Billy's gone.
Ruby Buckley's world ended with him.
But Hawkins isn't done with her yet.
When strange deaths begin again, Ruby is pulled into the heart of the storm. Between shadowy nightmares, the town's newest outcast, and someone she was never s...
( songs for the chapter ) moving in stereo // the cars the great gig in the sky // pink floyd
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Eddie heard it before he saw it, the crunch of tires on gravel outside the boathouse. His body went rigid.
He sat upright in the small rowboat, tossing the crumpled tarp aside. His pulse was a drumbeat in his throat. The others had left hours ago, promising food "later."
But "later" in Hawkins could mean anything.
He grabbed the nearest thing that could pass for a weapon, an empty beer bottle, and crept toward the grimy window. The glass was smudged with dirt and fogged from the damp air, but he squinted through it anyway, searching for movement.
"Shit," he muttered. Nothing but trees. The dark stretch of lake. Shadows that moved like people when the wind shifted. "Oh, shit."
Then the door burst open with a deafening bang.
Eddie yelped and raised the bottle like a club.
"Jesus!" he barked, right before Dustin's curly head popped through the doorway, grinning like an idiot.
"Delivery service!" the boy announced, juggling two plastic grocery bags full of snacks.
Eddie exhaled sharply, his shoulders sinking. "You're gonna give me a heart attack, man."
Dustin just grinned wider. Behind him came the others, Max, Robin, Steve, and Ruby.
Eddie's eyes caught on her instantly. Ruby offered him a small smile, tired but genuine, and the tension in his chest loosened just a little.
Steve followed her in, giving Eddie a small, nonthreatening wave like, See? We come in peace.
***
Eddie tore into the box of Honey Comb like a starving man. He sat cross-legged in the boat, shoveling cereal into his mouth without caring who was watching.
Ruby sat across from him, her knees pulled up, her eyes soft but still shadowed from the night before. The others ringed the boat like a jury, except no one looked ready to condemn him, not yet.
"So," Dustin started, tone too casual for what was coming, "we've got good news and bad news. You pick."
"Bad first," Eddie said through a mouthful of cereal. "Rip the Band-Aid."
"All right. Bad news. We tapped into the Hawkins PD dispatch with our Cerebro, and they're definitely looking for you."
Eddie froze mid-chew.
"And," Dustin added, "they're, uh, pretty convinced you killed Chrissy."
"Like, a hundred percent convinced," Max clarified.
