I whirled around, my heart leaping into my chest. “Who’s there? Harrison?”
No one answered.
I stalked down the hall, glancing into the rooms on either side of me, searching the shadows for an answer. The door to the Yellow Room was shut – the only one in the hall, and I knew I left it open earlier – the heavy wood held back by a brass stopper.
It’s okay. It was just a gust of wind blowing the door shut.Someone must have opened a window. Which was ridiculous, because of the raging storm outside, but the Yellow Room was at the back of the house, where the eaves hung lower, and it could get quite stuffy.
My fingers closed around the handle. My breath came out in short gasps.It’s nothing. It’s just this creepy old house capturing your imagination.But I couldn’t stop the niggling, tight sensation in my chest, the scratching on the back of my neck that signaled someone watching me.
Willing my heart to return to normal, I pushed the door open and stepped inside. The windows were all closed, and there was no breeze in the room.Of course, the storm could have rattled the frame so much the window slid down.I gulped back the lump in my throat as I crossed the room. The skin along my arms prickled, overwhelming me with a sense that I wasn’t alone in the room. I scanned all around, but I couldn’t see anyone, and there was nowhere for someone to hide unless they crawled into the piano.
My fingers shook as I drew back the curtains. All the windows were tightly latched. Not a breeze or draft touched my bare arms.
So how had the door slammed shut?Everyone’s inside the Blue Room.It couldn’t have been any of them.
Except for Harrison… I cupped my hands against the glass, but I could barely even see the gatehouse lights through the downpour. I picked up the house phone from its cradle beside the window seat, my hand trembling, and dialed his extension.
“Gidday,” Harrison’s gruff voice answered.
The words rushed out. “Hi, Harrison, it’s me. You weren’t just down at the house, were you? Specifically, in the Yellow Room?”
“Not me. I didn’t want to be a bother while Madame entertained her guest, so I knocked off early.” I could hear a TV blaring in the background. “Why do you ask?”
“The door slammed, but there’s no one here, and no windows open. And—” I paused. I couldn’t explain the weird feeling in my gut without sounding insane.
“Always strange noises in that house.” A crunching sound as Harrison opened a packet of something. “Knocking in the walls. Footsteps where there should be no footsteps. Cold spots. Clare complained about food missing from the kitchen.”
I remembered the three missing chimichangas, and a fresh wave of unease rocked through my body. “You might’ve mentioned this before.”
Harrison munched on his dinner for a moment. “But it can all be explained, can’t it? Rats stealin’ the food, drafts between the walls, old houses creaking and settling, rotten rich kids pulling pranks.”
“Yeah. You’re right. Thanks, Harrison.” I hung up the phone and turned back to the door.
I wanted so badly to believe he was right – there was a logical explanation for what happened. Of course, if this was a horror movie, Harrison would be the killer for sure – the harmless old groundskeeper with a sordid past and thirst for blood.
But I knew Harrison couldn’t have been here. He picked up the phone in the gatehouse only a couple of minutes after the door slammed. Even a fit person couldn’t have made it back down the driveway in time, and not in this storm. Besides, the windows were all latched from the inside. There was no way out of the room unless someone crawled up the chimney like Santa Claus.
My eye caught the bookshelf beside the window.
I froze.
Iknewwhen I dusted that shelf earlier today it had been perfectly in order. Now, several books had been pulled out and scattered across the floor.
I gathered up the books and shoved them back onto the shelf. A sliver of ice crawled up my spine as my fingers curled around a battered leather volume.
Grimm’s Fairy Tales.
Odd, it lookedexactlylike a book I had when I was a child. My father got it for me as a gift when he returned from a tour of Germany. He used to read a chapter to me every night before I went to sleep. When he was on tour, he’d call me as often as he could from the other side of the world, and we’d read the stories together over the phone. He did the best voices – I broke into giggles at his rumbling monsters and cackling witches. When he disappeared, I threw the book into the trash.
Lightning cracked outside the window, and the raw energy of the storm sizzled in my veins as I held that book in my hands, memories I didn’t want to recall flooding my mind.
I flipped open the cover.
My heart flew to my throat.
The book clattered from my hands, the frontispiece falling open on the floor.
There, written in looping script across the corner of the page, was the message:
