“Sorry,” I whisper. “And did you see that? Jack didn’t want us to leave!”
“Jack didn’t want you to leave,” Cohen says, looking grumpy. “He doesn’t care about me. I don’t need to be here.”
“Oh, no,” I say, putting as much threat and warning into my voice as I can. “You’re not leaving me here. Absolutely not.”
Cohen groans. “I don’t want to do the dumb haunted house, Mina.”
“You don’t like scary,” I say, feeling oddly triumphant at my deduction.
“What?” he says. His look of incredulity is unconvincing. “I’m not scared. I just don’t want to go.”
“Because it’s scary,” I say, nodding.
He stares at the ground and shuffles his feet. His eyes dart up to mine and then back down again. “Because it’s scary,” he says, his voice such a mumble that I almost don’t hear it.
“I knew it,” I say, grinning. “Do all your friends know you shudder when someone mentions scary movies?”
“No,” he says. “And you can’t tell them.”
“I wouldn’t tell them,” I say, rolling my eyes. “But it’s not a big deal.”
“You are incorrect,” he says. “It would be basis for mocking.”
I shrug. “Well, are you going to come or not? If you leave, I’m leaving with you. So if you want that on your conscience…”
“I’ll come,” he says. “But you owe me.”
“I owe you,” I say, nodding. “Because Jack was sort of flirting, right? He was sort of looking at me and stuff?”
“Yep,” Cohen says, his voice fake-casual again.
Interesting.
“Coming?” Jack yells over his shoulder to us, and we speed up. Cohen still looks a little pale.
“I bet Virginia would be willing to hold your hand if you—”
“Shut up,” Cohen says, but he smiles.
Well, that’s better. His hands are still shoved deep in his pockets, but a smile is a step in the right direction.
“This doesn’t look like a house,” I say with a frown as we approach the building.
We’re close enough that the others can hear me when I speak, and Virginia turns around.
“It’s not a house,” she says, her voice sweet, which catches me off guard. “It’s an old asylum.” Then her eyes do that little dagger thing they do so well.
I gulp. “Like…an insane asylum?”
“Yeah,” Jack says, grinning over his shoulder. “Cool, right?”
No. Not cool. Not cool at all. Suddenly I’m with Cohen; we don’t need to be here for this.
“You know what?” I whisper to him as we walk up the long stone steps leading to the large front doors, and he leans down slightly to hear me. It always makes me feel short when he does that. “You’re right. We can go.”
“Nope,” he says, his voice dry. “We’re here now; we’re about to go in. It’s too late. And look—Jack is holding the door open for you. How sweet.”
His voice is faintly mocking, which I don’t at all appreciate. “I could use a little less of the attitude,” I say, but he just grins.
“I’m terribly sorry,” he says over my shoulder as I walk past Jack—who is indeed holding the door open for me—and into the asylum.
16
Cohen
I’m not sure it’s good for my body to spend this long in fight-or-flight mode, but it doesn’t show signs of calming down any time soon.
This asylum place is straight out of a horror movie. Any second now something truly creepy is going to happen. I’m just waiting.
Mina has her nose buried in a pamphlet they handed us when we got inside. She might be staring at the pamphlet so she doesn’t see anything else. Apparently this place was a real asylum once, which makes it a billion times scarier. There are broken pieces of wood all over the place, graffiti on the walls, wheelchairs in the corners every now and then…
It’s not that I’m scared. I just…don’t like scary things.
“Hey,” Mina says, nudging me with her elbow. “This says there’s a hidden room in here somewhere.”
I swing my gaze down to look at her and frown. “A hidden room? In an asylum?”
She nods, still staring at the pamphlet. “That’s what it says.”
“Doesn’t that seem like a bad idea?”
She smiles up at me. “It does.”
I smile back, partly just because she looks so silly in that costume that it’s hard not to laugh. Somehow it’s cute on her instead of ridiculous.
Jack clearly thinks so too. He’s a bit ahead of us, walking with Virginia, but he looks back frequently, and I know it’s not me he’s checking on.
We pass through a small room with peeling paint on the walls and some old pipes on the wall. There’s a nasty-looking bathtub in the middle; it’s rusted and ancient. A chill runs down my spine when I see that there are chains with cuffs attached to the floor next to it—like they had to keep people restrained in the tub.
I regret coming here. I regret it deep down in my soul. I don’t need this in my life right now.
Virginia stops next to the tub, and Jack stops with her. I stand back, well away from them, and Mina does the same, which makes me feel a little better.
But then Jack yelps, and Virginia gives a loud shriek, and before the rational part of my brain can talk me out of it, I’m right there at the tub with them.
There’s water coming out of the faucet. Except…it’s red.
“Nope,” Mina says behind me. “Nope. I’m out.” She shuffles into the next room—which I can only assume has to be better than this one—and I follow quickly. I don’t mean to use her as an excuse to get away from the bathtub, but I’m not upset about the opportunity.
“Ugh. This is worse,” she says, turning her whole body to face me. I let my eyes sweep the room. I have to agree with her. There’s something shadowy in the far corner, and every inch of the walls is covered in writing. Big, frantic letters that, when I squint my eyes to read the wall nearest me, seem to be detailing some sort of internal dialogue.
Mina drops her voice to a whisper, and I have to lean in to hear her. “Is that a bed down there?” she says, jerking her head in the direction of the shadowy corner.
I lean closer without meaning to. It puts me in mind of what happened in the corn maze, and I push that away and lean back immediately. “Go check,” I say.
“No way. You go,” she says, giving my leg a little kick. “Be the big, strong man. This is your job.”
“Absolutely not. You go. You owe me.”
She raises one eyebrow. “Really? This is how you want to cash that in?”
Good point. “Let’s leave it and look for the hidden room instead,” I say. I turn my back on the corner with the possible bed. There are probably chains next to it, and that freaks me out.
Mina’s eyes light up. “Really?”
I shrug. “Sure. What else are we going to do? Actually look at the scary things?”
“True,” she says, voice musing. She traces one finger absently over her bottom lip, and I watch her. “We could shut Virginia inside,” she says.
My eyes go back to hers as I laugh. “There’s a thought. So, you’re the smart one—how do we find a secret room?”
“Not sure,” she says. She looks through the doorway at the others, who are still standing around the bathtub. “We might have missed it already.”
We search the next two rooms with increasingly devoted effort. It’s easier to ignore things like creepy, boarded-up windows and open wardrobes full of blood-spattered dresses when you’re focusing on something else.
The third room we look in looks like a little study, except that it’s all wrong. When I think of studies, I picture dark wood and leather chairs and floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. Maybe a painting of dogs playing cards and the smell of tobacco. This room has none of that, but there is a desk, a chair, and a single bookshelf against the opposite wall.
I look at Mina at the same time
as she looks at me. Our expressions both say the same thing: we have to check the bookshelf.
Behind a bookshelf is the number-one place to hide a secret room. Everyone knows that.
We rush to it, and I pointedly ignore what look to be animal bones on the floor. Man, this place is disgusting. When we reach the bookshelf, I begin scanning all the pictures and trinkets it holds. There’s a vase, which I pick up and give a little rattle. There’s nothing inside, and it’s not connected to the shelf at all.
Mina, on the other hand, tilts her head and begins scanning the books. I’m just reaching for a small picture frame when she says,
“Ah-ha. Here.” She points at a large red book, and I tilt my head to read the title.
Secrets.
“Yep,” I say with a wry grin. “Not very subtle, are they?”
“This might not even be it,” she says with a glance at me, but her face is shining with excitement.
“Pull on it,” I say, shoving my hands in my pockets. I try to stamp down a wave of nervousness. But can I be blamed for being apprehensive about a secret room in an old asylum?
Mina gives the book a tug, and it slides out—partly. She tugs a bit harder until there’s a loud click.
The bookcase in front of us swings open to reveal a small room.
“Whoa,” Mina says, sounding awed.
I shake my head. “That is truly horrific.”
“Yeah,” Mina says. “It really is.” She sounds part intrigued, part disturbed.
There’s a bed in one corner of the tiny room. It’s little more than a metal frame and a thin mattress. But there are chains attached to it, and there’s a large, dark stain on the mattress that looks suspiciously like blood. There’s more writing on the walls, too. This time I don’t read it. I don’t want to know what it says.
The others trail into the study, and Grant and Jack exclaim loudly. Their exuberance feels out of place in someplace as creepy as this, but I don’t say anything. I look at Virginia. She has one perfect eyebrow raised with disdain.
“That’s it?” she says. “That’s the room?”
Mina shrugs, barely paying attention. “I think it’s cool. I mean, horrible. But cool.”
Virginia scoffs loudly. “You would, Wet Willy.”
I feel irritation course through me. “Back off, Virginia.”
I watch Jack’s head swing back and forth between Virginia and me, his face apprehensive. Is he not going to say anything?
“Are you serious?” Virginia says, looking incredulously at me.
“I really am,” I say, grinding my teeth together.
Virginia walks up behind Mina, who’s still staring into the room.
“Go use your weird eyes to look inside,” Virginia says over Mina’s shoulder, and Mina looks back at her with a frown.
“No way,” she says, just as I’m about to tell Virginia off for being a brat.
“Just go look!” Virginia says again. “Make sure there’s nothing too creepy.” She gives Mina a little nudge. Mina stumbles forward and to the floor into the hidden room, and I frown. I follow her, intending to help her to her feet, but instead I whirl around when I see darkness overtaking us.
The last thing I see is the bookcase swinging shut behind us, trapping us in the hidden room.
17
Cohen
I let out a curse that my mother would have something to say about. I feel at the walls and find a light switch, but when I flick it, nothing happens.
“What a—” Mina, possessing more self-restraint than I do, breaks off. “You saw that, right?” she says, sounding furious—understandably so. “She shut me in here. You saw, didn’t you?”
“I saw,” I say, frowning grimly. I run my finger over my scar, thinking. Getting in was all well and good, but how do we get out? I am not spending the night stuck in a hidden room of an abandoned insane asylum. It’s just not happening. Especially when that room contains a blood-stained bed.
I run my fingers carefully over the hidden door that’s just closed behind us, but it’s no use in the dark. This stupid bookcase could have any number of trigger mechanisms in any number of places. I pull my phone out of my back pocket, intending to just call Jack and have him come get us out, but I don’t have any service.
“I already checked,” Mina says in the darkness. “No bars.”
“Jack!” I call, pounding on the door.
Jack’s muffled response comes immediately. “It’s jammed, man! We’re going to find someone.”
I turn on the phone’s flashlight instead. “Hold this right here,” I say to Mina. I need to hurry; I forgot to charge my phone after school, so it’s almost dead.
Mina takes my phone and holds it up so I can see what I’m doing. The bookcase is dusty; faint cobwebs clutter a few of the shelf corners. Clearly no one has found the hidden room in a very long time.
I wish we hadn’t found the hidden room.
And “room” is a pretty generous word. I would say “closet.”
“Why would they put this here?” Mina’s voice floats over my shoulder. “Do you think they added this later, when they turned it into a haunted house or whatever? Did they have concealed doors back in the day?”
“They probably did,” I mutter, running my fingers over the tops of the books on the top shelf. “Hidden rooms have been around basically forever—priests in England used to hide in priest holes in the 1500s when Catholics were persecuted. But I don’t know why there would be one here.”
“Huh,” Mina says, sounding interested. “I actually didn’t know that. It makes sense, now that I think about it. People used fake rooms in the Holocaust and all that.”
“Yeah. I watched a documentary about it,” I say, feeling the books on the middle shelf now. Nothing so far.
“Interesting,” she says. She pauses. “Why don’t you just try taking the books off the shelf? That would probably go faster. I’m concerned we’re going to die in here.”
I laugh. “I don’t think it will come to that.” She’s right about the books, though. I start pulling them off the shelves and stacking them haphazardly on the floor.
The light swings off of the shelves in front of me and goes to the stacks I’m making. “I need that back,” I say.
“I just wanted to make sure you were stacking them,” Mina says.
I stop and look over my shoulder at her, even though I can only vaguely see her. “That matters?”
“Of course it does,” she says, and I can tell she’s looking at me like I’m an idiot. “Old books are fragile. You have to treat them with care.”
I just shake my head and go back to my task. “They’re probably not that old.”
“I’ll still feel better if you stack them,” she says.
I can’t help my smile. “I’m stacking them.” I pause, and then I say, “I’m sorry. About this whole thing. We shouldn’t have come.” I pause again, and then I go on. “Virginia really doesn’t like you. I mean, there are people she doesn’t like, but…she’s actively mean to you. Has she always been this way to you?”
“She’s always been mean, but not like this,” Mina says. “She’s just jealous.” Her voice is soft, and she sounds hurt, but she still speaks rationally. “You’re spending time with me. When female devils perceive a threat to their territories, they bare their fangs to ward off anyone encroaching.”
I burst out laughing, and it takes me a minute to stop. This tiny room and its greedy darkness seem to eat up the sound. When I finally catch my breath, I say, “But you and I aren’t—you know. Together.”
I picture Mina shrugging. “Virginia doesn’t know that. All she sees is us suddenly spending time together. She’s threatened.”
“And is therefore baring her fangs to ward you off.”
“Exactly,” Mina says. She’s quiet for a second, and then she says, “I keep hoping that maybe she has a terrible home life or something. Something that explains why she is the way she is. There has to be something. I’m ju
st not sure why she’s so set on you. I mean, you’re cute, but you aren’t very good at puns.”
“Hey,” I protest, trying not to laugh. “I happen to be great at—”
I break off when I hear a sniggering noise coming from her. I grab my phone from her hand and turn the flashlight on her, and sure enough, she’s got one hand clamped over her mouth as she laughs. I purposely keep my eyes on her and ignore the bed illuminated in the back of the room.
“You’re so funny,” I say, grinning. “Really funny. Just hilarious.”
“I’m just kidding,” she says, her smile wide, and she rests her hand on my arm. “I’m sure you’re great at all kinds of jokes.” The light of my phone casts long shadows over her face.
“Yeah, yeah,” I say, still smiling. But my smile fades slightly as I say, “Virginia always wants to be the best. She wants to be the prettiest, the most desired.”
“Like I said,” Mina says. “She feels threatened.”
“Her mom has been through four husbands,” I say, pausing to think. Then I shrug. “Maybe she’s just always been shown that being pretty and having guys swarming around is the way to show how impressive she is or something. Can you put the light back on the bookshelf?” I hand her the phone again.
When I get all the books off the shelves—stacked, like someone insists—I eye the empty bookcase. “What now?” I say. “It’s just a bookcase.”
“Now we look—” she begins, but the light of my phone dims and then flickers. One second later, the light disappears completely. “Or not,” she mutters.
I sigh as I feel the darkness settle around me. I’m not worried for our safety; not really. As mean as Virginia might be, she’s not going to just leave us here forever. And we have Mina’s phone; we’ll keep feeling for hidden triggers or handles.
In just a second.
Because something about the darkness makes me tired in a way that has little to do with lack of sleep—I feel heavy. I turn around and feel blindly for the wall that I know is right behind me. When my hands hit the cool concrete, I place my back to it and slide slowly to the floor.
Eye of the Beholder (Stone Springs Book 1) Page 13