Chapter 6
The address Donny gives me is in rural Pennsylvania, four hours and fifty-seven minutes away. As soon as I press GO and the blue line appears, I reach for the gear shift, but my hand pauses.
How am I going to explain this to Ray?
The question makes me reach for the plastic container again, but nothing comes up. Ray gave me a chance when nobody else would. He’s been nothing but kind to me, and now I’m bailing on him with such little notice.
But I need to do this, so I spend ten minutes typing and deleting the same message:
Hey Ray, an emergency came up, and I have to leave town for a while. I’m sorry to leave you hanging. Thanks for everything.
The dots appear. Then:
RAY DAD’S FRIEND
Take care of yourself. Job will be here when you’re ready.
That makes me feel worse, but what choice do I have?
The GPS on my phone gives up after I turn onto a winding road somewhere on the outskirts of whatever tiny town I’m in. I try to remember the instructions Donny gave me:
Turn right at the red barn. Follow that road until you reach a rusted mailbox, then turn onto the gravel drive.
I haven’t seen a mailbox in miles, so when a rusted hunk of metal appears, I know I’m in the right place. My car shudders over the gravel as it winds through the trees. Bob, who’s been super chill during this entire trip, starts panting.
I have to say, I’d feel more comfortable if I were going somewhere in the city, but I guess you can’t drag a possessed serial killer into your house kicking and screaming in a suburban neighborhood without someone calling the cops.
I’m very aware that going to an isolated location to move in with two random men I met in a parking lot could be a terrible idea, but then again, so would sleeping in my car and waiting for the next dead person to show up.
But you know what else I’m very aware of?
I’m going to see Nico again.
Even the thought makes my stomach do this swooping thing that makes me glad I haven’t eaten anything more than saltines.
I stopped at a rest area an hour ago to give Bob a chance to stretch his legs and give me the opportunity to change into a pair of clean clothes, brush my teeth, and wash all the vomit and mysterious goo off my face.
Even though Donny told me the job was mine on the phone, I’m going to treat this like an interview.
I need to look professional, and not like I was up all night puking.
I also need to do my best not to think about how Nico’s going to be my coworker, because the things I want to do to that man are far from professional.
What the hell, Eden? You met him, like, five minutes ago. What is wrong with you?
My experience with men consists entirely of one-time sex with guys I’ve met at random jobs and never seen again (usually in motel rooms or the bed of their pickups), and Dylan, who thinks foreplay is asking if I’m ready. That’s what’s wrong with me.
The driveway ends at an iron gate that’s at least ten feet tall with arrows on the top that look designed to skewer any people who try to climb over. I stretch out my window to press the button on the call box.
“Eden?” Donny’s voice crackles through the speaker.
“Hi.”
The gate opens with a hum, and I drive into the property.
An iron fence with the same sharp arrows stretches from the gate and disappears into the trees.
I come around the corner of the driveway, leaning over the steering wheel to take in what I expect is going to be a very scary and very haunted-looking house, and find—
A farmhouse.
It’s unassuming, and three stories tall, with weathered gray siding and a wraparound porch.
The house stands alone in a small clearing, surrounded by dense trees with skeletal branches reaching toward it like spindly fingers.
There’s a small brown shed sitting to one side in the back, a detached garage (also brown), and this enormous barn on the other side of the house, painted the exact shade of red a child would choose when drawing a farm.
The panel van is parked out front, next to a Jeep and a dark blue pickup that has seen some serious use.
I sling on my backpack and set Bob on the grass, keeping one hand hovering under his stomach in case his legs give out. He wobbles on his cast as he pees, and only when he’s done do I turn to what I sincerely hope won’t be the setting of my murder documentary.
It occurs to me that no one knows where I am right now, which seems like a bad idea considering I’m about to walk into a stranger’s house in the middle of nowhere.
I find Tori in my contacts. Tori is probably the closest thing I have to a friend.
She’s a year older than me, and we were in the same foster placement for two years when I was fifteen and sixteen.
She’s living in Long Island City now with her boyfriend and is so busy—we haven’t talked since I wished her happy birthday over the summer, but she’s the only person in my life who I can send this mildly insane text to.
I type out the address and ‘if I don’t text you by tomorrow call the police’ and hit send.
Bob’s cone catches on the grass as he follows me across the lawn. The main door is all the way on the left of the facade, and there are three windows to the right of it, so the house looks asymmetrical.
I look for a doorbell, but instead find a cereal box taped to the door, scribbled with:
DOORBELL’S FUCKED
YELL DING DONG
I peel up the cardboard to see a doorbell with a cracked button and a piece of Scotch tape over it with DO NOT PRESS written on it.
I try knocking. Nothing happens.
I can feel a smile tugging at my mouth.
Clearing my throat makes the rope burn ache, but it doesn’t hurt as much as yesterday. Maybe all that vomiting soothed it. “Ding dong?”
No answer. The wind rustles through the trees.
Hold on—Donny knows I’m here. Understanding settles over me, and I let out a small laugh.
Is Donny messing with me right now?
Probably. But honestly, that’s kind of funny, and if he is, I can’t afford to make a bad impression.
I’m opening my mouth to yell ‘DING DONG’ loud enough to make the crows fly out of the trees, when the door opens.
Nico stands in front of me, and all the words I was about to say flee my brain.
He’s traded yesterday’s leather jacket for a plain black hoodie and jeans that hug him in all the right places.
Even the slouchy hoodie can’t hide the way his chest and shoulders fill it out.
I notice a couple of seconds too late that I’m staring at him, because he’s even more gorgeous than I remembered. How is that possible?
I’ve been around good-looking guys before, but no man has ever made me feel like this, like… my entire body got plugged into a live wire. I pull my eyes back up to his because standing here gaping at him is not the good impression I need to make.
“Do you make everyone do that? The ‘ding dong’ thing?” I jerk my thumb at the sign. “Does the mailman do it?”
Bob growls from between my feet, sounding very threatening for something that weighs less than a water bottle.
Nico’s expression is unreadable. “Why did you come here?”
“I accepted Donny’s job offer.”
“You need to leave,” he says, his voice urgent and almost desperate. “Right now.”
I shouldn’t be surprised. I should have expected this. Yesterday, he looked about as happy as Bob at the vet when Donny offered me this job. I shouldn’t have made so many jokes about punching him in the face.
But I really need help. I can’t just go back to my car and hope I make it through the night.
“I know yesterday was weird,” I say, “and I’m sorry for going back on what I said, but Donny told me to come here, and I need—”
“What do you need?” Nico steps onto the porch with such intense energy that I step away from him. “More salt? Iron? I can teach you some basic protection techniques. Give you some supplies. But you can’t stay here.”
“I need this job,” I say. “I need to learn what’s going on, because I had no way of protecting myself when a dead guy rearranged my organs in my car last night, and I don’t want that to happen again.”
Nico opens his mouth to reply, but then his brain seems to catch up to my words. “Excuse me?”
“A dead guy came up through the floor of my car and stabbed his hand inside my stomach?” I make a claw with my hand, miming the motion.
Nico still looks serious. I can’t help myself.
“In case it wasn’t clear, I meant he rearranged my organs in a literal, very bad way—not in a figurative, very good way that would make me want him to do it again. ”
“I know what you meant,” he says, deadpan.
“Right.” I give him a close-lipped smile. “Can I come in?”
Nico grabs the door, and I get the sinking feeling that he’s about to slam it in my face.
“Nicholas, is that Eden?” Donny’s muffled voice carries from somewhere down the hallway. “Can you show her to my office?”
Nico closes his eyes. It’s obvious he’d rather do anything else, but he throws a sharp, “Yes,” over his shoulder and turns into the house.
I guess that’s my cue.
I step into a narrow entrance hall, patting my leg to encourage Bob to follow.
The lighting in here is dim, and it smells of mothballs and cinnamon candles.
There’s a coat rack to my right covered with jackets of all colors and sizes, umbrellas, baseball caps, and one of those old-timey felt hats the newsies wore in the musical.
The wainscoting is dark wood, but the upper part of the wall is covered by detailed floral wallpaper, which in turn is decorated by watercolor paintings of birds.
Shoes of all styles and sizes have been piled by the door, which means more people live here than just Nico and Donny, and at least one of them is a girl, unless Nico is squeezing his feet into those tiny wedge sandals.
I untie my boots but leave my jacket on, then turn toward Nico, whose hands are shoved in his pockets as he watches me.