Influence

Chapter 4

In his dream, Jasper stood at the edge of a high cliff, a massive, jagged stone rising like a monolith above a dark ocean. Nothing but sea and rock and a sky peppered with stars as the sun set behind him. He cupped a small yellow bird between his palms; his mission was to see the bird soar into the dusky sky. Raising his hands, he hoisted the bird up and released her. It was only after she'd dropped below the cliff that he remembered her wings were clipped, and by then, it was too late. She would fall and she would crash into the ocean, her body carried in and out with the tide.

She fell, and Jasper watched her fall. Helpless. She cried out, a bird's squawk that sounded odd to his ear. She cried again and the sounds formed words, but the waves upon the shore and the roar of regret coursing through his mind made it hard for him to understand. It was a last message to him, perhaps. A scolding, a warning. Or a curse.

The screaming continued until the cliff and the falling bird and the ocean slipped away, replaced by a mahogany bedstand, light from the morning sun pressing into his room through a silk draped window. He rolled onto his back. Only a dream. He'd done nothing wrong, done nothing that couldn't be undone. He'd let no one slip through his fingers to fall and fall and fall.

And then the scream came again. A scream and words with it. "Wake up and help me find her."

His heart sped. Someone screaming. Someone needing to be found. He tugged on a pair of basketball shorts, hurrying out of the room, the urgency in Tam's voice outweighing his reluctancy to engage with her.

He opened his door to an empty hallway. Becca and Paul had already emerged from their room, Becca tying the cord of her bathrobe around her waist as she rushed in the direction of Tam's screams, Paul following a pace behind, camera in hand.

"Really dad?" Jasper said as he passed his father.

"You know the drill."

Jasper pushed ahead of his stepmother onto the balcony at the villa's western side. There, standing in its center was Tam, cheeks flush, eyes about to release a river of tears as soon as she blinked.

"It's Goldie." Her shoulders slumped forward. She studied the eye of Paul's camera as though she might find Goldie trapped behind its lens. "I've looked everywhere."

"Isn't she in her room?" Becca leaned over the edge of the balcony, scanning the dense foliage and the empty beach beyond it. "Maybe she's taking a bath."

"I checked. She asked me to wake her up early this morning for a jog, so I went to her room, but she wasn't there. Her bed—I don't think she slept in it."

Jasper followed his stepmother's gaze up and down the beach. "Are you serious?"

She rubbed at her cheeks as the tears she'd been holding back fell. "I searched downstairs, then outside. I came up here to see if I could spot her, but," She wavered and slumped against the railing. "It's like she just disappeared."

"That can't be!" Becca headed back into the villa. "People like Goldie don't disappear. Paul, let's search her room. Tam must have missed her."

"I'm sure that's the case, dear." Paul, still filming, followed his wife, probably eager to get shots of Goldie's empty accommodations.

As soon as they were gone, Jasper crossed his arms and stared at Tam. She shifted her weight and stared back.

"Why are you looking at me like that? Shouldn't you go search for her?"

"With my camera, right? Run down to the beach, make sure the mic picks up how hard I'm breathing. Is it because I'm run so fast hoping to discover her on the beach or is it because I'm so afraid she's gone?"