Tormenting Lila Read Online Free PDF Page B

whether there is a serial killer at loose on the island targeting nannies.
    I swallowed the lump in my throat and stared wide-eyed up at Alex. ‘It’s the same guy, isn’t it? The same guy who attacked Amber?’
    Alex, reading over my shoulder, nodded. ‘Looks like it.’
    ‘Oh my god,’ I whispered. ‘What if it was that girl?’
    ‘What girl?’
    ‘The girl – the English girl who was at The Ship. I heard her introduce herself as a nanny. What if it was her?’
    ‘We told the police. We did what we could,’ Alex told me, but I knew he was wondering too whether we should have done more,
could
have done more.
    ‘They’ll catch him, don’t worry,’ Alex said, pressing his lips to the top of my head. Beneath us, the engines thrummed angrily. Suki and Nate stood leaning over the
railing of the boat, throwing bread to the seagulls overhead.
    Jack walked over then, carrying two styrofoam cups of coffee. Amber was behind him. They sat down beside us on the plastic bench seats and we stared out in silence at the choppy waves of the
Sound and Nantucket, receding to a dot on the horizon.
    Jack nodded at the newspaper I was holding. ‘Now aren’t you glad I showed up? I told you Nantucket was a dangerous place.’ He yawned and stretched, one arm resting on the back
of Amber’s chair. ‘I’m not letting my little sis out of my sight from now on.’
    I felt Alex tense beside me and squeezed his hand. ‘Allow me,’ I whispered, swivelling my eyes in Jack’s direction . . . and to the steaming cup of coffee in his hand.

 
    Meet Ren, Tyler, Parker and Jesse this summer in
The Sound,
out August 1st.
    THE SOUND
    When aspiring music journalist Ren Kingston takes a job nannying for a wealthy family on the exclusive island of Nantucket, playground for Boston’s elite, she’s
    hoping for a low-key summer reading books and blogging about bands. Boys are firmly off the agenda.
    What she doesn’t count on is falling in with a bunch of party-loving private school kids who are hiding some dark secrets, falling (possibly) in love with the local bad boy,
and falling out with a dangerous serial killer . . .

 
Prologue
    I’m running, running blind. Into the dark. Into the woods. Ricocheting off branches, tripping over tangled tree roots, gripping my arm as I stumble on, sobbing. Are those
his footsteps coming after me or is it the wind? A bird? An animal?
    I come to a flying halt and crouch down in the dirt, trying to listen. Is he following me? But my breathing is so loud and laboured it’s all I can hear. That and the wild drumming of blood
in my ears. My heart is no longer a caged bird but a dozen bats trying to burst free. I close my eyes and try to sink down into the dark.
    My fingers burrow through sandy soil, damp leaves. I want to claw my way deep into the earth, roll beneath the leaves and bury myself. I want to sob and scream and melt and turn to smoke and
vanish. When I open my eyes the world spins, recedes then rushes back in.
    ‘Ren!’
    His voice yells my name. Over and over. Filling my head with the sound of it and tearing apart the night.
    I need to stand up. I need to run. But I’m frozen. My back is slammed against a tree. My lungs are beginning to close down. I try to suck in a breath but it gets stuck and all of a sudden
the sky looms darker and larger overhead, the stars fuzzing out of focus and dissolving into the blanket sky.
    A crunch.
    I shrink back as far as I can, feeling the bark of the tree scratch a bloody trail across my shoulder. I bite my lip, choking off the scream that is fighting to burst out.
    He is out there, holding his breath as I hold mine. Ears pricked, eyes scouring the darkness. I can sense him there waiting, just a few feet away, his head tilted as he listens, and I can no
longer balance my weight on the balls of my feet. My knees are going to give, my arms are shaking.
    Tears are slipping noiselessly down my cheeks as my eyes dart left and right strafing the