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who waltzed up and flashed her a smile. “Go find your mom, and then let me know you’re okay. Then I’ll go.”
“Fine,” she said. “I’ll come back in a few hours and let you know everything’s kosher, okay?”
“Sure. I’ll try to figure a way to get this thing into the water.”
“The water?” Nicholas called, looking vaguely curious. “You can still fly that thing?”
“If I can get her to the water, I might be able to float her out,” Jim said. He heaved a sigh and scrubbed at the back of his neck. “But it’ll take a hell of a miracle.”
Sophie took a step toward him, but he could tell from the way her eyes kept flickering to Nicholas that she was eager to move on and find her mom. He couldn’t blame her. “Thanks, Jim,” she said. “I’ll see if my mom can’t help. That is, if she’s . . .” She stopped and bit her lip.
If she’s alive? Jim wondered how she would have ended that thought. He shrugged. “Go on. I’ll wait till dark.”
“Thanks,” she said. Their eyes met and held briefly, and Jim nodded. The look in her eyes as she turned away was fierce; he reckoned that if her mother was on Skin Island, Sophie would find her. She had a determination about her that wore him down, made him weary just to watch. Had she been this steely when they were kids? She seemed so much older now, in more than just her looks. He thought of all that had befallen them since those happy days, and how much it had altered them both.
Nicholas threw Jim a half-salute, half-wave, then took Sophie’s hand and led her down the beach to where a small motorboat was anchored, out of Jim’s sight until he took a few steps to his left. In minutes, they were speeding across the channel toward Skin Island, and Jim was left alone beneath the palms with his broken plane and a nagging feeling that something wasn’t quite right.

FIVE
SOPHIE
S he couldn’t have said why she trusted him, and she wasn’t entirely certain that she did, but for now Nicholas was her only guide and she had no choice but to follow him. After he anchored the boat in a small inlet and tied it to an overhanging pine, he led her up a wooded slope and into a grove of low-growing, heavy-leafed trees. Sunlight leaked through the canopy to dapple the sandy earth and Nicholas’s skin. He walked slightly ahead of her, but kept glancing back every few moments, as if she might evaporate.
    “Who are you?” she asked after several minutes of trekking in silence, listening only to the crunch of sand and leaves under their shoes and the fading rush and roar of the ocean. “I mean, I know your name—but what are you doing here? You seem young to be a doctor or scientist.”
“Do I?” He held up a branch for her pass underneath it. “Do you know anything about Skin Island?”
    “Not much,” she admitted, then added, “Well, nothing at all, really.”
He nodded distractedly, letting go of the branch. It whacked her head from behind.
“Ouch! Hey!”
Nicholas stared at her as if seeing right through her, then he blinked and the look was gone, replaced by a sheepish smile. “Oh. Sorry.”
He started forward again, but she caught his arm and held it tight. “Please,” she said. “Just give me a straight answer. My mother, Moira Crue—where is she and how is she? She sent me a message, saying there was an emergency and that—”
He covered her hand with his. “Sophie. Sophie Crue. Everything is fine. Just relax. You’re jumpier than a fish on a string.”
She frowned and pulled her hand away. “Look. It’s been a really long day for me, okay? I don’t know who you are or what your connection to this place is, but I want you to tell me straight out—have you or anyone else harmed my mom? Because I swear—”
“Dr. Crue is waiting for you,” he interrupted, and the smile came off his face. “She’s fine. No one’s hurt her. Now come on.”
“Then why would she—”
He rounded on her, his vague demeanor suddenly sharpening into