UNWELCOME GUESTS: An atmospheric, suspenseful thriller

by Anna Willett

  The safest path would be out and around the back of Blyte’s vehicle. He’d be most vulnerable for the first five metres when he’d have to leave the cover of the bushes and dart across the grass. If he kept low and moved fast, there was little chance of being spotted.

  Jace pulled the car keys out of his pocket and gripped the clicker, he wanted to be ready when he reached the driver’s door. Poker in one hand, keys in the other, he bent his knees and shuffled out from the side of the house. The cold grass felt soothing on the soles of his feet. He edged out and slightly to the left, trying to get a look at the main entrance before he bolted.

  The front door was a dark smudge flanked by brickwork. Jace craned his neck but couldn’t make out a human shape near the entrance. He listened for voices but heard only the lone cry of an owl in the distant trees. Where were Eli and Cat? Surely they’d be calling to Blyte, trying to engage him with questions or demands.

  Jace swore under his breath. Something was wrong. They wouldn’t leave him hanging like this unless there was a problem. He could feel his pulse thumping in his ears. He thought of turning around and making his way back to the deck but then they’d be back where they started. Besides, he’d gotten the three of them into this mess in the first place. He thought of his brother. Jace had been so angry with him for what he was doing to Cat, it was tearing the brothers apart. Maybe if Jace stepped up for once and took responsibility, he could put things right. Then there was Cat. He couldn’t bear to see her so frightened. If anything happened to her… He couldn’t let himself go in that direction.

  There was no more time to waste, he broke from the cover of the house and made for the cars. He’d made it less than a metre when something crashed through the trees. Jace pivoted and tried to turn but his left foot, slippery with blood, slid at an awkward angle and he lost his balance. At the same time as his knee hit the grass, a blow to his back knocked the air out of his lungs and sent him crashing to the ground writhing in pain. He tried to catch his breath, but his chest refused to heave. He heard grunting from above him. Something thick and coarse slipped down over his face and drew tight around his throat. Panicked and desperate for air, Jace pushed up in an attempt to stand but a crushing weight dropped onto his back mashing his face into the grass. He bucked and then lay still.

  Chapter Eight

  “We’d better get this against the door.” Eli pressed his back to the fridge, knees bent. “Give me a hand?”

  Caitlin joined him, her arm touching his. When they were both in place, Eli nodded for her to push. The hulking appliance tipped, almost toppling over then thumped down. “Get lower.” Eli bent his knees. “Like this.”

  Both crouching like Sumo wrestlers, they used their legs and backs to force movement. Caitlin felt like her knees would give out under the strain as the fridge inched forward, casters tearing across the stone floor. She turned her head towards Eli. The tendons in his neck were straining against his skin as if they might push through. The appliance shuddered to a stop so suddenly, Caitlin’s feet slid out from under her.

  “You okay?” Eli offered her his hand. Her mind flashed back to the text message. You look otherworldly.

  “I’m fine.” She scrambled up ignoring his outstretched hand and brushing at her butt. “We should get to the front door, before Jace reaches the car.”

  Eli blocked her way. “Look, about what I said earlier… I didn’t mean to–”

  “You mean when you called me a slut?” She forced herself to meet his gaze.

  “That was wrong of me, I know. I can’t explain how it made me feel when I heard you talking to the doctor.” His eyes glistened as if fighting back tears. “But I thought you were…” He hesitated as if at a loss, not sure how to finish.

  “Perfect?” Caitlin spat out the word. It had taken all this time for her to realise what all this was about. Eli’s need for perfection. Perfection in how he wanted his possessions to be arranged. Everything had to be just so, even his wife. On some level, she’d always known she could never measure up to his standards, that’s why she’d eaten herself up trying to please him. But seeing the text message had changed everything. As much as his betrayal hurt, it also set her free.

  “I’m sorry I hurt you.” He looked down, defeated like a child who’d learned the tooth fairy’s not real.

  “We need to help Jace.” There was so much more she wanted to say, but what good would it do? Their marriage was over. Each time she told herself, turned the words over in her mind, a little more weight fell from her shoulders.

  “Yeah. Right.” He rolled his shoulders and when he looked up, the tears were gone. Or maybe they’d never been there. Maybe he felt as relieved as her.

  She followed him through to the sitting room, rubber-soled tennis shoes almost soundless on the stone floor. A quick glance towards the study confirmed the door was closed. She wondered if Felix was standing on the other side. The thought sent an icy shiver down her spine. What was it about the man that bothered her so much? The smell of him set her teeth on edge, but there was something else.

  “We should get ready.” Eli took up position behind the wooden cabinet and leaned towards the front door.

  Before climbing up on the stool, Caitlin raced over to the coffee table and grabbed the candle holder. She pulled the half-melted candle free and tossed it on the table. The weight of the tarnished candlestick felt good in her hand, solid.

  “Ready?” Eli whispered.

  Caitlin nodded and took her place on the stool. The plan was pretty straightforward, when Jace unlocked the car, the beep would alert Blyte. At the same time, Caitlin and Eli would try and distract the man by turning the lights on and off and smashing a window. In the confusion, Jace would have the few seconds he needed to jump in the car and get going. At least that’s how they hoped it would work. But first, they had to keep Blyte talking until Jace reached the car.

  “Blyte?” Eli raised his voice. “Blyte?”

  Caitlin pressed her hands to the glass and peered out. The night was impossibly dark, as if the house was no longer on the edge of the Myalup Forest but floating in deep space. She took a tremulous breath and forced herself to focus on the window. As her eyes adjusted to the dimness, she was able to see the outlines of the vehicles and bushes. Last time she’d looked out, Blyte’s shoulder and arm were partially visible but now he was nowhere in sight.

  “I can’t see him,” she kept her voice low, fighting the panic that threatened to swamp her.

  “Blyte, are you out there? Blyte, I need to talk to you.” Eli’s voice was louder now, almost shouting. “Blyte?”

  “He’s not there.”

  Caitlin kept her face glued to the glass. “I can’t see him anywhere. What do we do?”

  “Shit.” She heard her husband cursing and felt a flicker of anger.

  “We need to do something. We can’t just leave him out there.” Caitlin dragged her gaze away from the window. They had to act quickly, there was no time for standing around.

  The first thing she noticed was the look on Eli’s face—fear mixed with shock. It was only then she noticed Felix. For a split second, she felt only confusion. Then the scene came together in stark detail. Felix had the gun in his hand and was pointing it at her husband.

  “Get down.” He spoke to her out of the side of his swollen mouth, keeping his eyes on Eli.

  From where she stood on the stool, a circular bald spot on the top of Felix’s head was clearly visible. For some reason, her eyes were drawn to the shiny pate and the way the light reflected making it seem like he had something oily on his scalp.

  “Don’t make me ask again.” His voice, harsh and cold got her moving.

  Caitlin made her way off the stool and onto the floor still clutching the candlestick. Her mind tried to make sense of what was happening. A few hours ago, they’d been having a barbeque and now they were prisoners in an isolated house with a guy holding a gun at them.

  “Put that down and come over here.” Felix jerke
d his chin towards Caitlin. It took her a second to process what he was telling her. She looked at the candlestick in her hand and realised he saw it as a potential weapon. She almost laughed but managed to clamp her mouth shut before the sound broke free.

  Caitlin placed the candlestick on the stool and walked over to her husband. Her legs felt numb, as if she’d been sitting on them. For one horrifying second, she thought they’d collapse under her and she’d hit the floor. What then? Would he shoot her? The questions turned over in her head, one for each step she took. Eli’s face floated ahead of her, pale and strained as he watched her progress.

  The last time she remembered seeing the gun was in the kitchen. Eli put it on the island bench while they were talking. He must have left it there when they came through to the sitting room. Had Felix been waiting for a chance to get his hands on the weapon?

  She stood beside her husband, her shoulder touching his arm just as it had only minutes ago when they were moving the fridge. Something touched her fingers. She almost gasped, but realised Eli was holding her hand. His breathing seemed too loud, she wanted to tell him to take deep breaths but all she could focus on was the black circle pointed towards them. The barrel of the gun trained on her like a dark empty eye.

  “Don’t do anything crazy,” Eli’s voice sounded hollow as if he spoke into the wind. “We’re the ones trying to help you.”

  Felix’s puffy face, one eye obscured by swelling, stretched into a lop-sided grin. One of his front teeth had been broken leaving a jagged line of white, stark against the dried blood on his lips. “By driving off and leaving me here.”

  “We were going to get help.” Eli’s hand felt slippery with sweat. “Look, you have to understand. We have no idea what’s going on here, we just wanted to get help.” Caitlin squeezed his fingers willing him to stop talking. Nothing he could say would make the man understand their reasoning. He was enjoying watching them squirm.

  “Good idea. Only I’ll go and you can wait here.” The smile on Felix’s face slipped away turning his features into a mask of bruised indifference.

  When the gun fired, Caitlin heard an explosion of sound as if it came from inside her head and thumped the back of her ear drums. The roar seemed to go on and on, bouncing off the walls and blocking out every other noise. A blast of warm air hit her in the chest like a tepid snowball.

  She blinked in flashes of colour and faces. It wasn’t until the ringing blast faded that she realised she was screaming and there was blood streaming down her arm.

  Chapter Nine

  Jace stopped struggling. The sour taste of damp grass filled his mouth as the rope tightened around his neck. The weight on his back increased until he thought his shoulders would break under the load. With each breath, his lungs shuddered.

  “I’m going to let you turn over, but if you try to run, you’ll choke yourself.” The voice was familiar, deep and gruff. “Nod if you understand.”

  Jace moved his chin, as close as he could come to nodding with his face mashed into the ground.

  “Okay. When I say move, you turn.” The rope tightened, bunching the skin against Jace’s Adam’s apple. “If you hear me, you better start nodding.”

  The increased pressure made it almost impossible to move, but Jace pulled in a breath and managed to jerk his head. The movement must have been enough because almost immediately the rope loosened a fraction allowing him room to swallow. The weight on his back shifted and then eased.

  “Okay. Turn.”

  Jace did as the voice ordered and flopped over onto his back. Without the grass clogging his mouth, he was free to breathe in the night air. As his lungs filled, he tried to blink away the tears that filled his eyes. Stars wavered and then came into focus.

  To his right, a narrow pool of bluish white light. He shifted his elbows trying to raise his head. “Slowly.” The voice, definitely Blyte’s, came from the same direction as the light.

  With the rope still looped around his neck, it was impossible for Jace to move any other way but slowly. Pushing his forearms flat against the ground, he lifted his upper body into a sitting position. As his head came up, the pressure on the noose increased.

  “Now.” Blyte spoke from behind the light obscuring his face and body. “Tell me what the hell you’re doing in my house.”

  Two lengths of striped rope, possibly used for abseiling, ran from the noose. One trailed over his shoulder and ran towards the trees, the other ran into the light. Judging by the tautness and the direction of Blyte’s voice, Jace guessed the man held the end of the second line, pulling it tight or letting it loose when he wanted Jace to move.

  Jace ran his fingers around the noose, pulling it forward slightly. As he did so, the pressure increased. “Stop fucking about and answer the question.”

  “I–” Jace’s throat contracted. He hacked out a coughing breath and tried again. “I worked on your deck… With Lowman’s Construction.” The back of his throat burned as if he’d swallowed gravel. “I copied the key and brought my brother and his wife here for the weekend.” In the darkness, he could feel his face burn with shame. He’d never stolen anything in his life, but now the words were out, he felt like a petty criminal. “I told them you were a mate of mine. None of this is their fault.”

  Jace waited, the hiss of insects sounded louder as if they were crowding in. “What’s your name?”

  “Jace. Jace Frost.” He stared into the light but could only make out a dark form.

  “Well, Jace, it doesn’t matter whose fault this is. You and your family have wandered into a shit storm. The question is, what are we going to do about it?”

  Jace’s mind tried to fathom what Blyte was asking. If the man wanted him dead, he could have killed him by now. Maybe he could talk his way out of the mess he’d gotten everyone into; it was worth a chance.

  “Look, we don’t care what’s going on here. Just let us leave and we won’t say anything.” He reached for something convincing. “I’ve broken the law by using your house. I’d be dropping myself in it if I went to the cops.” His voice rasped as if he had a handful of dirt in his throat.

  “I’d like to believe that, Jace. I really would, but I’ve worked on this too long and hard to have it fall apart now.”

  Jace felt his stomach clench. What did Blyte mean? Surely he wouldn’t kill the three of them in cold blood. He searched for something to say that might convince the man to let them go, but his mind raced and all he could see was Felix’s bruised and battered face. He’d seen what Blyte was capable of, would murder be a stretch for a man like him?

  “Please, my brother and his wife have done nothing wrong. Don’t hurt them, I’m begging you.” Jace stared into the light, arms out, palms up.

  “What do you think I am?” Blyte no longer sounded calm. “I’m not a murderer.”

  Jace felt a rush of relief. “Thank you. I promise we won’t tell anyone what you’re doing here.”

  “I can’t let you leave.”

  “What? But you just said–”

  “I’m not a murderer, but you and your family can’t leave, not yet. I don’t want to have to hurt you, but if you try to get away…” Blyte let out a tired breath. “I’ll take whatever measure I feel necessary to stop you.”

  Jace shook his head. The rope burned into his skin making it difficult for him to focus and think clearly. He tried swallowing, the soft flesh in the back of his throat felt scarred and dry. He needed water, something to sooth the burning. He tried to ignore the pain and concentrate on what the man was saying. Something about not letting them go, yet.

  “You said not yet… and earlier, you mentioned someone named Amy.” He saw Blyte’s shape move behind the light. He had his attention, maybe he was on to something. “Is this about a woman? Is that why you locked Felix in the cellar, because of a woman?”

  Blyte’s voice, when he answered was quieter. “She wasn’t a woman. She was my thirteen-year-old sister.” He hesitated. “Felix Holly abducted and murdered her
fifteen years ago.”

  The words hit Jace like a physical blow. If what Blyte said was true, Eli and Cat were locked in the house with a killer. No, he corrected himself. A child killer.

  “I’m sorry.” It sounded lame but Jace didn’t know what else to say. “If he did that, what you said–”

  “Murdered my little sister?” Blyte’s voice cracked. “He did, only the cops could never prove anything.”

  “So you brought him here to kill him?” Jace shifted his butt, moving a few centimetres closer to Blyte. In doing so, the rope slackened giving him a little more breathing room.

  “I told you, I’m not a killer… I just want to know where she is so we can give her a proper burial. My mother’s dying.” Jace could hear the emotion in the man’s voice. The light moved, Jace heard rustling. A lighter flared and for a second, he got a glimpse of Blyte’s face, prominent jaw, and deep-set eyes. He lit a cigarette and then extinguished the flame. “She’s got a couple of months at best. I want her to be able to bury her daughter before…” His words trailed off.

  “So you were beating the answers out of him?” Jace finished for him. “Is that it?”

  “Yep.” The tip of the cigarette glowed red in the blackness.

  Jace watched the light glowing, moving occasionally from Blyte’s mouth to his hand. Felix’s story was very different to Blyte’s, yet Jace had no doubt Micky Blyte was telling the truth. Or what he believed to be the truth.

  Jace opened his mouth to ask, what now? A thunderous crack pierced the night, silencing the clatter of insects and sending sleeping birds screeching from the surrounding trees. It took him a few seconds to understand what was happening. A gunshot, fired inside the house.

  Chapter Ten

  Fingers still wrapped around Caitlin’s hand, Eli’s weight sank pulling her down with him. He met the floor with a muffled thump. Then came a crack as his head hit stone. Caitlin sprawled over her husband, sounds were coming out of her mouth but she had no awareness of what she was saying. There was so much blood and the smell mingled with spent gunpowder filled her nose.