Doesn’t she ever wonder about her? Does she miss her on her birthday? Does the day she went missing haunt her each year? And, if any of that is true, how did she manage to hide it from me so completely? Why would she?
Anger and sadness wash over me like waves, competing with the settled, older, and wiser devastation and fury that have been there for months already. It doesn’t matter. None of it matters anymore—what happened here, what Mom is hiding from me.
Eventually, she’ll come around. For now, I have to protect my daughter. Taylor deserves all of me. She deserves for me to make Foxglove the magical refuge I know it can be.
I have to forget about what happened here and focus on the future.
When I open my eyes, the house is dark. It takes a few seconds for me to orient myself and remember where I am and why. Foxglove has a distinct scent—damp, floral, and earthy—that brings me back to reality before anything else.
I sit up on the couch, my shoulders and neck stiff. I can’t get my bedroom set up quickly enough. I didn’t think it was worth it to bring my mattress back into the living room again for just myself, but another night on the couch might just be the death of me.
I rub my eyes, checking the time. It’s nearly two in the morning. I roll the predicament around in my mind. Should I try to go back to sleep or make my way into the bedroom and move my things around to make space for the mattress on the floor? I definitely don’t have time to put my bed frame together, which is what I should’ve done in the first place, but it’s currently buried behind boxes.
With a stretch, I stand.
Then…freeze.
Slowly, oh so slowly, I turn my head toward the sound I just heard.
It’s the sound of the doorknob. Across the living room, someone is turning the knob at the front door, rattling the metal handle.Is that what woke me up in the first place?
With the lock freshly changed, there’s no chance anyone has the key.
Unless I didn’t lock it after dinner.
My throat constricts as I recall the evening, trying to decide my best course of action. Phone in hand, I take a cautious step toward the door. I could call 911 right now, but it would be half an hour before they’d get to me. I grab an iron fire poker from the stand next to the stone fireplace. It’s old, but heavy. Its handle is ornate, with loops and swirls that settle into my palm easily, giving me a good grip.
I lift it as I move closer to the door, then, all at once, I flip on the porch light.
My breathing catches as I wait to see what they’ll do. They know they’re caught. That this home isn’t empty anymore.
Seconds later, the doorknob rattles again. Whoever it is, they aren’t leaving.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
SARAH WILDE - 1655
The wind outside rattles the house and its windows, whistling under the eaves above. The storm rages, shaking the trees surrounding Foxglove so terribly they sound fearful themselves, whispering warnings of what’s to come.
But perhaps that’s not about the storm at all.
Here in the belly of Foxglove, all is still, but I can feel in my bones that all is not well. All is not right. I place my hand against the stones of the hidden door, pressing it there to keep myself from doing something that might make this worse somehow.
I’m taut as a wire as I listen, my body aching with the need to go. To do. To save.
I wish to believe my instincts have deceived me, but there is no mistaking that sound. The tread of boot, of firm leather sole, upon the wood of the floor above my head, drawing nearer. I remember the sound well from my days as a young girl, the time my mother descended the stairs of the oak to save me from this very passage when the air became too tight around my lungs.
Except these shoes have not come to do any saving.
His boot comes into view on the stairs, following the light from her candle.
My Anna is just on the other side of this wall, just two arm reaches away, but I cannot get to her. She doesn’t know I am here, but then again…neither does he.
My Anna. My little lamb. Quiet and gentle as she has always been as she plays with her dolls in the cellar, her safe place from the storms. Oblivious to the monster descending.
If I had not gone to the meadow to collect herbs before the rain, she would be with me, and this man would not have found her. This monster would not have found her.
Here in my hiding place, I weigh my options.
