“Leave it,” I ordered. “You can come back for it later.”
Netty looked hesitant. “I don’t know, Alice…”
“Who employs you at this house, Netty?” I demanded, pushing away from the corner and slinking slowly toward her. “If you like your job, you will do what I say.”
She took afew steps back, her eyes going wide. “Mr. Proffitt promised me—”
I sprung forward, coming within inches of her face. She pressed herself as flat as possible against the wall, her eyes squeezed shut, her head turned away from me.
“Do not believe a word he says,” I ground out near her ear. “He’ll use you as he has the rest, make you and your sister vessels for his hell spawn. Has he promised that he will always take care of you? That he will always love you? Has he fucked you yet, Netty?Hashe?”
Netty ducked away from me and ran toward the door. But I was faster. I grabbed the silver dome and swung it, striking her in the back of her head. She crumpled to the ground, unconscious from the blow.
I tossed the dome aside and fled from the room. Turning to close the door behind me, I paused to survey the place that had been my prison. Carved into the walls over and over again until nearly all the surface was covered was my warning to anyone else who followed.
The Devil’s child must die.
I crept out of the attic and down the servants’ stairs to the kitchen. Finding it empty, I hurried in, snatched a knife from the table, then tiptoed back up the stairs until I reached the top floor where the nursery was located.
The Devil’s child must die.
I could hear a child singing softly and went forward before I changed my mind.
The Devil’s child must die.
It had to be done.
The Devil’s child must die.
For his own good.
The Devil’s child must die.
I couldn’t let him become a monster. Not my David.
The Devil’s child must die…
The nursery door was only half closed. I pushed it open slowly so as not to startle him. He sat at his little desk, drawing. His hand stilled when he saw me standing in the doorway.
He said nothing—merely watched me as I stepped inside and closed the door behind me.
I bolted upright, a scream on my lips, but I choked it back before I could make a sound. Tears streamed down my face unchecked as I scanned the room, assuring myself that I was in my apartment and not the nightmare that had intruded on sleep that had been so, so sweet since I’d married Whit.
As the adrenaline dissipated, I began to shiver, not just from my sweat-soaked pajamas and sheets, but the horror I’d witnessed in my dream.
“Zellie?” Whit reached for me, wrapping me in his arms. “What’s wrong? What’s happened?”
“I saw her, Whit,” I sobbed. “I saw her. She killed him.”
“Who, baby?”
“Her name is Alice,” I said, pulling back and wiping my eyes. “She’s the screaming woman, the one I keep seeing. The one I saw on the first night here.”
I gasped, suddenly sensing a presence nearby. I threw off the covers and ran down the hall to the living room and pulled open the apartment door, stumbling out into the main hallway. At the far end of the hall, the door was open, the white curtains billowing in the breeze.
And then I saw her—Alice, knife in hand, blood splattered across her nightgown, her arms, her face, a macabre testament to the heartbreaking scene I’d witnessed in my dream. Her black, empty sockets where eyes had once been bored into me as if trying to communicate the pain, the desperation, the madness that had driven her to such horrific acts. Then she raised the knife and plunged it into her stomach, over and over again.
“No!” I screamed and would have lurched forward to stop her from mutilating herself if Whit hadn’t wrapped his arms around me, keeping mewhere I was.
