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He took the ramp to the highway, nearly empty this early in the morning. His mouth was a firm line of determination. He drove with one hand, staring out the window with intense concentration.

She rested her head back on the seat and took her first full breath in hours.

“I rigged up a speaker,” he blurted. “Upstairs, in a bedroom.”

It took her a moment to realize what he’d said. He spared her a brief glance, taking his eyes off the road long enough to say, “I used my phone as the remote. That’s why you heard a woman’s voice saying, ‘Go.’”

He moved his attention to the road again. She was too sleep-deprived to be angry with him. “That last time, we heard the voice say, ‘Out.’”

He replied with a dismayed, “I know.”

“And the crashing sound that came from the kitchen? Was that another speaker?”

Without looking over at her, he shook his head.

“And…the footsteps?”

He gripped the steering wheel with both hands and squeezed. “No.”

“Oh.” She nodded numbly. Beyond the highway, the sun peeked over the trees. “That’s alarming.”

“I think you should stay at my house. I’d feel better knowing you were safe.” When she didn’t respond he added, “Think about it.”

Ten minutes later he pulled her red car in front of a house that, she assumed, he owned. It was almost…quaint. Cute, even. There were flower boxes on the windows, navy-blue shutters against white siding. And it was clean. Tidy.

She’d expected a bachelor pad. An über-chic lair filled with high-end electronics and modern furniture. From the outside, it looked like the kind of house with lace curtains hanging above the kitchen windows.

He killed the engine and scrubbed his face with his hands. “I’m so fucking tired.”

“Me too. I could die.”

“You nearly did.” He rested his head back and looked over at her. His smile was frayed at the edges, but it was there. “Want to come in?”

She sighed. It wasn’t a good idea, but it was tempting. She was damn tired, too.

“I don’t want you driving home after being awake all night.” He brushed her cheek with his knuckles. Her eyes sank shut. “Come on, McIntire. I have a warm bed with me in it. We’ll patch up that scratch, too.”

That sounded so much better than driving herself home. Her arms were too heavy to steer, her legs too weak to press the pedals. After spending the night with him at Willow Mansion, what was a few more hours?

He rounded the vehicle and helped her out.

“You went to that mansion alone to put a speaker upstairs,” she said as he unlocked his front door. “How’d you get in?”

“Kitchen door was sticky, but not locked.” His lips compressed as he looked down at her. “It was stupid.”

“Stupider than the mask.”

“Much stupider.”

“I’m going to sleep in your bed,” she said around a yawn. “Not have sex with you.”

“That’s fair.” He lifted her into his arms. She didn’t argue. Her legs were as heavy as sandbags. She vaguely recalled him bandaging her thigh and removing her torn pants. But the moment she put her head on his pillow, everything went blurry. Shortly after, she slipped off to dreamland.

Lily McIntire was in his bed.

Not on an air mattress in a crumbling house, but wrapped in slate gray sheets, her strawberry-blond hair spread over a pillow. He’d left her T-shirt on, but had taken her bra off—trying his damnedest not to peek at her perfect tits before tucking her in. That had taken some doing.

He’d crawled in next to her but hadn’t fallen asleep right away. Instead, he’d turned over in his mind the strange sounds in the mansion. He didn’t believe in hauntings, but he and Lily had been in the house, and he’d found nothing that would explain what he’d heard and felt.