Page 106 of The Unknown

“Fine,” Ronan says with a defeated sigh. “We’ll do it.”

Violet looks my way, defiant. Her plan is still on track. All that remains to be seen is if I’ll agree to be a part of it.

“I’m going to make myself some breakfast and prepare for tonight,” she says. “Marin, would you like to join me?”

Ronan signals for me to wait. “I need to talk to you alone for a minute first.”

Violet leaves. I stay, even though being alone with him prompts a rising tide of dread. Especially when he says, “Hey, about last night. I’m—”

“It’s fine,” I say, cutting him off. I don’t want to talk about it. Not now. Not ever. I want to pretend it didn’t happen.

Ronan’s face brightens in surprise. “You sure?”

“Of course.”

“And you’re not mad at me for being, you know, inappropriate?”

Of course I’m mad, not to mention repulsed. The dread keeps rising—a numbness that’s moved past my waist and now shoots up my arms, making my hands shake. “Not at all.”

“And you’re not going to tell anyone, right?” Ronan says, each subsequent word descending lower into a whisper.

I wonder if he talked this way to other women, including the ones he’d fucked and filmed without their consent before dumping them. The thought makes my hands tremble even more. I hide them behind my back.

“I’m an unknown actress, Ronan. Who am I going to tell? And who would believe me if I did? As far as I’m concerned, we’re good. I’d honestly forgotten about it until you brought it up.”

Ronan lets out another sigh, punctuating it with an exaggerated wipe of his brow. “Thank you. I’m glad we could clear the air.”

I turn to leave, relieved to be done with the conversation. But when I reach the door, Ronan utters one last thing before I’m gone.

“But if you ever change your mind,” he says to my back, “you know where to find me.”

The same icy shock I felt last night returns, only worse than before. Because the fact that Ronan won’t quit tells me he’s learned nothing from Elise’s death. He’s still preying on actresses, angling for anotherconquest. The reason why eludes me. Maybe it’s a power thing. More likely he’s just another in a long line of pathetic, toxic men who’ve been prowling the movie industry since it began. Either way, it’s clear he’s not going to stop on his own. Someone else needs to step up and do it.

I keep moving, again pretending I didn’t hear Ronan. Not because I’m worried about him firing me from the movie.

I do it because I know he won’t be directing it.

Rattled but resolute, I head to the kitchen. There, I stay just long enough to whisper two words to Violet.

“I’m in.”

Twenty-Nine

Violet swears the plan is simple.

I beg to differ.

Nothing about this ruse of theirs so far has been simple. The scope of it—not to mention its sheer audacity—is breathtaking, and there were a thousand ways in which it all could have fallen apart. It still might, depending on my performance this evening. Which wasn’t supposed to be a performance at all.

“We’ll start with pretending to contact Molly,” Violet says as the two of us prepare the parlor for tonight. We stand at the table, arranging the lettered squares exactly the way they were during the first séance. “Ask her some questions, apologize for failing her, and then make peace. Since we want Ronan to do the same thing when we contact Elise next, he needs to believe every word. You need to really sell it, Marin. Do you think you can do that?”

I give her a look. “Can I convincingly express guilt and remorse for failing to prevent the drowning death of my sister? Yeah, Violet. I think I can manage it.”

“It’s not that I doubt your abilities,” Violet says as she places theYESandNOsquares amid the letters. “It’s just very important that we getthis right. Everything we did was designed to lead us to tonight. We hoped the history of the island, plus these new disappearances and us talking about our own hauntings, would muddy reality, guiding us to a situation in which Ronan—”

“And me,” I remind her, just to make it clear I’m still mad about being dragged into all of this.

“Yes, you as well. We didn’t mean any harm. Truly. We just needed—”