Jeb looked surprised to see us. “Leaving so soon?”
“One of your customers wasn’t pleased to see me,” Nolan said.
Jeb smacked his forehead with the heel of his hand. “Oh man,” he said softly. “I’m sorry about that. She’s been camped out for so long that I forgot she was back there. Otherwise I would have warned you.”
“No worries,” Nolan assured him. “We all need people like Maisie to keep us on our toes.”
I led the way to the café door, and outside Nolan and I walked side by side through a tunnel that had just been cleared by a kid with a snowblower. “So how long have you and Maisie been sworn enemies?” I asked.
Nolan found the question amusing. He seemed to find the humor in pretty much everything. I wondered if he took anything seriously. “Since she moved into the house next door a couple of years ago.”
I remembered seeing him down by the water the day I met Maisie. “So you two are neighbors. That must be awkward.”
“For her, maybe,” Nolan said, as if he couldn’t summon the energy to care. “Maisie hates me, not the other way around. I don’t know what I ever did to her, but she’s had it in for me since day one. If anything, I feel sorry for the girl. Her home life is seriously screwed up. How did you meet her, anyway?”
“She introduced herself to me at the café yesterday. We talked about Lark. I think Maisie is still pretty upset about what happened to her.”
“We all are,” Nolan said.
“You knew her, too?” I asked, surprised.
“Lark was one of the few people in Louth who was always nice to me,” Nolan said. “I thought she was smart and interesting. We hung out a few times. I guess you could say we were friends.”
“I know Lark is in an institution now, but Maisie told me that she was totally sane before the fire. Sam Reinhart said pretty much the same thing. What do you think?” I worried Nolan might feel like I was interrogating him, but I couldn’t stop myself.
Nolan shrugged. “I’m not a psychiatrist,” he said. “And I hate to gossip. I’m too used to being the one they all talk about. I never questioned Lark’s sanity for a second. But there is something I can show you if you don’t mind walking a little bit farther. It might explain why some people are so willing to believe she had problems.”
“Okay,” I agreed. It didn’t matter how cold it was. I would have trekked across the north pole in pursuit of more information about Lark. I hesitated only once—when we reached the edge of town. The pavement turned to gravel, and the trees leaned together over the road, blocking sight of the sky.
“Don’t worry.” Nolan said, seeming to sense my discomfort. “It’s only a short walk from here.”
Inside my coat pocket, my thumb worried the box cutter’s button. I’d come to Louth for a reason, I reminded myself. I couldn’t run the second I got scared. As we walked down the lonely road, all I could hear was the sound of our boots on the snow-covered gravel. Aside from tire tracks, there were no signs of civilization. I felt the familiar panic ignite inside my chest. I knew it would be my fault if something happened. I’d accepted the risk, hoping there would be a reward.
Then suddenly Nolan stopped. We were standing at the top of a driveway that ended with a gate fastened with at least ten padlocks. A giant red No Trespassing sign was fixed to the front of the gate. Along the drive, every tree for as far as I could see had at least one warning sign nailed to its trunk. trespassers will be shot! private property! keep out! i own a gun and a backhoe! if you can read this, you’re in range! i shoot first and ask questions later!
There were at least a hundred signs, some red and some yellow.
“What the hell are we looking at?” I asked, even more on edge.
“This is the entrance to Ruben Bellinger’s farm. This is where Lark’s father lives.”
It was hard to wrap my head around. Lark’s father. “Here? This is the place where Lark was staying at the time of the fire?”
“Yep. What do you think?” Nolan replied, contemplating the scene.
It made no difference what words had been printed on each of the signs. They all screamed the same thing in unison. The person who’d posted them to the trees was not well.
“Mr. Bellinger doesn’t seem interested in making new friends.” I tried to sound diplomatic. “If I had to make a diagnosis, I’d say he’s a little bit paranoid.”
“A bit?” Nolan smirked. “The signs have been up for ages, but Lark told me her dad wasn’t always this way. Then when she was in fourth or fifth grade, Ruben stopped taking his medication and his problems got worse. Her mom tried to stick it out, but she ended up leaving Ruben a couple years later. She and Lark moved across the river to Hudson. That’s where they were living when Dahlia met your uncle. Apparently, Ruben wasn’t happy about the marriage. He was still obsessed with his ex-wife.”
“How do you know all that?” I asked.
“Your uncle told my dad,” Nolan said. “James claims Ruben used to watch the manor at night. I guess that was the reason why James put new locks on all the doors. I don’t know if it’s true, but if it is, it’s creepy as hell, don’t you think?”
Before I could answer, I heard a sound somewhere deep in the woods. “Did you hear that?” I asked Nolan.
“Hear what?”
Until that moment, I’d never heard a shotgun cocked in real life, but the sound was unmistakable. Someone with a gun was lurking among the trees.
“I should get back to the manor,” I told Nolan. I didn’t give him a reason, but I figured it was best to hit the road before Ruben Bellinger put two bullets into our backs. Maisie hadn’t been joking. Louth was a dangerous place.
“Want to take a shortcut?” Nolan asked. “We’re actually not that far from the manor. If we walk through the woods, we could be back in ten minutes.”
I didn’t know him well enough to tell if he was joking. “Have you lost your mind?” I pointed at one of the Keep Out signs.
“Nope,” Nolan said with a laugh. “Just making sure you haven’t, either.”
* * *
—
When we finally crested the top of the manor’s hill, I could see James standing in the driveway with Gavin Turner. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but I saw my uncle’s jaw clench as he listened to Nolan’s father. They were arguing. That much was certain. I got the impression that their business relationship wasn’t quite as rosy as Nolan had made it seem. Then James spotted the two of us coming up the drive. As he waved, a smile took the place of his frown.
“I enjoyed our walk,” Nolan said while we were still out of earshot. “Let’s take another one sometime soon.”
I couldn’t read his face. There was no knowing look in his eye, no smile lifting the edge of his lips.
“I should warn you—I don’t date,” I informed him.
Nolan grinned, and I realized I’d been too quick with my answer. “Okay, good to know. But you do walk, am I right?”
I felt myself blushing. I’d been silly to jump to conclusions. “Of course,” I said. “Another walk would be nice.”
“Great! There’s a place up in the mountains I’d love to show you sometime.”
“Sounds good.” I was so embarrassed that I probably would have agreed to anything when I should have just said no.
* * *
—
A few minutes later, I was standing beside James, waving at the back of the Turners’ SUV. The instant it disappeared, my uncle slid an arm around my shoulder and squeezed.
“Did everything go okay with Nolan?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “He’s not too bad.”
“I’m sorry if you thought I was being too protective before. I didn’t know if you were comfortable spending time with young men yet. I wasn’t expecting Nolan to join us this morning, and I didn’t
want you to feel pressured to entertain him.”
My uncle’s concern made me uncomfortable. I wasn’t used to people worrying about my feelings. “It’s fine. We had a nice walk,” I answered.
That’s when James’s voice changed. “The truth is, Bram, I don’t know Nolan very well and I can’t vouch for him. It’s not been very long since the…incident. I don’t want anything to happen that might impact your recovery.”
I squirmed with discomfort. He was edging near the one subject I didn’t care to discuss. “Nolan and I just went for a walk,” I said. “It wasn’t a date.”
“He seemed quite taken with you,” James pressed.
“I’m not interested in Nolan,” I told him. “I have no intention of dating anyone.”
My uncle squeezed my shoulder. “I’m glad to hear it, Bram,” he said. He seemed pleased. “I really do think it’s for the best for the time being.”
Something inside me shifted, and I felt the anger rising. When did you decide to care? I wanted to ask him. Why weren’t you there when I really needed you? Why didn’t you save me before it was too late? But I didn’t say anything. Instead I swallowed my words, as I’d always done. I felt them melt back into the molten pit inside me that had been churning and bubbling for five long years, waiting for the right time to explode.
I went upstairs and took a cold shower. Then I stayed in the rose room for the rest of the day. I did what I could to keep it together. The right time was close, but it hadn’t yet come.
In my dream, the whisper was soft and cajoling—the kind you’d offer a whimpering pet or a crying child. Lips brushed against my ear, and feverish breath scalded the side of my face. I couldn’t see a thing. I felt a flaming hot hand on my thigh. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t call out for help. Something was horribly wrong with my voice.
Then I found it. I sat up, wide awake, and screamed until my throat was raw.
“Bram! Bram!” The bed bounced as someone plopped down onto the mattress. An arm curled around my shoulders and shook me until I recovered my senses. I could feel Miriam’s heart pounding inside her chest. She was panting as though she’d sprinted all the way to my room.
“Sorry,” I croaked.
“Sweetheart, it’s okay.” Then she leaned closer to my ear. “What happened? Did something scare you?”
I shook my head to spare my voice. I wasn’t scared. I was sorry for dragging her out of bed in the middle of the night.
“I think she’s going to be okay,” Miriam assured someone.
I looked up to see James standing in the doorway, swathed in the pajamas of the bigger man he’d once been. He knew what he’d heard. I hadn’t been screaming in fear. Rage sounds different. I know my mother must have warned him it would happen, but I could tell by the look on his face that he wasn’t prepared. He thought I was crazy.
“Was it a bad dream?” Miriam asked me.
It had all the elements of a bad dream. Monsters. Terror. Darkness. But it was more than a dream. It was a memory—one that had lodged itself in the back of my head.
I cleared my throat. “You guys can go back to sleep,” I told them both. “I’ll be fine. I have the same dream all the time. It’s nothing new.”
“You’re sure? You’re as red as a beet,” Miriam said, though she was looking at James, not me.
“Positive,” I said, swinging my legs over to the other side of the mattress and standing up. “I’ll go splash some cold water on my face.” I walked to the bathroom and paused at the door. Neither Miriam nor my uncle had budged. “Thank you,” I said firmly. “You can both go.” I waited until Miriam crossed the room and James stepped aside to let her out. Then the door closed behind them. James hadn’t said a single thing.
I stood in front of the bathroom sink with the water running. My face was still a deep red—like that of a newborn baby who’s just discovered her lungs. That’s what the dream felt like. A shock, followed by terror. And then finally, freedom.
When I returned to the rose room, the door was standing wide open. The only light in the room came from the embers glowing in the fireplace. I was sure James had closed the door when he’d left with Miriam, but I hadn’t had a chance to lock it. Now the empty doorframe stood like a portal to a darker place. I could sense someone there, standing just out of sight. Whoever it was had been summoned by my screams.
This time, I didn’t run or slam the door shut. I wasn’t going to hide anymore.
“Hello?” I said, careful to keep my voice low. “Who’s there?”
I waited for an answer. Then the outline of a girl appeared in the doorway. She was small—almost dainty. While her face stayed in the shadows, her satin dress glowed faintly. It was drab and dingy, no longer white. The skirt appeared sodden and the hem had ripped. Clutching the fabric were pale hands with long, thin fingers.
I hadn’t touched drugs in a year, and I’d been so sure of my sanity. Now I was seeing something I knew couldn’t exist. Ghosts lived in people’s heads, not in their houses. My own skull was full of them. Now it felt like one of them had broken free. My mind hadn’t been strong enough to hold her.
“Am I going crazy?” The ground was disintegrating beneath my feet. It was a sensation I knew all too well. When you aren’t sure what’s real, it feels like you’re falling.
I tried closing my eyes. When I opened them, the girl was still there, and I started to cry. My faith in my sanity was the only thing I had left. It had saved me from hopelessness and given me purpose. Without it, I knew I’d be lost.
“Please,” I begged the girl. “Don’t do this to me.”
I watched her fingers begin working the fabric between them. It seemed like something a real girl would do.
“If I start seeing things, they’ll send me away,” I told her. “I’ll never find out what happened here.”
She said nothing, but I saw her fingers freeze.
“Do you have any idea what it’s like, not knowing what’s real?” I felt my chin quivering. The tears were now falling freely. “It feels like you’re trapped in a place where nothing means anything. I came here to escape, and I won’t let you stop me.”
I couldn’t see her anymore, but I knew she was there.
“Go away,” I sobbed. “Please. I have too much to do.”
Blind from tears, I turned my back to the girl in the doorway, crawled into bed, and cried until I fell asleep.
I woke to the sound of someone opening the door. The room was flooded with sun, and the combination of bright light and noise made my head throb.
“What are you doing in here?” I demanded as Miriam made her way to my bedside.
By the time the last word left my lips, I was fully awake.
“Was my bedroom door open just now?”
“No. I’m sorry. I knocked, but you didn’t answer.” Miriam waited for a response, but I was struggling to make sense of what I recalled of the previous night. I was sure I’d fallen asleep with the door wide open, but now it seemed that I hadn’t. Which meant that, as vivid as she’d seemed to me, the ghostly girl in the doorway must have been just a dream.
“Bram?”
“What time is it?” I asked, pushing the girl out of my mind. There was no point in questioning my mental health. I had no choice but to trust myself. I was the only person on earth I could truly depend on.
“Seven-thirty. I wouldn’t have bothered you so early—I know you had a rough night—but you have a guest downstairs.”
“How can I have a guest? I don’t have any friends,” I groused.
“Apparently you have a friend you didn’t know about. She brought you breakfast. I let her in and sent her down to the kitchen.”
I sat up in bed. “It’s Maisie, isn’t it?”
“How did you know?” Miriam asked.
“Wild guess.” After she’d seen me with
Nolan the previous day, I wasn’t surprised that she’d hunted me down. If I was lucky, she’d brought more than breakfast. I was hoping Maisie had beans to spill.
I got dressed and hurried down to the kitchen. Maisie was wearing her black fur coat again, and the lipstick she’d chosen was too red for daytime. But somehow the effect seemed sweet rather than sexy—like an eight-year-old girl playing dress-up.
“Hey there!” she said, holding up a brown bag with a grease-stained bottom. “I brought croissants!”
I stood and stared at her, not quite sure if she might be an impostor. The chipper attitude was definitely phony. I preferred doom-and-gloom Maisie.
“Do you usually make croissant deliveries at the crack of dawn?”
“Sorry!” She clearly wasn’t. “I just wanted to catch you before you went out.”
“Out? This is Louth. Where would I go?” As far as I knew, I didn’t have any social plans for the next few months.
Maisie smiled in response, and we experienced one of those weird psychic moments that girls sometimes share. I suddenly knew exactly why she was in my kitchen at seven-thirty in the morning. She wanted to catch me before I set out to find Nolan. She shook the bag of croissants she was carrying. “These go great with coffee. Mind if I make us some?”
Where were my manners? “Knock yourself out,” I told her.
“Fabulous.” She filled the kettle and lit the stove before she stripped off her coat and tossed it over the back of a chair. The body-hugging black jumpsuit she wore underneath would have turned heads down in town. I had a hunch she knew that better than anyone else. Maisie’s wardrobe was a language all its own. Each outfit seemed chosen to send a message.
She pulled two plates from the cupboard and placed a croissant on each. The perfectly browned crescents were still warm to the touch.
“Wait—did you make these?” I marveled.
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