"We went right into the guardrail," Josh said. "No big deal. We weren't going very fast. I thought, Shit, I crushed the fender. And I started to back up. But then he hit us again - "

"Oh, but surely - " Father Dominic began.

Josh, however, went on as if the priest hadn't spoken.

"And the second time he hit us," Josh said, "we just kept on going."

"As if the guardrail weren't even there," Felicia put in.

"We went straight over." Josh slipped his hands back into his pockets. "And woke up down here. Dead."

There was silence after that. At least no one spoke. There was still the sound of the waves, of course, and the crackling of the fire. Spray from the sea, blown by the wind, was coating my hair and forming little ice crystals in it. I moved closer to the fire, thankful for its warmth…

And realized, all in a rush, why the RLS Angels had gone to the trouble of building it. Because that's what they'd have done if they'd still been alive. They'd have built a fire for warmth. So what if they could no longer feel its heat? It didn't matter. That's what live people would have done.

And all they wanted was to be alive again.

"Troubling," Father Dominic said. "Very troubling. But surely, my children, you can see that it was just an accident - "

"An accident?" Josh glared at Father D. "There was nothing accidental about it, Father. That guy - that Michael guy - came at us on purpose."

"But that's ridiculous," Father Dominic said. "Perfectly ridiculous. Why on earth would he do such a thing?"

"Simple," Josh said with a shrug. "He's jealous."

"Jealous?" Father Dominic looked appalled. "Perhaps you aren't aware of this, young man, but Michael Meducci, whom I have known since he was in the first grade, is a very gifted student. He is well liked by his fellow classmates. Why in heaven's name would he - No. No, I'm sorry. You're mistaken, my boy."

I wasn't sure which universe Father Dom was living in - the one where Michael Meducci was well liked by his fellow classmates - but it sure wasn't this one. As far as I knew, no one at the Mission Academy liked Michael Meducci - or even knew him, outside of the chess club. But then, I had only been there a few months, so maybe I was wrong.

"He may be gifted," Josh said, "but he's still a geek."

Father Dominic blinked at him. "Geek?" he ventured.

"You heard me." Josh shook his head. "Look, Father, face facts. Your boy Meducci is nothing. Nothing. We" - he pointed at himself, then gestured toward his friends - "on the other hand, were it. The most popular people in our school. Nothing happened at RLS unless it had our seal of approval. A party wasn't a party until we got there. A dance wasn't a dance unless Josh, Carrie, Mark, and Felicia - the RLS 'Angels' - were there. Okay? Are you getting the picture now?"

Father Dominic looked confused. "Um," he said. "Not quite."

Josh rolled his eyes. "Is this guy for real?" he asked me and Jesse.

Jesse said, without smiling, "Very much so."

"Okay," Josh said. "Then let me put it to you this way. This Meducci guy? He may have the sparkling GPA. But so what? That's nothing. I've got a 4.0. I hold the school record in the high jump. I belong to the National Honor Society. I play forward on the basketball team. I've been president of the student council for three years in a row, and for a lark, this spring I tried out for - and got - the lead in the school drama society's production of Romeo and Juliet. Oh, and guess what? I was accepted to Harvard. Early decision."

Josh paused to take a breath. Father Dominic opened his mouth to say something, but Josh barreled right along.

"How many Saturday nights," Josh asked, "do you think Michael Meducci has sat alone in his room playing video games? Huh? Well, let me put it to you another way: do you know how many I've spent caressing a joystick? None. Want to know why? Because there's never been a Saturday night when I didn't have something to do - a party to go to or a girl to take out. And not just any girl, either, but the hottest, most popular girls in school. Carrie here" - he gestured at Carrie Whitman, sitting in the sand in her ice-blue evening gown - "models part-time up in San Francisco. She's done commercials. She was homecoming queen."

"Two years in a row," Carrie pointed out in her squeaky voice.

Josh nodded. "Two years in a row. Are you starting to get it now, Father? Is Michael Meducci dating a model? I don't think so. Is Michael Meducci's best friend like mine, Mark over there, captain of the football team? Does Michael Meducci have a full athletic scholarship to UCLA?"

Mark, obviously not the group genius, went, with feeling, "Go Bruins."

"What about me?" Felicia demanded.

Josh said, "Yes, what about Mark's girlfriend, Felicia? Head cheerleader, captain of the dance team, and, oh yeah, winner of a National Merit Scholarship because of her superior grades. So, keeping all that in mind, let's ask that question again, shall we? Why would a guy like Michael Meducci want people like us dead? Simple: he's jealous."

The silence that swept in after this statement was almost as penetrating as the smell of brine permeating the air. No one said a word. The Angels looked too self-righteous to speak, and Father Dom seemed stunned by their revelations. Jesse's feelings on the subject were unclear; he looked a little bored. I guess to a guy born over a hundred and fifty years ago, the words National Merit Scholarship don't mean much.

I pried my tongue from where it had been stuck to the roof of my mouth. I was very thirsty from my long hike down, and I certainly wasn't looking forward to the climb back up to Father Dom's car. But I felt compelled, despite my discomfort, to speak.

"Or," I said, "it could be because of his sister."

CHAPTER 13

Everyone - from Father Dom to Carrie Whitman - blinked at me in the firelight.

"Excuse me?" Josh said. Only his tone was more impatient than polite.

"Michael's sister," I said. "The one who's in the coma."

Don't ask me what made me think of it. Maybe it was Josh's reference to parties - how no party began until he and the other Angels got there. That started me thinking of the last party I'd heard about - the one where Michael's sister had fallen into the pool and nearly drowned. Some party that must have been. Had the police broken it up after the ambulance arrived?

Father Dominic's shaggy white eyebrows went up. "You mean Lila Meducci? Yes, of course. How could I have forgotten about her? It's tragic - very tragic - what happened to her."

Jesse piped up for the first time in some minutes. "What happened to her?" he asked, lifting his chin from the knee he'd been resting it on, his foot propped up against the boulder he was sitting on.

"An accident," Father Dom said, shaking his head. "A terrible accident. She tripped and fell into a swimming pool and very nearly drowned. Her parents are losing hope that she'll ever regain consciousness."

I grunted. "That's one version of the story, anyway," I said. Michael's parents had obviously cleaned it up for the principal of their daughter's school.

"You left out the part," I went on, "about how she was at a party in the Valley when it happened. And that she was completely blotto when she went under." I narrowed my eyes at the four ghosts seated on the opposite side of the fire. "So was everybody else at this particular party, apparently, since nobody noticed what happened to her until she'd been under long enough to curdle her brain." I looked at Jesse. "Did I mention the fact that she's only fourteen years old?"

Jesse, still sitting on the boulder, his hands around the propped up knee, looked at the Angels. "I don't suppose any of you," he said, "would know something about this."

Mark looked disgusted. "How would any of us know about some geek's sister getting wasted at a party?" he demanded.

"Perhaps because one - or all - of you happened to be at the party at the time?" I suggested sweetly.

Father Dominic looked startled. "Is this true?" He blinked down at the Angels. "Do any of you know anything about this?"

"Of course not," Josh said - too quickly, I thought. Felicia's "As if" was not very convincing, either.

It was Carrie who gave it away, though.

"Even if we did," she demanded with unfeigned indignation, "what would it matter? Just because some stupid wannabe drank herself into a coma at one of our parties, how does that make us responsible?"

I stared at her. Felicia, I remembered, was the National Merit Scholar. Carrie Whitman had only been homecoming queen. Twice.

"How about, just for starters," I said, "making alcohol available to an eighth grader?"

"How were we supposed to know how old she was?" Felicia asked, not very nicely. "I mean, she had enough makeup slathered on, I could have sworn she was forty."

"Yeah," Carrie said. "And that particular party was by invitation only. I certainly never issued an invitation to any eighth grader."

"If you want to hold someone responsible," Felicia said, "how about the idiot who brought her in the first place?"

"Yeah," Carrie said angrily.

"I don't think Susannah is the one holding you responsible for what happened to Michael's sister." Jesse's voice, after the shrillness of the girls, sounded like distant thunder. It shut the others up quite effectively. "Michael, I believe, is the one who killed you for it."

Father Dominic made a soft noise as if Jesse's words had sunk, like a fist, into his stomach.