing bad could actually happen to her.
        As Abilene entered the kitchen behind Cora and Helen, she realized that Helen wasn’t the only one with a carefree attitude about the adventures.
        Finley, too, seemed cheerfully reckless.
        In Finley’s case, however, it was more than empty bravado. The girl was audacious, intrepid to the bone.
        

CHAPTER FOUR
        

BELMORE GIRLS
        
        ‘Now let’s calm down, everyone,’ Finley said as Cora grabbed the front of her tank top and yanked her up.
        ‘No need for violence,’ she said as Cora drove her across the room and rammed her back against a wall between two of the showers.
        ‘Is my camera okay?’ she asked as Cora clutched her throat.
        Abilene had picked it up.
        She located Cora and Finley in the viewfinder. ‘I guess it’s