“People have been known to disappear in the past. Visitors to Lilyvale. I think this is where they were buried. Walled in.”
So much bullshit, I can’t help but laugh out loud.
Lane sighs. “I think this is a passage to the store.”
Now that makes more sense. “Why would you think that?”
“Cos’ there’s the same one in the store’s basement.”
I shrug. “Why don’t you open them up?”
“Noah would have a heart attack.”
I consider this for a second. “Do you need his permission?”
“I like her thinking,” Lane says.
Beck shrugs. “Or we might find bodies.”
“Or we might find bodies,” I agree, an unexpected giddiness spreading through me as our easy banter carries on.
“Which would explain the weird noises at night,” Beck says as we retreat upstairs.
“I didn’t hear anything last night.”
“Oh, you will. Eventually.”
Jesus. Are they trying to scare me? We’re a little old for this, but I’m still having more fun than I expected. No wonder Noah is so protective of them.
I didn’t grow up with siblings, and with the way I ping-ponged in and out of Emerald Creek, I never could create a steady group of childhood friends. Besides the Bitch Brigade, which Kiara consolidated to help save Grace’s spa last summer, this is the closest I’m getting to having my group. I’ll take it and enjoy it, and hope it continues once the marriage with Noah is over.
“So this is where she hanged herself,” Beck says when we’re in the powder room of the main house. He’s referring to a local legend, presenting it like it’s this morning’s front-page story.
“Uh-huh.”
“So… like, if you hear your name at night, just don’t get up,” Lane says, looking dead serious.
An eerie shadow floats about two feet above and behind Beck for a fleeting second, and warmth envelops me. “Gotcha,” I say, my gaze pulled upward, a smile forming on my lips. It’s got to be the way the sun hits the old glass panel at this time of day, and they knew it would happen.
And yet.
They’re trying to spook me, but instead, it’s the unfamiliar feeling ofcoming homethat seizes me.
It has to be because Lane and Beck are sharing their family lore with me.
Beck jumps, looking up. “Fucking shit,” he curses, slapping his nape as if a mosquito was biting him.
I laugh out loud, feeling part of something. Even if it’s pretend, to me it feels real. And after Mom’s brush-off this morning and the dread of facing Kiara, I needed this more than I want to admit.
thirteen
Willow
“Ican’t believe Noah never gave you the grand tour,” Lane says once Beck is gone and she proceeds to show me each room, one after the other, starting at the front. She huffs. “It’s not a secret I didn’t like Anika,” she says, which is actually news to me, “but you… you’re one of us. You need to know this place inside and out.
“Big picture, this wing is the oldest, built in the 1820s on the ruins of the original house built in the 1790s. That one burned to the ground…” She stops herself, then adds, “but you know that, right?”
Why would I know that? “Uh… no.”
