Robin smiled and tugged on her braid. “We’ll see you later. Stay here with Grandma Helen. Uncle Jack and Grandma’s brother are on the way.”
“’Kay,” Austin said.
“Sure.”
Robin took one more look at Grandma Helen.
We’re going to find out what happened, Grandma. I promise.
* * *
Val, Monica, Mark, and Robin stood at the foot of the attic stairs. All four had flashlights in hand, and Mark held a set of work lights he’d grabbed from the boathouse.
“Okay,” he said. “I’ll go first.”
Robin stepped forward. “If there’s a ghost up there, I should go first. I might be able to see him, and I’m his granddaughter.”
“Do you think that makes a difference?” Monica asked.
“Maybe?” Robin shrugged. “I have no idea, but I’m going.”
Mark called her name, but she was already on the stairs. She felt the chill run down her spine like a long, cold finger.
You don’t scare me.
If you’re up there, you’re a ghost.
You can’t hurt me.
The only problem with that theory was that Robin knew firsthand that ghosts could move things in the living world if they wanted it enough. Billy had broken the window. Nurse Hawkins had taken her blood pressure. If her grandfather’s spirit was in the attic, how angry might he be?
She clutched her flashlight in one hand and her sketchbook in the other. It felt like precious little defense against an angry ghost. Mark was behind her, shining his flashlight into the darkness as Robin opened the door.
The air in the attic smelled of must and earth. Robin stepped inside, and everything was immediately muffled. Her footsteps fell flat on the hardwood planks of the floor. It was as if the darkness in the room absorbed sound, light, and warmth. There was one window in the room, but the light was fading, and the room was drenched in shadows.
As she stepped farther into the room, a pull chain hit her forehead, startling a gasp from her.
“Robin?” Mark was right behind her.
“I’m okay. There’s a light.” She pulled on the chain, but nothing happened. “Never mind.” She swept her flashlight around the room.
“Let me…” Mark pushed past her and searched the baseboards for an electrical socket. “We need light,” he muttered as Robin walked farther into the room.
She could hear Monica and Val behind her, but every sound was muffled. The energy wasn’t warm or cold.
“Robin?” Monica called. “Are you getting anything?”
Boxes lined the walls, and furniture was covered in white sheets. “I don’t feel anything. It’s like a vacuum.”
“This feels weird.” Val held her hands out and pulled off her gloves, but she was careful not to touch anything. “Agreed. It feels like there’s some kind of barrier.”
The feel of the room reminded Robin of the hearing loss after a concert. You could hear, but everything was muffled. Only in the attic, it wasn’t only her hearing; all her senses were muffled. Shadows and light blended together. The air smelled of old musty corners and also the earth and the outside. Sound was swallowed by the corners of the room.
“Mark, do you have the light?”
“Just found an outlet,” he said. “Let’s hope it’s connected to something.”
Robin heard a clicking sound, and suddenly the dark room was flooded with light.
Monica gasped.
Robin spun around. “What it is?”
She was staring above the window and pointing. “There. It’s the stained glass window I saw in my dream.”
“I’d forgotten that was even here,” Robin said.
There was a single odd dormer built onto the back of the house that looked away from the lake and into the woods. At the top of the window was a spreading shell of Tiffany-style stained glass, the colors dull in the fading light.
Mark stood from plugging in the work lights. The bright yellow lights reflected off the sloped ceiling, illuminating the attic. “That’s better.” He put his hands on his hips. “What window?”
“That one.” Monica pointed again. “I saw it in a dream, along with a bloody knife.” She spun around. “But I don’t see a knife. In my dream, there was a bloody knife.”
“But in your other dream, you saw me and Billy walking by the cabin in the woods,” Robin said. “And we didn’t actually do that. So I think the knife is here. We just need to find it.”
Mark said, “Didn’t your dad say there was hunting stuff?”
“Yeah.” Robin scanned the large attic. It was larger than the master bedroom, and boxes were stacked along every wall. “I don’t see much labeled, so I think we’re doing this the hard way.”
Val walked to the other wall. “Four walls. Four of us. Let’s start or we’ll never finish.”
Box after box lined the walls. The furniture was evident from each tented outline. There was a draped table. A dresser. An armoire. Several chairs were stacked in the corner with a plastic tarp thrown over them.
“I don’t get the smell.” Val walked around the room. “It smells like fresh dirt. But there’s no dirt in here. There’s not even much dust.”
It was the truth. Though there was a fine layer of dust over the surfaces, there were no cobwebs. No dust bunnies. The dirt smell was a mystery.
The creeping sense of dread that Robin felt when she first entered the attic hadn’t left, but she focused on each box as she opened it. “This looks like holiday decorations.” She moved to the next. “School records.”
Monica was across the room. “This looks like business stuff related to the lumber company.”
“Skip,” Mark said. “Jack told me all that stuff is electronic now.”
Val said, “This looks more promising. Maybe scrapbooks from when your mom and her brother were little?” Val grabbed a heavy book and brought it to a table covered in a sheet. “This looks like your mom.”
Robin walked over and looked at the album. “We should bring that down. Mom and Grandma might actually enjoy that one. Val, you keeping your gloves on?”
“While we do this? Definitely.” She looked tired. “If and when we find something incriminating, I’ll take them off.”
Robin walked over and hugged her. “Thank you.”
“You owe me a bottle of my favorite whiskey,” Val said, hugging her back. “Maybe two.”
“I’ll do you one better. I’ll come over and help you fold laundry while we drink the whiskey.”
Mark said, “I could probably help fold laundry if you gave me whiskey.”
Val smiled. “If only I could offer whiskey as bribes to my boys. Maybe then they’d clean their rooms.”
“Guys!” Monica’s voice cut through the laughter. “I think I found something.” She was digging through a box filled with dingy clothes.
“What is it?” Robin walked closer and realized the clothes weren’t dingy, they were camouflage pattern. “That’s Grandfather Russell’s hunting gear.”
Val said, “Didn’t your dad say that he had a knife collection with all his hunting stuff?”
“Yeah,” Robin said. “I remember it. He had a bunch of knives, all spread out on the wall above the mantel in the living room.”
Mark frowned. “Not gonna lie, I like sharp, pointy things as much as the next guy, but that’s kind of creepy. Maybe in your office, but the living room?”
“Yeah.” Robin walked over and opened the box next to the one Monica was going through. “Christmas Day and we’d have stockings hanging on the mantel. Right under the massive knife collection.”
“What kind of knives?” Monica asked.
“Hunting knives mostly. He had some historic pieces.” Robin searched her memory, trying to put herself back into childhood. “They weren’t collectors’ pieces. They looked used. There were some really old ones. I remember a buffalo-skinning knife with a horn handle. One little short one that he said went in your sock? I don’t remember them
all.”
“No knives in here,” Mark set another box to the side. “Let’s concentrate on this section though.”
“The knives were the first thing Grandma wanted packed up,” Robin said. “I do remember that. I remember her talking to Dad. I don’t know why that memory is so clear, but it is. She said, ‘Philip, I’ve been living with those things in my face for forty years. Put them away, won’t you?’”
A chill swept down Robin’s back and she turned. Was she seeing things? There was a shadow just behind the work lamps in the corner of the room. She walked toward it.
Val shouted, “I think I found something.”
Robin turned for a moment and the shadow was gone.
“Robin, come here,” Mark said. “Is this the collection?” He, Val, and Robin were standing around a box on the sheet-covered table. He held up a familiar bowie knife.
“Yes,” Robin said. “That’s it.”
They started unwrapping each blade. Five weapons in, Monica dropped a knife, which fell to the table with a hard thud.
“Monica?”
She pointed to the weapon. “That one. That’s the knife I saw. It’s not covered in blood, but that’s the one in my dream.”
The knife she was pointing to didn’t look particularly ominous. Like so many of the others, it was an old-fashioned hunting knife with a fixed blade about six or seven inches long. The handle was wrapped in leather, and the hilt was detailed in brass. It was secured in a thick leather sheath.
Mark reached for it and slid it out of the sheath. “It’s clean.”
Val took a deep breath and took off her gloves. “Monica, are you sure?”
Monica looked like she was going to cry. She slid the knife across the table. “Yeah. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” Val looked around the attic. “There’s something up here. You guys feel it?”
“Yes,” Robin said.
“Yeah.” Mark crossed his arms. “I don’t even have superpowers and I can feel it.”
Val stared at the knife in front of her. “Grandma Helen fed me cookies and rubbed sunscreen on my back when I was a little kid. She braided my hair for me. She gave me money for a prom dress when my parents told me they didn’t have enough.”
Robin looked at her. “You never told me that.”
“Me either,” Monica said.
Val blinked hard. “She told me it was between us. That ladies needed to look out for each and take care of each other.” She looked around the attic. “She’s been living with this… whatever it is… for how long? Thirty years? Longer?” Val looked at Robin. “We need to get rid of it. We need to keep it away from her. Once and for all.”
Val wrapped her fingers around the handle of the knife and closed her eyes.
A spark snapped beneath her hand, then she gasped and fell to the ground, still clutching the knife. She arched her back and her whole body shuddered.
“Get the knife!” Mark yelled. “Monica, hold her arm still.” He knelt down and grabbed Val’s wrist, tearing the knife from her rigid grasp. He stood and put it on the table, sliding the knife back in the sheath.
“Val!” Robin knelt next to her friend and held her head. “Val, we’re here.”
“She’s gonna throw up,” Monica said. “Mark, is there a bag? A bucket? Anything!”
He ran to the corner and grabbed an old brass wastebasket. “Got it.”
Val opened her eyes, and Robin helped her up to her knees and then pulled her hair back while Monica held the wastebasket in front of Val’s face.
There wasn’t too much in her stomach, but she dry heaved for what felt like five minutes straight. Robin and Monica rubbed her back, and Mark ran down to the third floor to look for tissues and some water.
“It was him,” Val said quietly. “Gordon waited for the dark. Billy was trying so hard to get out of the chains that he didn’t even hear him. He snuck up on Billy and cut his throat, just as Billy worked his foot free. He was bloody all over his leg, but Gordon…”
“Shhh.” Monica brushed her hair back. “It’s okay. We get the picture.”
Robin stood and walked to the table. She stared at the plain hunting knife her grandfather had used to murder her grandmother’s first love. Gordon Russell had stalked Helen Moore, killed the man she loved, and then married her, all the while making Helen believe he’d been her rescuer.
Robin had known her grandfather as a hard man, but what Gordon had done was evil. Flat-out evil. Even in death, his presence was everywhere, driving wedges between his descendants, stoking conflict, and haunting his wife.
She turned in a circle, feeling the malevolent energy of the dark and dusty attic, the coldness of the house. Gordon Russell had left a legacy of darkness, secrets, and fear.
Enough.
Russell House had seen enough evil. It was time for Robin Brannon to clean house.
Chapter 26
Robin, Val, and Monica sat in Grandma Helen’s bedroom, watching over the sleeping woman. They had taken everything they could find that belonged to Gordon and loaded it in the back of Mark’s truck. He was driving it to their house. He’d put it in the garage until they could rent a storage unit somewhere.
“My knee is killing me,” Robin whispered.
“Same,” Monica said. “The stairs in this house are ridiculous.”
“Remember when we thought stairs were cool?” Val asked. “I did. When I was a kid, I thought houses with stairs were so fancy.”
“This house is fancy,” Robin said. “It’s kind of ridiculous for one family.”
She looked around the room, realizing that Helen had chosen to spend her later years in the maid’s quarters rather than the ridiculous and fancy house her husband had built her. Robin had always assumed it was because Helen didn’t want to deal with all the stairs, but Helen could have turned the downstairs library into a bedroom. She could have made her bedroom in the cozy den behind the formal living room.
But those were all rooms where Gordon had once lived. Only this room and the kitchen felt free of her grandfather. The kitchen, the breakfast nook, and the maid’s room.
“She loved being outside,” Robin said. “I can’t even count how many signs there were that something in this house was wrong. I just thought she liked the outdoors.”
“Do you think she’s why Billy stayed?” Val picked up a comb and smoothed Helen’s hair back. “Do you think he protected her?”
“Billy’s ghost said he couldn’t come in the house,” Robin said. “But that tells me he could be near her when she was outside. So maybe.”
“She spent as much time in the garden as she possibly could,” Monica said. “And the woods and the beach.”
“She used to tell me houses were for being sick and sleeping. But you lived outdoors.”
No one had told Grace, Phil, or the kids what they were doing. The rest of the family had been busy welcoming Jack and Uncle Raymond into the house and updating them on Grandma Helen’s condition. No one noticed the boxes or the many trips up and down the stairs. There had been too many things going on. Grandma Helen woke up and talked to both Jack and Raymond for a while. Then she’d had a short conversation with Grace and Raymond, after which they’d gone to the den on their own to talk.
“There are so many people in this house,” Robin said. “My mom and dad. The kids. My uncles. How are we supposed to banish Grandpa Russell’s murderous ghost without anyone knowing? Because I do not want to have to explain this to the whole family.”
“You don’t want to tell Raymond?” Monica said. “That his father—”
“He already knows Gordon wasn’t his father,” Val said. “I’m with Robin. It’s not like anyone liked the man. They’re not singing songs about him. Telling the whole story will only bring up too many questions. They’d probably never believe us in the first place.”
“I guess you’re right.”
Robin held Grandma Helen’s hand. “She would have believed us.”
“Do you th
ink she knew?”
“No.” Robin shook her head. “She told me over and over he was kind to Uncle Raymond.”
“Leave it then,” Monica said. “But we need to get rid of him. He’s been hanging over her for decades. Once he’s out of this house…”
“I think that’s what she’s waiting for.” Robin stared at Helen’s profile in the low light. “I think on some level, she’s always known he’s still here. Still keeping her under his thumb.”
Val shuddered. “I just had the mental image of a ghost following her. If you died while a ghost was following you, would they get attached?”
“The more important question is, how do we banish a ghost? Do any of you have any idea?”
Val and Monica both looked as clueless as Robin felt.
“I just barely learned how call one,” she said. “And now I need to figure out how to send one away?”
“What do you do to call one?” Monica said. “The drawing thing?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t suppose you saw Gordon up there?” Val asked. “That might be helpful.”
“I saw… something. A shadow. I could feel him up there, especially when we had his things spread out. But I didn’t see him. Not like I’ve seen Billy.”
“What if you drew him?”
“That would call him, but we want to get rid of him.”
“Right.” Val bit her lip. “I have no idea.”
“Well.” Monica pulled out her phone. “Pretty sure you can find anything on the internet.”
* * *
Two days later, Robin, Val, and Monica were still batting theories around. Grandma Helen had seemed to perk up with Raymond’s arrival, and there was a happy hum in the house. Helen was still in and out of consciousness, but between the nurses, the company, and the music and movies the kids had on, she seemed comfortable, even if she was sleeping most of the time.
Robin had nearly convinced herself that taking all of Grandfather Russell’s things out of the attic had done the trick. That was until she visited the attic again. The earthy smell still lingered, and the cold was even more pervasive.
Suddenly Psychic: Glimmer Lake Book One Page 21