by Mia Sheridan
“Yes, Mommy.”
Ten minutes later, wearing her green dress with the tiny white flowers, and a pair of yellow rain boots, Haddie exited Lilith House through the back door. The air felt steamy from the rain, a soft mist rising from the ground, growing thicker at the edge of the woods, curling toward her like reaching hands. Haddie glanced at the open kitchen window, checking to make sure her mommy wasn’t looking as she ducked into the cover of trees, allowing the cool, misty fingers to swirl around her limbs.
Despite the hazy ground, she spotted the acorns immediately. She’d seen them when they got out of the car and started walking toward the door, and she’d been thinking about those acorns since then. They’d been left for her, she knew they had been. The horned creature had used her idea and left a trail for Haddie to follow.
Haddie stepped tentatively over the pine needles on the ground, following the acorns farther into the woods. At first, they were spaced close together, and then farther apart. Eventually, they tapered off completely and confused and slightly frightened, Haddie turned in a full circle, wondering what she should do.
The mist had risen off the ground and now it whispered through the trees, creating a world that felt both dreamy and strange. Straight ahead, a pair of horns appeared, their outline parting the fog and then being swallowed up once again as the creature moved forward. Haddie gasped, her feet primed to turn and run. But no, she’d come here for answers and she had to be brave.
The horns appeared and then faded into the mist, emerging again seconds later, even easier to follow than a trail of acorns. Haddie gathered all her courage, moving forward, following the creature that had no weight.
Haddie moved through trees, first so thick she had to weave between their massive trunks, and then spaced farther apart. She got caught up on brush, her legs and arms scraped and poked. She followed the thing up, her legs growing weary, and then down, her rainboot-clad feet slipping in the dirt, though she caught herself before she fell.
She followed for a long time, her muscles growing weary, the sky beginning to grow dim, the creature waiting for her, but keeping just far enough ahead that Haddie could never see it clearly.
Where are you leading me?
Follow.
A shiver of excitement raced through Haddie. She’d heard it. Not in words, but in intentions. She’d heard it.
The first glints of starlight appeared, the sky overhead colored in a hundred different shades of blue.
Her mommy was going to be very worried.
Haddie was worried too. But she’d come this far, and she couldn’t turn back now.
The creature wanted to show her something.
It was . . . saying something . . . and she could almost hear like she had before, but not quite.
Through the mist, Haddie spotted a small hut-like house between two tall trees. She stopped, peering at it, wondering if that was what she was meant to see. But no, the creature had passed right by the dwelling and moved somewhere beyond. Haddie took in the weight of the structure, measuring it. It felt light. A peaceful place, though she also felt its emptiness. Someone had lived there once, but not anymore.
Haddie continued on.
The ground grew rockier, large boulders replacing the trees. The creature had disappeared, replaced by the soft pounding of drums from . . . somewhere. Haddie couldn’t tell where the sound came from because it echoed off the rocks and the walls of the canyon ahead, bouncing all around so it was everywhere at once. She could see the edge of the cliff that fell into it stretching around in a giant circle. Though there was no fog out in this wide space, the canyon was so deep, Haddie couldn’t see the bottom from where she stood.
The moon was big here, big and yellow and round. High in the sky, bats circled, their inky wings outlined in moonglow. A bunny hopped out from behind a rock, spotting Haddie and going still, its little nose twitching. He and Haddie measured each other, then satisfied, both turned away, focusing back on their own business.
Haddie eyed the cliff again, lost in uncertainty. What was she supposed to do from here? She glanced down, and that’s when she saw the red-hued rocks, each about the size of her fist. They had been formed in a trail, just like the acorns. Just like her Skittles. Haddie took a step forward, then another, moving to the final reddish stone directly on the edge of the cliff.
Haddie picked it up, holding it in her hand, feeling the very slight warmth in her palm. Warily, she leaned forward, peeking over the edge of the cliff.
Down.
Startled, she looked around, searching for the one who’d said that word. Demanding.
Again, she peeked over the edge. It was very, very far down. Did the thing want to hurt her? Kill her? Her breath came short and she stumbled back, her feet slipping in the gravel and coming out from under her, pitching her forward. With a cry of fear, she threw her body sideways, landing on her stomach, the air knocked out of her lungs.
For several minutes she lay there, gripping the ground and sucking in lungfuls of dusty air. When she’d finally managed to calm herself, she began to push back from the edge, the rocky ground scraping her bare legs.
Something caught her eye on a ledge below. A reddish rock. Haddie stilled, glancing around at the windless night. She scooted herself forward just enough to hang her head over the edge, her hand finding a prickly plant and wrapping around its strong root.
She eyed the reddish rock on the small ledge below, her gaze moving to a similar one on a wider ledge beneath, plants and brush growing near the wall of the cliff.
Haddie’s bones squeezed tight, growing leaden in her body. She cried out softly, her head falling limply over the edge of the cliff, her eyes glued to that second ledge. This place was like that room on the second floor of Lilith House. It had weight. She didn’t know if the weight was bad or sad, it wasn’t like that with places. Places weren’t clear like people. Places held their weight different.
Haddie caught her breath, lifting her head, willing the feel of the weight to leave her bones, but remain in her mind. She’d been practicing that lately, and sometimes it worked. Mostly, it didn’t, but Haddie didn’t want the weight of badness to make it so she couldn’t move.
That scared her, and she didn’t want to be scared. She wanted to be brave.
She peered below the weighty ledge. There were no more rocks beneath.
Haddie paused, lifting her head higher and peering around again. The distant sound of a drumbeat started up again. She couldn’t tell if it was moving closer or farther away.
Haddie looked down again. She knew what she had to do. She knew she had been led here for a reason. Haddie came up on her knees, gathering every ounce of courage in her small, skinny, seven-year-old body. And then Haddie turned around, lowering herself backward over the cliff.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Georgia sat on the couch, legs drawn up, arms linked around them, a scowl on her face that Camden knew hid her hurt. He sat down next to her. “Georgie,” he implored. “Look at me.”
She turned away. “You shouldn’t have told her,” she said. “I can’t believe you told her.”
Mason cleared his throat from where he sat on the easy chair across from the sofa. “He had to, Georgia,” Mason said.
She whipped her head toward him. “Now you’re on her side too?”
He let out a breath. “There don’t always have to be sides,” he said. “What was Camden supposed to do? Deny what she’d already discovered?” He glanced at Camden. “He has feelings for her. He trusted her. And she wants to help.”
“Help, my ass!” Georgia said. “What can she do to help?”
“She can give us complete access to the house,” Camden said. “The property.”
“We could have had complete access to that property ourselves if you’d have let us do whatever it took to get rid of her.”
“God, Georgie, listen to you,” Camden said, his voice a low growl of frustration. “Do whatever it took to get rid of her? You sound like
Ms. Wykes.”
Georgia let out a gasp. “How dare you? Until five minutes ago, you were just as on board with this plan as we were.”
He ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah, well, things changed.” My priorities changed.
“Yeah, because Scarlett Lattimore opened her legs for you. What a good guild member you are.”
“For the love of God, stop this, you two,” Mason said, standing up and lacing his hands behind his head as he paced. “This is ridiculous. Georgia,” he said, turning to her. “I’m sorry, but I’m with Camden. Our plan . . . it needs to be adjusted. We can still seek answers, justice. That’s not going to change, okay? That part is bigger than just us. But I don’t want to be ruled by vengeance either. I want . . . more.” He looked at her so adoringly that Camden glanced away. He sometimes wondered if Mason ever admitted his longing for Georgia, even in his own head. What he did know was that Mason was inspired by the work he was doing on Lilith House. It’d become a passion project for him, not only because he was good at what he did, but because it was filling something inside him to be given reign over the structure that had imprisoned him for most of his life. He was turning Lilith House into something different than she’d been, inspired by the vision he had for her. Camden could see that it provided a cleansing for Mason, one long past due, one taking the place of what they had previously planned. This one feeding the good wolf inside, he could see it in Mason’s eyes. “Don’t you want more, Georgie?” Mason asked softly.
She glowered at him. “You want more than us?” she asked. “Suddenly we’re not enough for you anymore?”
“You’ve always been enough for me, Georgia,” he said softly. “But I also want to be happy.” He looked at Cam. “I’ve never seen Cam happy . . . until now. And I want that for you too. I want that for me,” he finished. “We deserve to have a life, Georgia, things that bring us joy and satisfaction. Things that don’t only revolve around Lilith House and the damage done to us.”
“That’s easy for you to say,” she choked, her face still turned away from them. Camden’s chest gave a hard knock. He glanced at Mason and they exchanged a look of empathy. Yes, she’d had it harder than both of them, not just at Lilith House, but after that when she went to live with the head of the guild, Clarence Dreschel. That man had paid for her surgery, and then promptly exacted payment in the form of another slice of her innocence, which she’d only divulged to him and Mason when they’d begun setting their plan in motion. He would give anything to change it, to change all of it. He’d give anything to have had the power then to rescue her. But he’d been a kid too. Traumatized. Confused. And God, he admitted it, so desperately relieved to have been swept away from Farrow.
“I still hear his cane on the floor,” she said, her gaze faraway. “Coming toward my room.”
He went to sit back down next to her. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. Nothing like that will ever happen to you again. You’ll always have us, Georgia. We’re family. We will never ever desert you. But, look at me.” For a moment she ignored him, but then her face turned his way. She had tears in her eyes. “We—all three of us—have to make it our end goal to build lives that are bigger than what happened at Lilith House and even after that. We have to, Georgie, or we’ll turn into the very people we’re trying to punish. The people who hurt us so badly.”
“It’s always been us. Just us,” she whispered miserably.
A tear slipped down her cheek and Camden wiped it away. “Maybe it doesn’t have to be. Maybe that’s not healthy, Georgie. There are others out there who will love you too.”
Georgia let out a humorless laugh. “How could they?” Oh, Georgia. She still saw herself as that damaged, unwanted girl. An ugly reject. An unlovable castoff. He had seen himself in a similar light for a very long time. It had been an awakening, a long-awaited miracle to find out he wasn’t the loathsome mistake he’d been taught to believe he was. To discover that a person like Scarlett Lattimore could find him worthy. But it was his decision to choose her word over the lies of all those who had manipulated him so terribly. And he hoped to God someday Georgia and Mason would be able to do the same.
“Easily,” he said softly but with great surety. He looked at Mason, who watched them from where he stood. “I think it was a mistake to think that by recreating our situation on our terms, it would give us power, help us move on.” He bit at his lip for a moment. “I think instead it would’ve just left us stuck in the past. Forever those three invisible children. You deserve more, Georgia. We all do.”
Georgia let out a slow breath, giving him the ghost of a smile.
Mason came to sit down on the other side of her, wrapping his arms around her shoulders. He nodded to Camden who did the same.
After a moment, Georgia let out a sniffy laugh. “You’re crushing me.”
Camden sat up on a smile, his phone dinging from his pocket. He stood as Mason grabbed a tissue and started blotting at Georgia’s eyes as she let out a teary laugh.
Camden looked down at his text, everything inside him stopping cold.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Camden raised his fist, banging on the door. He heard footsteps rushing toward it and a moment later Scarlett flung the door open, her expression frantic.
“How long has she been gone?”
“Hours.” She wrung her hands together. “I told her she could go out and play in the yard.” She shook her head. “This is my fault. I got distracted with the damn wallpaper and then some designs I was working on and by the time I looked up, it was getting dark. I went out to call her in and it was like she’d just . . . disappeared.” Oh Jesus, Scarlett. Her face crumpled and Camden stepped forward, taking her in his arms, but just as quickly letting go. Time was of the essence.
“We’re going to find her.” The alternative was too unthinkable.
She bobbed her head, swallowing, her face awash in misery. Fuck fuck fuck! He felt sick with worry, desperate to find that little girl. “I went out to the woods. She’s always been so cautious. I couldn’t imagine that she went farther than the tree line. I called and called . . .” A small sob came up her throat but she quickly gained control of herself. “I didn’t dare go any deeper into the woods and get lost myself.”
“Okay. Listen, we’re going to have to form a search party.”
“My God, Cam, this is exactly what happened to Kandace. She walked out into those woods and was never seen again.”
“That’s not going to happen.” And yet even as he said it, a ball of lead formed in his gut. Don’t go there. Chances are she just wandered away and lost her bearings. She’s out there right now, curled up under a tree, waiting to be rescued.
Cam brought his phone from his pocket, but Scarlett grabbed his forearm, halting him. “Can we trust them, Cam? They might be behind Kandace’s disappearance. What if—”
He ground his jaw. “We have no choice. We need lights, equipment. We need as many hands on deck as possible if we have any chance of finding her.”
She bobbed her head again, her eyes filled with terror. He wanted to yell, to claw at something, to run out into the woods right this second and start screaming bloody murder for Haddie to please, please come home. And he knew what he was feeling was nothing compared to what Scarlett was experiencing.
He’d only dialed three digits when the door swung open. They both whipped around to see Haddie, disheveled and covered in dirt, the hem of her dress mostly detached and hanging down around her dusty calves, standing in the doorway.
Scarlett let out a strangled yelp, flying to where Haddie stood and going down on her knees in front of her. For a moment, Camden watched as Scarlett ran her hands over Haddie’s face, over her head, down her shoulders and over her hips, her hands visibly shaking as she checked her child for injury.
“Mommy,” the little girl said, and her voice was surprisingly strong and clear.
“Haddie, Haddie,” Scarlett repeated over and over. She drew her into her arms, clinging to her for a moment
before pulling back. “Where were you, baby? What happened? Did you get lost?”
Haddie glanced up at Camden, her gaze lingering on him for several beats, a wariness coming into her eyes before she looked back to her mother. “Bones, Mommy,” she said breathlessly. “I found bones.”
**********
The sky was smudged with shades of pink and amber, the sun a pale ring in the morning sky when Camden pushed the vegetation aside, startled to see, not the rocky side of the cliff as he expected, but instead the opening of a cave. He leaned away, looking up to where Scarlett lay at the edge, peering over to where he’d carefully lowered himself, and then slowly, painstakingly made his way down the very narrow path to the ledge below.
Haddie sat several feet safely behind her mother, having directed them through the forest and to the hidden opening where she’d seen the bones. She’d been insistent on leading them back to this spot, but Scarlett had been even more insistent that they get her cleaned up and wait until daybreak to make the long trip through the woods. “There’s an opening here,” he called up to Scarlett. “Just like she said.” How had she known? From the top, it looked just like any number of other small ledges on the basin of this deep canyon, bristly brush growing from a crack in the rock.
Scarlett nodded, her eyes wide. “Can you see them?” she called. “The bones?”
A noise distracted him and Cam turned, gazing in the opposite direction, the soft sound of what he thought was a drumbeat coming from nearby. He’d heard that sound before, remembered it from his childhood. He felt watched. His head turned in the other direction, and then slowly returned to Scarlett. “I’m going inside,” he said.