Grace weaves her fingers together. She glances at me nervously, but I won’t look at her. I can’t tear my eyes away from Riley.
Riley shifts her eyes back up to me. They’re the eyes of a predator: dead and calculating.
“Didn’t realize you were a big drinker,” she says, lifting the bottle.
“What?” I swallow, waiting, but Riley holds the wine just below her mouth. The glass brushes against her lower lip.
“The wine,” she says. “You seem more interested in it all of the sudden.”
“I guess I’m just thirsty,” I say.
Riley inhales the scent of the wine, closing her eyes. “Me, too,” she murmurs. She tips the bottle back and the wine slides forward. I hold my breath, but the second seems to stretch for an eternity. Sweat breaks out along my palms.
Just before she drinks, Riley’s eyes flicker back open.
“Do you think I’m stupid?” she whispers. My throat goes dry.
“Of course not.”
Riley lowers the bottle. “What did you put in here?”
Dread creeps into my gut. “I . . .”
Riley heaves the wine bottle across the room. It shatters against the wall just a few feet from where Alexis is crouched, spraying the floor with glass. Alexis flinches, throwing her hands over her face. The thick liquid oozes down the boards behind her head, but the wood drinks the wine before it slides to the floor, leaving behind a deep red stain.
“You tell me you want me to trust you, but you’re lying to me!” Riley screams.
“Riley, I didn’t . . . ,” I say.
“Shut up!” Riley says. Alexis releases another loud sob, and Riley’s face twists. She whirls around to face her.
“None of us feel sorry for you!” she yells. “You deserve to suffer. You’re a monster.”
Something in Alexis snaps when Riley screams that last word at her. The light drains from her eyes, leaving her skin hollow and pale. The final sob dies on her lips, and her mouth hangs open—shocked.
“Lexie.” Grace takes a step toward her, but Alexis pushes herself to her feet and races from the room. The rickety ladder shakes and moans as she climbs to the second floor.
“You bitch, I told you not to leave.” Riley pushes past Grace and tears down the ladder after Alexis. Alexis’s sobs echo below us. Her bare feet slap against the floor as she drops from the ladder and starts to run.
“Should we go after them?” Grace asks.
As an answer, I head for the ladder. I shouldn’t be so worried. Alexis has been almost as bad as Riley this whole time. She put her sister in a coma. I should leave the two of them together—they deserve each other.
Still, I can’t get Alexis’s broken expression out of my mind.
Riley drops to the floor, causing the ladder to shake. I grip the banister to keep from falling.
“You’re as bad as Brooklyn!” Riley shouts, tearing down the hallway. “Maybe we should exorcise you next.”
My heart thuds in my chest as my shoe slips on a blood-coated rung. I smack my chin on the ladder before managing to catch myself. Black stars blossom before my eyes.
“Get back here, psycho!” Riley trips over a beer bottle and falls, hitting the ground on her knees. Alexis races into the master bedroom. Riley pushes herself back to her feet.
“Riley, wait!” Stomach turning, I jump to the second floor. The shock jolts through my legs, but I don’t pause long enough to notice. I reach for Riley’s shoulder, but she whips around on me.
“This has nothing to do with you,” she spits out, pushing me. I slam against the wall.
“Riley,” I groan, but she follows Alexis into the master bedroom and shuts the door in my face. I grab the doorknob, but it won’t turn. Grace runs up behind me, breathless.
“Locked,” I say. “From the inside.”
Grace wiggles the doorknob, but it holds tight. She swears under her breath, then pounds against the door with her open hand.
“Riley! Let us in.”
No one answers. I picture Riley pushing Brooklyn below the water in the bathtub, Riley peeling away Brooklyn’s fingernail and letting it fall to the floor in the basement.
“Riley wouldn’t hurt Alexis, right?” I ask.
Grace swallows and presses her lips together. “I don’t know what Riley would do.”
I press my face against the door to the bedroom. Muffled voices sound inside—more arguing, but I can’t hear what they’re saying. Cursing, I pull away.
“We have to get inside,” I say to Grace. “Can you think of anything?”
Grace’s face lights up. “Riley kept a key in a drawer in the kitchen. I don’t know if it’s the master, but . . .”
“It’s worth a try,” I finish. “Come on.” I grab Grace’s arm and we start down the stairs.
I take them two at a time, nervous for every second I’m not in the bedroom with Riley and Alexis. I see that desperate, broken expression every time I close my eyes and urge my feet to move faster.
Alexis releases a shrill scream. “Riley, no!”
I jump to the landing as a shadow falls past the arched window overlooking the staircase. Something crashes into the bushes next to the house, sending a shudder through the floor. A thousand pins prick the back of my neck. I freeze on the landing.
“Oh, god.” Grace’s body stiffens behind me.
“What was that?” I whisper, terrified I already know. I don’t want to look, but I turn toward the window anyway and lean into the glass.
Alexis’s body lies crumpled in the dirt. Her white-blond hair glows in the dim moonlight, and a halo of blood pools around her head. I lift a trembling finger to the window, my breath misting the glass.
“Move,” I whisper to her broken body. But she doesn’t. She stares at the sky with milky, lifeless eyes. Her arm twists above her head, and her fingers curl toward her palm, almost like she tried to grab onto something as she fell. Her cracked lips hang open in a silent scream. Her final words echo through my head. Riley, no!
The door above us creaks open, and footsteps pad across the floor. I lift my head as Riley stops at the top of the stairs, her face white as death.
“Alexis jumped,” she says.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Riley wraps her fingers around the banister at the top of the staircase, her eyes unfocused.
“Our Father who art in heaven,” she whispers, barely loud enough to hear. A tear slips over her cheek. “Hallowed be thy name . . .”
“Don’t.” I step away from the window, hands trembling at my sides. “He’s not listening.”
“Sofia,” Grace murmurs. She tries to touch my arm, but I shake her hand away. I can’t stop thinking about Alexis’s cloudy eyes, her broken body, the way her fingers curled toward her palm. I don’t want to be comforted.
Riley considers me for a long moment, until the anger burning through my chest cools, just a little. “You’re grieving,” she says finally. “I get that. But we have to pray for the Lord to forgive Alexis’s sin.”
“No!” I shout. The word is a death sentence, but I don’t care. Maybe I want Riley to kill me next. “You’re wrong about everything. God’s not helping us. He’s not fixing Brooklyn, and he can’t forgive Alexis, not anymore.”
Riley’s feet pad down the stairs soundlessly. She crouches in front of me.
“You don’t know that, Sof,” she says, wiping a tear from her cheek with the back of her hand. “Come back up to the attic. We have to finish what we started.”
“The attic?” My voice sounds so shrill I hardly recognize it as my own. I swallow, trying to steady it. “We have to call the police. Alexis is dead.”
The word sounds so final as it echoes through the house.
Grace sobs into her hands. “Don’t say that,” she hisses through her fingers. “Maybe she’s jus
t . . . just . . .”
“Stop it! Alexis is dead, Grace! She committed suicide.” Riley’s voice caresses that word. Suicide. It’s like she’s trying it out on us, seeing how the story sounds when she says it out loud.
“Think about it,” she continues. “What would happen if we brought the cops here now? What do you think they’ll do when they see Brooklyn? They’ll think we’re monsters. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in jail. Do you?”
Grace shakes her head. “Shit,” she whispers. She hangs her head and starts to cry, her movements already slow and clumsy from the wine.
Every emotion I’ve forced down since entering this house explodes out of me. I try to speak, but the most I can do is release a gasping, ugly sob. My chest tightens, and I cry like I’m five years old again, like it’s something I just discovered I could do.
“Sofia.” Riley grabs me by the shoulder and squeezes. “Sofia, you need to calm down.”
I can’t stop. I realize, for the first time, that none of us is ever going home. Even if I somehow get out of this house alive, I never get to return to my old life. Tears race down my cheeks as I heave and choke for breath. My head starts to feel fuzzy.
“Sofia, look at me.” Suddenly Riley’s voice is soft and even. My eyes flutter open, and I focus on her face, my lips trembling as I struggle to breathe.
Riley presses her lips together, considering me. The deep shadows under her eyes make her look older, wise even. She’s given up on the ponytail, and now her hair falls limply around her thin, angular face. It hides the bite mark on her cheek, so she looks almost normal. She squeezes my shoulders again.
“I know you don’t realize it now, but everything that’s happened is Brooklyn’s fault,” she explains. “The devil compelled Alexis to jump out that window. There’s nothing we can do for her now, but you need to be strong—you need to keep the devil from taking control of you, too.”
Keep the devil from taking control of me, too. The words echo in my head, meaningless, but I still feel my breathing begin to steady.
“There’s my girl,” she whispers. “Now, don’t worry. As soon as we beat this, we can all go home.”
“How?” I whisper. Riley wipes a tear from my cheek with her thumb. My skin burns where she touches it, but I try not to let my disgust show on my face. The only way out of here is through Riley. I have to be strong.
“We’ll figure it out. Some exorcisms are just trickier than others.” Riley stands, smoothing her bloodstained tank top. “Take a moment to catch your breath, then come back to the attic. All three of us need to be united if this is going to work. We might have to resort to extreme measures to defeat the demon.”
I nod numbly as Riley turns and walks back up the stairs and down the hallway. Grace crouches near the wall, so still she looks like a shadow.
“Are you ready?” Grace asks. I don’t think I’ll ever be ready to go back up there, but I push myself to my feet and take a step toward her. She wraps a hand around my arm, and we walk down the hall together.
“What do you think Riley meant when she said extreme measures?” I ask before we reach the stairs to the attic. Grace blinks at me blearily. Her eyes are clouded over, and she can barely walk straight. When she speaks, her voice is raspy, almost a whisper.
“She meant that sometimes the host has to die.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“Jesus, Sofia, go.” Grace pinches my leg, and the jolt of pain gets me moving. I climb up the last three ladder rungs, then pull myself into the attic. The room itself feels evil, like something twisted crawled into the spaces Alexis left behind.
Riley stares out the window at the far end of the room, one arm angled in front of her. Rope coils around her feet. I peer around the beam. Brooklyn lies, twisted, on the floor, her arms and legs untied. Her spiky blond hair is slicked with blood.
The attic door slams shut behind me. I whirl around in time to see Grace stand and wipe her dusty hands on her jeans.
“What’s going on?” I ask. Grace shifts her eyes to the floor.
Moonlight streams through the window, leaving the attic thick with shadows. I don’t see what Riley’s holding until she steps forward and candlelight illuminates her hands.
The nail gun.
Sometimes the host has to die. Just a few hours ago I’d have done anything to stop this. But now I hesitate, curling my fingers into fists. It’s Brooklyn’s life or mine. By helping her, I make myself Riley’s next target.
Brooklyn whimpers and tries to sit up.
“Almost done,” Riley says. She shifts the nail gun to one hand, then drops to her knees and rolls Brooklyn onto her back.
“Don’t, please!” Brooklyn writhes and kicks beneath Riley’s legs. Riley lowers the nail gun.
I can’t do this. I can’t stand by and watch someone die, even if it means saving myself.
“Get off of her!” I throw my whole body into Riley, using every ounce of strength I have left. “You psycho bitch!”
We tumble to the floor next to Brooklyn. Riley regains her balance first and whips an elbow into my face. I slam back down, pain exploding across my cheek.
“Grace, take care of her,” Riley snarls. Brooklyn tries to move, but Riley straddles her chest and pins her arm to the floor with one hand. I push myself up and try to crawl toward them, but Grace grabs me from behind.
“Let go!” I claw at Grace’s arms, but she just tightens her grip around my chest and drags me away. Splinters jutting out from the unfinished wooden floor scrape the backs of my legs.
An eerie silence fills the attic. Riley lowers the gun. The nail shoots into Brooklyn’s hand with a dull blast, breaking the quiet.
Brooklyn roars with pain, so loud I swear I feel the floorboards tremble beneath my feet. Riley moves to the next arm, pinning it beneath her knee as she positions the nail gun over Brooklyn’s hand. It sticks straight out from her body, like a cross.
“You’re crucifying her,” I whisper, horrified. A thick line of blood oozes over the side of Brooklyn’s hand and pools on the floor.
She aims the gun at Brooklyn’s other palm and pulls the trigger. Metal crunches through skin and bone.
“I wanted to hang her from the beams,” Riley explains, motioning to the ceiling with the nail gun. “But I didn’t think we could lift her that high.” She curls her toes into the floor and pivots around to face me.
“Now, what should we do with you?” she says, almost to herself. She raises an eyebrow, and suddenly it’s as if all the air in the room has been sucked away.
“No, please,” I beg. Grace tightens her grip around my arms, and I can’t move.
“It’s for your own good,” Riley says, gathering the ropes she’d used to tie up Brooklyn. “First you texted Josh, and then you played that little trick with the wine. Now this. I just don’t trust you anymore.”
“Please,” I whisper again, trying to pull out of Grace’s grip. “I can cooperate. I can help.”
Riley untangles a length of rope as she moves toward me. She lifts a finger to her lips.
“This’ll be easier if you don’t struggle,” she says. As Grace holds me in place, Riley binds my arms and legs in thick knots. The ropes pinch the skin around my wrists, and they’re so tight they cut off circulation in my hands. When she’s done, Riley pushes the hair out of my face and leans in to kiss me on the cheek.
“When we’re done with Brooklyn, we’ll help you. Okay?” She taps my nose with her finger. “It’s almost dawn. Grace and I need to do something with Alexis’s body before the sun comes up.”
I turn to the window and see that Riley’s right. The black sky has faded to a deep blue. I think of my mother crawling out of bed at seven in the morning as always and finding my room empty. A spark of hope flickers through my chest—if she calls the police, then maybe . . . but no. Even if she called 911 as soon as s
he found me missing, they’d never find me here. Not in time to stop Riley.
Grace pushes my shoulders down, and I awkwardly sit. “Riley,” I try one last time. “Please don’t leave me here like this.”
Riley ignores my pleas as she opens the attic door and starts down the ladder.
Grace hesitates at the door. “It’s easier this way,” she says. Without another word she follows Riley down to the second floor.
I release my breath in a rush of air. It’s easier. Karen said that to me once, after watching Lila and Erin torture me in biology class. It’s just easier to let them do what they want. What bullshit.
I struggle to keep myself calm, but as reality sets in, each breath feels more ragged. I squeeze my eyes closed, and the situation comes into clearer focus. Riley knows I’m not on her side, that I can’t be trusted. Alexis is dead. Soon, Brooklyn will be, too. Maybe Riley will decide I’m possessed, too. Maybe I’ll be the next person nailed to the floor.
Tears stream down my cheeks. I’m crying for Alexis and for Brooklyn, but also for myself—for fear of what’s going to happen next. I release another sob, no longer trying to keep my pain under control. My shoulders shake, and my chest aches as my breathing gets heavier and heavier. Tears cloud my eyes until I can barely see.
“Stop!” Brooklyn screams. Her voice startles me so much that I dig my teeth into my lower lip, sniffling. Brooklyn groans in pain, and there’s a shuffling sound as she tries to readjust her position on the floor. “This isn’t the time to cry. We need to figure out how to escape.”
“Escape? I’ve been trying to escape since we first got here!” I press my lips together to keep from sobbing again. “There is no escape.”
“Bullshit. We’ve just been thinking about this wrong.” Brooklyn pauses, and for a moment the only sound in the attic is her low, steady breathing. “What’s Riley been saying this whole time?”
“That . . . that you’re evil.” I stutter. “That you’re possessed by the devil.”
“Right. And what would the devil do in this situation?”
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