“Why?” Lisette asked.
“Because you’ve been on a bus.” I suppressed a shudder. “I’d prefer to burn your clothes, but that isn’t practical, so we’ll have to make do.”
She gave me a glare that was pure Violet, and then she let out a gusty sigh. “Fine.”
“The bathroom is this way.” I led her down the hall and pointed inside. “There’s a towel. You can use my nice shampoo and conditioner. And for the love of God, brush your hair. I’ll wait out here. Don’t take too long.”
“I don’t need you to babysit my shower.”
“And yet here I am, giving you no choice. Now go.”
She made an impressive display of closing the door just a little too hard, then turning the lock loudly before clomping around in the bathroom. It was truly bitchy and well done. I liked her already. I might have no use for children, but teenagers were my kind of people.
I stayed outside her door as she showered. Vail and Violet talked softly in the kitchen, and then they were quiet. I listened for sounds, footsteps, anything that wasn’t the rain. The hair on the back of my neck didn’t rise. I heard nothing except the normal sounds of a house.
When Lisette finished, I escorted her back to Violet’s bedroom and sat on the bed with my back to her while she dressed. “This is stupid,” she said as I heard clothing rustle. “Do you think I’ll run away again?”
“It would be convenient if you would,” I replied. “But no, I don’t think you will.”
“Don’t you want to know how I got here?”
“I’m not curious in the least.” No one had told me, and I didn’t care to ask.
“I shouldn’t have come.”
“Are you expecting me to disagree?”
“Don’t worry, you don’t have to put up with me for long. I’ll go home tomorrow.”
I sighed. She was almost—almost—as dramatic as I was. I turned around to see her dressed in jeans and an unflattering T-shirt, her damp hair hanging bedraggled as she shoved her belongings miserably into her backpack. Her eyes were red.
“Put that down and sit on the edge of the bed.” I gentled my voice. “Please.”
Lisette dropped the backpack with a thump and sat.
“I’m horrible,” I said as I slid across the bed to sit cross-legged behind her. “But I have top-shelf shampoo and conditioner. Admit it.”The bottles in the shower contained the very best, most expensive brand. My hair was my livelihood, along with my hands.
“It’s pretty nice,” Lisette admitted.
“Of course it is.” I put my fingers into her hair, combing out the strands. “I also make excellent French braids.” I sorted her hair into pieces, and she sat still without protest. “Now,” I continued, “I’m going to braid, and I’m going to tell you a story. You’re going to sit and listen. When you decided to come here, you decided you were an adult. So I have no choice but to tell you the truth.”
I saw her shoulders tense, but she still didn’t protest, and she didn’t pull away.
I braided her hair, and I spoke. I told her about Ben, about the day he disappeared, the lack of footprints in the snow, how we’d shouted ourselves hoarse looking for him. I told her how he’d called us home. How we’d come, and we’d found Ben, but we’d found something else, too. Someone else. A thing that had taken Ben, that was still in this house, that was sometimes a shadow in the woods, following a ten-year-old girl as she walked. A thing that kept the neighborhood children away.
Lisette didn’t speak. She didn’t argue, even when I told her that Ben’s original name was Edward Whitten, and he’d died in 1906.
“I know it isn’t a happy story,” I said as I finished the braid and tied the end with Lisette’s hair elastic. “But you see why we’re worried for you, especially your mother. You see why we don’t think you’re safe.”
Finally, she spoke. “Dad says ghosts aren’t real.”
“Men say a lot of things,” I replied. “They don’t know as much as they think they do.”
“Mom is crazy.”
“Is she?”
She squirmed in annoyance under my hands as I tucked away errant pieces of hair. “Don’t ask me. I’m askingyou.”
