Going missing twice inside of a week was the last thing my extremely pregnant and hyper-worrisome best friend needed.
I was going to have to go inside now. I would have to sneak around without Abram knowing I was in there. It was a terrible plan, and yet, it was all I had without the risk of losing this opportunity forever.
Ducking low, I scampered across the field toward the front door. My feet fell lightly onto the porch and, quietly as possible, I turned the knob.
I had no idea what I was going to do if Abram had locked it behind him. Or if he was standing right on the other side of the door. I had never been the sort who thought things through. But the house was in the middle of nowhere, so it wasn’t likely he was expecting company, or that he had come all the way out here to sit the living room.
Luckily for me, the door sprang open. After slipping inside, I crouched down and looked around cautiously, praying Abram wasn’t standing there watching me. But the living room was as empty today as it had been the other night, though the quickly setting sun tinted the entire room orange and red.
I listened for sounds, trying to gauge where Abram might be. Suddenly, heavy footsteps stomped from a back room. Crap. They were headed this way. I sprang to my feet, bolted toward the steps, and pushed up them, hoping to get out of sight before he found me.
I shuddered as my feet fell across the staircase. The last time I had been on them, I had been tumbling down like a discarded sequin on a McCartney original. Shaking my head, I moved into the upstairs hallway just before Abram crossed into the living room.
Pressed against the wall, I found myself guarded in shadow. The sun would be down soon, and getting home from here would prove troublesome. But I needed answers. And right now was the only time I could get them.
Sorry, Lulu.
Abram stopped in the living room, and I shivered, thinking he would move up the stairs. I darted farther into the hallway. Remembering the layout from the last time I was here, I knew there were only two rooms at the end of the hall. One of them was the room I had almost died in and the other had been locked the last time I was here.
Now, with little bit of daylight remaining, I could actually see the door. And when I did, I nearly choked on air. The door was stamped with a similar crescent moon symbol to the mysterious room inside The Castle.
Realization slammed into me with a sickening thud. How could I have forgotten the way the doorknob had burned me that night? Of course Abram had something to do with all this. I was just the idiot girl who needed a damn symbol to spell it out for me. But that still didn’t explain what was going on. I needed to hide before Abram came upstairs. I needed to find answers before he found me.
I moved toward the marked door, knowing it would probably be locked but also knowing I would regret it forever if I didn’t at least check. Suddenly, a strange noise poured from the other side. It was a song; someone was singing one word.
My name.
A repressed memory from earlier in the night tried to push its way through. The room in the hall at The Castle … I couldn’t quite grasp the picture, though. It was like a lost dream. I tried to retrieve more from my mind, but footsteps bounding up the stairs interrupted my efforts.
Abram would be here in mere seconds, and unless I found someplace to hide, he would know I had followed him.
The crescent moon symbol began to glow, and I jerked back just in time for the previously locked door to fly open. A whoosh of cinnamon-scented air burst from the open space, almost knocking me down.
I slid into the room quickly and, without touching it, the door closed behind me.
Okay, so, that’s not a good sign.
A loud crashing and then a sound like glass shattering stole my attention before I was able to take the room in. A picture had fallen off a nearby counter. When I looked down at it, my heart skidded to a stop.
The old photograph lay face up under shards of broken frame. Two men stood by a lake, smiling for the camera and showing off their latest catch: a huge catfish.
I recognized both of the men instantly. I had seen one of them in my dreams almost every night since I was a child. When I was little, it seemed I would never stop seeing his face, watching him walk away from me night after night. It was my father and, beside him, untouched by time or trend, stood Abram.
“He looks exactly the same,” I muttered, mouth agape. “How is that … that’s not possible.”
“Miss,” a tired voice croaked, breaking me from my concentration and startling the hell out of me. “Are you here to help me?”