RATING: VERY GOOD
SPOILERS!!!
Things become exciting and messy in the last part of the book.
Sam insists on Billy surfing even though the boy is afraid of swimming in the sea. After the affair with the police, Sam is wary because his father is angry. So he allows him to drag him to the beach. It is when he is driving on the back of the truck that he sees the shiny piece again. He manages to unstuck it. It is a girl's hairclip, and he recongnises it as the one that Olive wore in the photograph she saw of her the day she disappeared.
Billy starts to think that his father killed Olive, so he grows afraid. Then he forces him to go into the sea, and at some point when there is a big wave and Sam pushes Billy's head down, and Billy begins to think that his father wants to kill him too.
At the same time at the station one of the workers records Billy's details, and she discovers that his prints are already recorded but by another name, Ben. She talks to the officer in charge, Langley. They discover that Sam Wheatley's real name is Jamie Stone and he is a wanted man for murder and abduction. The boss is not happy that Jessica interviewed the man twice and let it go, so she is sent to talk to those in the town where Stone ran away from. Sam is also now suspected of the murder of Olive as his truck was found and Olive's DNA was found in the back.
Jess travels to Oregon where she gets the story from the chief of police. Jamie Stone was a bad piece who started to date Christine Austin, the daughter of a wealthy family. The girl got pregnant and had twins. Jamie kept visiting her and their children, but he had no money or aspirations. Then one day Christine's brother arrived to find Jamie wanting to drown and one of the twins, Eva, already dead in the lake. Jamie then escaped with Ben, the other child, when Paul was trying to help his sister. The story is shocking. Jessica goes to talk to Paul Austin, the brother, because she wants to talk to Christine. Paul tries to dissaude her from her idea, but Christine insists, and he finally gave her the name of the clinic where his sister has been since that unfortunate episode. Jess goes to see her and the doctor tells her that Christine is unresponsive most of the time. They go to find her and Jess is shocked to see her, and she only gets a response when she mentions Ben. When she is about to go, she offers her card, which the doctor says should be left with him. Then Christine grabs her hand and says that she is sorry and she shouldn't trust them. When Jess leaves, she realises that she dropped her calling card at Christine's feet.
On the island Sam tries to escape the police, dragging the boy along. There is no way they can leave the island undetected. Then he realises there is only one way they can go. Billy is surprised when his father takes him to the house where Emily, the waitres, lives. They tell him that they are an item but they have kept it secret because Emily has a boyfriend, coastguard Dan, and they couldn'ts say anything.
Jessica returns to the island and tells Rogers about what she has discovered, but she is confused by what Christine told her. Also, she does not understand how Sam killed one of the babies, and then took one away and kept him safe. The police now have Billy's computer, and they find the files of the cameras have. They watch the ones from the day of the disappearance, and there is footage of safeguard Dan walking in the dark, trying to find someone. Jess and Oliver go to find the man, and the man eventually admits that he and Olive hooked. He took her to the dunes but at one point she said she had to pee and left, and she never returned. He says he didn't say anything because he has a girlfriend, Emily.
At Emily's, Billy and Sam spent several days. Emily's idea is that she should sneak father and son into the cabin of the ship where she will spend several times to do her scientific research, and when they reach Venezuela or Colombia, they could stay there. Billy is not happy because he claims that he doesn't speak Spanish and how can he then go to school. His father reassures him, saying that they won't stay away forever.
Billy starts seeing some things that are not good about Emily. Then Emily tells Sam that he can't avoid seeing Dan or he will suspect something is going on. So she tells them that in the mines where Billy does his research of crabs there is a secret room where workers stayed, and they can use before they can go to the ship. Billy doesn't like the idea as this is the cave that you can get trapped in the high tide. When they are getting ready, Billy notices that his father sounds strange, slurring his words. Then when they are ready to leave, Emily takes hold of Sam's jacket, and Billy realises something. He goes back to the room, and as he doesn't find paper, he uses the condensation of the window to write a message.
Jess and Rogers agree that she should go and talk to Emily about Dan. On the way there she comes across a woman in a car, and she hopes it is not Emily. It is Emily, who has Billy in the back, hidden under a blanket, and Sam in the boot. Jess find the house locked and goes in the back, and there the window shows a message. In a child's hand she reads 'Help' and the direction the message gives leads her to the caves.
In the caves where Emily, Sam and Billy are now, the situation comes to a head. Emily shows her real face, and she produces the gun that Sam had. Her intention is to kill both father and son. He has been feeding Sam's coffee with sleeping pills, and he has done the same with Billy's hot chocolate, but he has not drunk anything because it tasted like old chocolate. In this confrontation Emily reveals that she killed Olive as she saw her with Dan, adn when she went to have a pee, she hit her with a stone. Then as Sam had lent her his jacket, she had the keys to his truck.. So she used the truck to transport the dead girl. And then she got together with Sam to control him. What she did not expect was that he would appear at her door, so now she has to get rid of them. She orders them to drink the flasks with coffee and chocolate.
What she doesn't know is that Jessica is creeping inside the cave, and she hears when Emily says that Sam is a murderer who killed his daughter. Then Billy says that he remembers that it was not his dad, but his mum who killed baby Eva. Then Emily says that this is the tale that Sam spurned for her, saying that Christine had postpartum depression and her family protected her by accusing Sam.
Emily shoots Sam, and then Jessica comes closer, but she falls, making her presence evident. There is a shootout and Jessica is wounded. Emily escapes, and Jessica finds herself alone with Billy. The tide has blocked the way out, and the only way to escape is by swimming, but Billy refuses to swim. Jessica persuades him as she has to take Sam to safety. They eventually get to safety. Jessica wakes up in a hospital then, and Rogers tells him that Billy is fine, and Sam was operated and he will be fine. The police arrested Emily, and after the truth about Sam/Jamie was know, all charges have been removed. So that is how the novel finishes.
I loved the novel but there are certain things that I found hard to believe. I can't understand how Billy remembers what happened to her mother and sister when he was a baby. And Emily's reason to want Billy and Sam killed is not convincing, at least, not for me. And I don't understand why after killing Olive she had to cut off her hand and leave it to be found.
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