Chapter 48
Chapter Forty-Eight
T oo many parts of Rose’s body ached to single out one muscle.
The family and some of their friends had been at it most of yesterday, moving specific pieces of furniture out of the main house, along with the packed boxes.
Willow took the dining chairs, three at a time, to her garage with Ada’s help.
Broome took most of his inherited pieces in his pickup.
Thorne made two trips, one with Aspen’s boxes and the few pieces of furniture she’d inherited.
She’d rented a storage facility in Asheville, a choice that didn’t quite make sense.
She and Gavin had a large house fifteen minutes up the hill in the Opal Point subdivision.
The second trip had been Thorne’s stuff.
Finn helped load items into Broome and Thorne’s pickups, but he hadn’t been able to stay. He’d made a special trip to help for a few hours amongst a round of night shifts.
Mack Daggett and Zane Sheffield showed up to help early afternoon, staying for pizza after the pickups and cars were loaded. Ada joined them as well. Rose coordinated a date with Broome and Thorne to move the last of her furniture from the cottage.
Once everyone left, Rose locked the doors, set the alarm, and climbed the three flights of stairs to her childhood room. She’d promised Broome she’d live in the house from now on. She hadn’t mentioned where she’d be sleeping.
It’d been almost two years since she’d slept in her twin bed, when she’d first returned to Evers Hollow. It felt too small. She tossed, turned, and tried to recapture the position she used to sleep in within this room.
When she drifted off, nightmares came, twisted ones, of the gruesome moments from the past weeks. She woke. Sweat clung to her. Her chest felt tight. Her heart pounded in her ears. A glance at the alarm clock made her curse. It was just after midnight.
The moon must be up, close to full. Pearly light leaked around the edges of the curtains.
She reached for her water bottle. It wasn’t on her bedside table.
She must have left it downstairs. Slipping from her bed, she grabbed her robe.
In bare feet, she left her room. A glass of water or a cup of chamomile tea would settle her, wipe away haunting memories of decaying teeth and a vice-like grip.
She held onto the handrail as she went downstairs, then headed toward the kitchen.
The faucet squeaked as she filled a glass. She stood at the sink; her gaze focused on the cottage she’d lived in for almost two years. It looked lonely, less welcoming. The mums she’d planted in the pots outside the door were fading.
The bright moon edged the tips of the forest, enough to remind her the trees stood just as they had for every Everson that got up in the middle of the night for a glass of water.
She should go back to her room, get another six hours of sleep. Around her, the house was a combination of eerie quiet and creaky loud. As if each wall needed to settle a microscopic amount at night.
Glass empty, she placed it in the sink. She glided out of the kitchen, toward the foot of the stairs.
A single loud thump came from the front door. It startled her. She wrapped her arms around herself as if that alone would save her. Her steps came to a halt in the moonlit room. Was the doorknob turning?
Another thump, louder. She flinched. The middle of the door flexed as if someone shoved against it. Its wood protested but held.
She backed away, her eyes fixed on the door as she did so.
Her cell phone was upstairs, in her room. The table at the base of the stairs held a cordless phone for the landline. Her fingers wrapped around it. She tore her gaze away from the door to dial 9-1-1. She hunkered down behind a nearby chair and waited.
“9-1-1, what’s your emergency?”
Her words were brief to the woman on the other end of the line. She’d have help in minutes.
Another thud. Sharper. A crack of wood followed.
The house alarm triggered its shrill, repetitive sequence.
Rose sprang up and ran for the closest room, phone still in hand.
She scrambled into the library. There was no lock on the door.
She glanced at the secret hidden nook she used to hide in behind the bookshelves.
Only a child could fit in there. She looked around for another option.
She crawled beneath one of the heavy desks, pulling its chair toward her a tad. Then waited.
She should have gone upstairs. It held multiple hiding places. She could disappear for hours.
Her heart pounded in her ears as she waited for the next thud, another impact that cracked the door. Unlikely that she would hear it from here over the alarm, but still she listened.
She clutched the phone, her other hand over one ear. Sound pulsed outside the room. “I’m under a desk—in the library.”
“Smart thinking. Stay on the line. Cops are one minute out.”
“Okay. Sorry about the alarm.”
“No worries. Stay hidden. They’ll be there soon.”
She listened, ignoring the emerging kink in her neck as she hugged her knees to stay as small as possible. All she heard was the sound of her own breath, the alarm in the distance, and occasional reassurances from the feminine voice on the line.
The crunch of wheels on gravel reached her ears. And the slam of two car doors.
“Cops are on site, miss.”
Zane Sheffield and his partner, Ashley, found nothing but footprints and scuffs around the house. Along with a single crack in the door.
Zane said, “Good thing this is made of actual wood.”
Rose didn’t ask what would’ve happened if it’d been made of something else.
He looked above the entrance to the security camera, over the door. “Does that work?”
“Yes.” She hadn’t checked the feed yet. The security company had replaced the broken front camera after the last incident. She’d objected to the ugly wire cage encasing it, but Broome convinced her the cage would be temporary.
“Know where the feed goes?”
“I can access it on my phone and my computer. Broome can too.”
Zane shone a light upward as if to check something. “From here, the wires look good. Let’s look at your phone. See if you got some footage of your intruder.”
Intruder. But he hadn’t gotten in, at least not through the front door. Was there such a word as an outruder ?
She tamped down a sudden desire to laugh. Tears would be more appropriate to the situation, but she felt depleted. A snort came out of her.
As if he understood, Zane gave her a pitying look. “Can I call someone for you? Broome’s not that far away.”
“No, I’ll be okay. Don’t call him. He needs his sleep. His toddler is teething.”
Zane seemed hesitant to accept her answer, but nodded. “I’ll get a patrol car to drive by the place on their rounds. We’ll check every building on the property before we leave.”
Zane and Ashley were thorough, like Reggie and Mack days before.
The house was empty, as were the cottages.
The garden shed held only varmints. Recent activity from the cameras showed a tall, dark hooded figure.
They wore gloves and never looked up at the camera.
A large wooden planter lay on its side, dirt spilling out onto the front porch.
The footage confirmed it’d been used on the door. Zane bagged it as evidence.
It took her time to settle back into her childhood bed, to calm herself enough to close her eyes. She told herself no thief would relish climbing three flights of stairs to find her, not when the pricey valuables were on the lower floors.
Rose woke late the next morning, groggy from last night. After a cup of tea and some yogurt, she entered the woods for a morning hike. She passed other townsfolk, running or walking their dogs. She greeted each one.
Her clothes clung to her skin as she exited the woods and moved toward the house. Sweat burned her eyes. She used the hem of her tank top to wipe her face and neck.
She took the front steps and almost tripped before she grabbed the railing.
Nausea filled her as she took in the latest addition to Briar House’s front porch along with the sickly smell of sweet and decay.
It hadn’t been there last night. Reversing her steps, she pulled out her cell and walked around to the kitchen side of the house.
If this crazy kept up, she would be on a first name basis with the entire police department.
When she hung up, she emptied her stomach into the pink azaleas across from the kitchen steps.
She lowered herself onto the steps and curled her fingers into her hair. This had to stop. There was no space in her life for continual fear.
Her phone pinged. She removed it from her pocket, expecting a text from Reggie or Mack.
Damn. Her editor. She’d forgotten to email Elise her revisions.
She tapped a quick response.
Rose
Will send revisions soon. Dead animal on my porch. Waiting for cops.
.
As she expected, her phone rang. She touched decline. Seconds later, it pinged.
Elise
What the hell is going on there?
Rose slid her phone back into her pocket.
Elise would have to wait. The revisions were done.
Elise would have thoughts on them, the sort that’d be rough to hear.
She rubbed two fingers against the side of her temple.
What her book needed seemed out of reach, locked inside her amongst her grief, fear, and anger. And her feelings for Finn.
An EHPD vehicle spit gravel as it tore into the drive. Mack was at the wheel.