Or was that the walls.
If she unlocks the bedroom door, it feels like there will be nothing beyond it, the house having collapsed in on itself under the weight ofits corrosion. A black void will stretch, the nothingness vast and consuming and absolute.
But she will have to open that door.
She dresses herself quickly, discarding her blood-flecked oversize sweatshirt. Digging in her dresser produces black jeans that barely go up over her belly, a sleek black turtleneck, and her thickest socks. She finds her coat in the wardrobe and buttons it to her throat. Cold, she is so endlessly cold. Jude’s toes are bare, so she finds him socks.
A tiny tap sounds at the door. She whips around, her heartbeat spooked to an immediate riot. But it’s still locked. There’s nothing there.
It had only sounded like a single fingernail, scratching.
If she crawls into bed and sings Jude to sleep, the world could look different in the morning. She could find a way to explain—
No. There is no explaining.
A headache pulses in her skull, and she can feel mold growing in a porous film behind her eyelids. It makes her want to dig fingers into her eyes and peel them out, scrub them clean and reinsert; then she will be better able to parse this situation. Then she will trust what she sees.
Around her, the walls run with blood.
“Come on, baby.” She picks up Jude, and he immediately goes limp in her arms.
She drifts to the bedroom door, pausing before her hand connects with the old brass key.Don’t be insane.There’s nothing out there. The house, she is sure, won’t notice them in the dark if she walks quickly and keeps their limbs tight to their bodies.
The house is busy eating.
Breathe deeply. After this, she can rest, she can close her eyes and let the whimper of pain twisting around her tongue finally release.Then she will cry. But first is unlocking the door and turning the knob as the hinges sigh and darkness sweeps into the bedroom with a silky, seductive whisper.See? There’s nothing—
The door swings open wide.
A shape grows in front of her.
Inked in darkness.
Solidifying with shocking clarity.
Elodie screams. She lunges backward. Jude slips from her arms, and she is screaming and screaming and—
Bren’s bloodied hand clamps around her throat.
TWENTY-THREE
Terror is a flammable spillacross her face, match lit, horror unspooling, undefined and unstoppable. Her scream cuts off as the hand blackened with blood squeezes her throat and then hurls her to the ground.
She hits hard, her gasp tipping into a wail of pure devastation. Her baby.Her baby.The back of her head hits the carpet and air punches from lungs already drowning in pools of brackish water. Jude is no longer in her arms. She lost him. No, this monster—
Took him.
“JUDE.”She scrambles backward, clawing in the dark for her son, but the single bedside lamp splutters, electricity surging on and off. She can’t see.
where is her son where is her son where is
The monster lunges for her again, and she tries to propel herselfbackward, kicking wildly, her body a mad thing. Too late, she realizes her mistake. How she has backed up against the huge mahogany bed frame and boxed herself in. The bulb flickers frantically as her spine hits the bedside table and the lamp rocks, throwing light in chaotic streaks across the room. She is still clawing for Jude, screaming for him, trying to find him as the monster leers over her and blots out the world.
He is a thing of terror, of ruin, half of him opened up and spilling out. When Bren drops to his knees in front of her, his claw reaches out and he
s n a t c h e s
a fistful of her curls with a brutal twist. Then he slams her head against the bedside table.
