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Derek stopped walking and cradled ainst his chest When Eli and Ibrahi

"I know he’s not co back," I breathed "And I know it’s been years But, God, it still hurts It hurts like it was yesterday"

Derek bent down and kissed ainst mine and whispered into my ear, "Some scars just don’t heal, Sofia You need to accept that"

I gripped Derek tighter againstdown into a fresh wave of tears "I-I needed to hear that"

I sank toin his ar

We ran to catch up with Ibrahim, Eli and Shadow

"I’ you need to do is apologize, Sofia," Eli said

I gave the in a deep breath "Let’s get down to business"

We walked along the length of the beach that night until we reached the area the humans had disappeared from

We searched all around, scanned the sand, splashed around in the waves looking for any clue that could tell us what had happened Shadoas finding nothing of interest to us--although he was certainly finding things that were of interest to hie buoy, a dead whale shark and an unholy amount of seaweed

Of course, we’d expected not to find anything After all, if these were supernatural creatures, they wouldn’t leave traces

Once there wasn’t any ether in a circle and looked at each other Then all eyes fixed on Eli

"So?" Ibrahih

"We need to return hoet my maps out"

"And?" Derek said

"I need to analyze all the locations they’ve hit over the past few years I want to see if I can spot any pattern"