Page 167 of Property of Bob

“They were fighting. Struggling.” She took a breath. “Someone fell into the water.”

“Caleb.”

She nodded. “I think so.”

“Then he ends up dead.”

“Yeah.”

I looked at Anchor.

He was already following me.

“Twenty-three years later,” I continued, “somebody starts dumping bodies around our island.”

“Four of them,” Vin said.

“Then the skeleton,” Skull added.

“With a note telling us we’re paying for the sins of the club,” Anchor muttered.

I nodded.

“The symbol gets carved into a tree. Same one Bernice’s biker had.”

“Ron,” McKayla said.

Everyone looked at her.

She folded her arms. “Don’t forget Ron.”

I sure as fuck wasn’t.

Ron had been right under our noses. Working on the island. Helping us. Or pretending to. “Ron knew something,” I said.

“More than something,” Anchor replied.

The six notes we’d found under his desk flashed through my head.

DO WHAT I TELL YOU.

THEY CAN’T KNOW YOU’RE HELPING ME.

GET HER ON THE ISLAND. I’LL HANDLE THE REST.

PRINT WHAT I SEND YOU. PUT IT WHERE I TELL YOU.

DON’T FUCK THIS UP, RON. YOU KNOW WHAT THEY DID.

And the one I couldn’t stop thinking about.

BERNICE KNOWS TOO MUCH.

I looked at Pearl. “Ron was the one who told Anchor to hire you.”

Her face went pale. “Yeah.”

“And you brought Bernice.”