The first YA thriller from Rick Riordan Presents is finally here. It Waits in the Forest by Sarah Dass tells the story of Selina DaSilva, daughter of the most prominent woman of magic on the Caribbean island of St. Virgil. In the aftermath of a brutal home invasion that took the life of her father and left her mother in a coma, Selina gave up on her dream of studying pharmacology at a university abroad, opting instead to remain on the island and process her trauma in peace. But when the island is plagued by a string of mysterious murders, Selina finds herself caught in the center of the investigation. An investigation that will force her to confront her past, reunite her with an old flame, and challenge her steadfast skepticism of the supernatural.

Read on to see how it all starts . . .

My mother always said that guilt had a scent. That it was as acrid as unripe akee fruit and just as toxic. She claimed she could smell it on a person like the tang of unwashed skin. That it hung in the air like the scent of oncoming rain, suspended overhead like a threat.

Then again, my mother lied about a lot of things. I learned at a very young age not to believe everything she said.

“Look how the sky set up again,” Edward said, facing the shop window. He had his back to me, the lines of his broad silhouette blurred against the sullen gray clouds. Outside, the colorful buildings cast gloomy shadows on the almost-empty street. The bad weather seemed to have deterred the day’s tourists from venturing beyond the pristine shops of the town center to our little souvenir store, which was tucked like an afterthought at the end of Main Street.

“It’s Sahara dust,” Edward said confidently. “That’s what have it looking like that.”

“It can’t be,” his sister, Allison, said. “If it was, I’d be coughing down the place.” She sat with her feet propped on the counter, snacking on a brown bag of honey-roasted cashews. She’d bought them from Cliff, the nuts man, whose cart rolled past the shop a few minutes earlier.

Her eyes never left her iPad, an American dating show playing on the screen. “Selina, tell my brother he’s wrong.”

“You’re wrong,” I said, dusting off the postcard display, only half-listening to the siblings’ disagreement.

From time to time, particles of Sahara sand swept across the Atlantic Ocean, darkening the skies of the small Caribbean island of St. Virgil. It coated our land and our lungs and left a hazy, hazardous mess in the air. The sunsets were stunning, though, the skies streaked with brilliant reddish hues.

“Ha!” Allison said. “There. Selina knows.”

“Selina works for you,” Edward said dryly. “She’s not going to disagree with you while she’s on the clock.” He drew closer to me. “Besides, I know what I’m talking about. They mentioned it on the radio last night. Said it might last a few days.”

Allison tucked her long twisted locks behind her ear. “Who listens to radio anymore?”

“I did, last night.” He rested his chin on my shoulder. His warm, minty breath brushed against my cheek. “In the car. Selina can vouch for me.”

In my memory, the radio had been background noise. At the time, I’d been too distracted by the feel of his lips and his hands to listen to any reports, and honestly, I was a little offended to learn that he hadn’t been. But still, he wasn’t wrong. We’d been together last night, and for many of the nights before—a part of an unlabeled relationship that had bloomed between us over the past few months.

Edward wrapped his arms around my waist. I reached up to dust the highest row of postcards—scenes of Crimson Bay at sunset, an ibis bird perched in a frangipani tree, the mountains that stood like sentinels on the northern end of the island—all of them faded and yellowing with age. In the seven months I’d been working in the shop, we’d sold maybe three in total.

“Ew,” Allison said. “If you two start kissing in front of me, I will vomit.”

“We won’t,” I assured her.

Edward drew me even closer. “Well, let’s not completely close off the possibility.”

I pulled away to rearrange the carved figurines in the window—some were dancing, others playing drums or steel pans. Overhead, wooden and bamboo chimes hung from nails in the rafters. Over the past few weeks, Edward had become bolder with his public displays of affection, as if he no longer cared what people thought about our association. I found the notion as tantalizing as it was worrying.

Edward sighed dramatically. I continued to ignore him. He might have been pouting, but I knew he wasn’t actually offended.

Early in our relationship, I’d learned he enjoyed my seeming indifference. It was all part of my mystery, as he called it. Honestly, it was more like my weird, though he was too tactful to say that. Everyone on St. Virgil knew about my family, what my mother had done, and what had happened to my parents.

Edward, like his sister, had a slightly morbid streak—perhaps a result of a very comfortable life? Not that I’d ever be foolish enough to call him out or criticize him for it. Not when it was that same streak that attracted him to me in the first place. And I’d be a hypocrite if I denied that it was his distinct lack of weird that made me like him back. I’d had enough weird in my life already.

Besides, Edward was movie-star gorgeous, with luminous brown eyes and rich dark brown skin. Apparently, he’d liked me since we were in secondary school, him two years ahead. He said that’s why he used to tease me so much.

Even if he had made his crush obvious in the past, I wouldn’t have noticed. Yes, he was smart and charming, and the son of the revered chief of police—but none of that mattered. Back then, I’d only had eyes for one person, and it wasn’t him.

An argument broke out on Allison’s dating show. The shop filled with voices raised in anger, occasionally undercut by the sound of a bleep censor.

“Can’t you watch something with a bit more substance?” Edward asked, returning to the window. He’d studied filmmaking for only a year before dropping out to take a job at his mother’s real estate firm. And yet, he considered himself the local authority on all forms of visual entertainment media. “There’s so much better content to spend your time on.”

“How is this any different from those documentaries you’re obsessed with?” Allison pointed at her screen. “This is about real life, too. Except, you know, not boring.”

“No, documentaries are about finding and presenting the truth. The trash you’re watching—”

A thunderous hammering from next door cut him off. It rattled the walls and shook the glass windows.

“What the hell?” Allison rocked forward, raising her voice to complain over the noise. “Not again! It’s after six. The construction should be done for today.”

“It’s only five to six,” Edward interjected, but either Allison couldn’t hear or she didn’t want to listen.

“I’m sick and tired of it,” she said. “First, it was the bakery across the street, now it’s the jewelry store beside us. Here I am, just trying to watch this cinematic piece of art—”

“No,” Edward said.

“—without feeling like I’m being repeatedly punched in the ears.”

The hammering stopped.

“Thank you!” Allison said, when the silence persisted. Her chair creaked as she kicked back again. “I swear, if it’s not one thing—”

“Incoming!” Edward announced, sounding a little too excited.

“—it’s another.” Allison sucked her teeth. She paused her show.

“Tell me it’s not Miss Heather again. No way she burned through all that incense already. We’re almost out of stock.”

“No, it’s someone else.” Edward leaned closer to the window. “Older woman. White. A tourist, probably. I don’t recognize her.”

“Well, don’t stand there gawking at her.” Allison tucked the iPad under the counter. “That’s not a one-way mirror, you dodo. Your face will scare her off.”

Edward approached the counter, reached across, and swiped the nuts from her. “Better my gawking face than your ugly one.”

“Hey!” Allison tried to retrieve her snack from him.

Edward held on to the brown bag, twisting the top to seal it. He threw me a smirk and started to back away. The door opened, triggering the chime that hung over the top.

“Oh, thank you,” Edward said, clutching the bag to his chest like it was some great prize rather than an oversweetened street snack. He did this sometimes—pretended to be a customer, brimming with awe and gratefulness. No one asked for this performance, but he seemed to enjoy it.

“I can’t tell you what this means to me. I didn’t know what else to—Oh!” He backed right into the new customer, then made a show of recoiling in surprise, as if just noticing her for the first time. No doubt he’d formulated some story in his head. Perhaps he was pretending to be a farmer who needed a charm to cure blight, or a new homeowner who asked for a talisman for protection from evil jumbie spirits. A future Best Actor winner, he was not.

Thankfully, Edward did not stick around, promptly exiting the scene after chewing it up.

The newcomer paused in the center of the shop. She looked the way most people did when they came to us: Nervous. Suspicious. A little thrown by the innocuous decor. From the outside, our shop was no different from the eleven or so souvenir stores she’d have passed on her way here. But almost everyone who came to this shop came for a specific reason.

“Can we help you?” Allison asked not too kindly, when the silence stretched.

I continued to clean the other side of the room, sneaking glances at them from the corner of my eye.

“I’m . . . uh . . .” The woman hesitated. “I’m looking for someone. Someone who can . . . help me.”

“Are you sure you have the right place, ma’am?” Allison’s tone was dry. Dismissive. “They have an information booth on the port and a health center down the street. Maybe one of them can help you?”

The lady rocked back on her heels, indecisive. Allison’s tone was a bit rude, and there was always a chance the customer would leave, but we had a system. A routine. A show that had started the second she’d stepped inside the shop.

Step one: Establish an antagonist.

“I . . . I heard about you from Mikael,” the lady said, cautiously stepping forward. “He told me to give you some . . . password—some phrase—but I can’t remember it. Maybe you know him? He works as a waiter on my ship.”

Ah, Mikael. It had been a while since he’d sent someone our way. Not as prolific as some of our other referrers, but he had a talent for sniffing out the right kind of person to send.

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” Allison said, not sounding apologetic in the least. “I think you have the wrong place.” She left the counter, crossed the room, and pulled the front door open. The lady flinched as she passed.

“Gloriosa superba,” the lady blurted out, startling us and herself. “That’s it. That is what he said to tell you. Gloriosa superba.”

Allison’s eyes narrowed. She said nothing, the door still open.

Step two: Establish an ally.

“You heard her,” I said without turning to face them. “She said the magic words. She can stay.”

Allison waited a few beats, then appeared to reluctantly relent, shutting and locking the door. She turned the sign so that it read CLOSED to anyone passing by.

Want to read more? Rick Riordan Presents: It Waits in the Forest by Sarah Dass is on sale now!