Total pages in book: 153
Estimated words: 146289 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 731(@200wpm)___ 585(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 146289 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 731(@200wpm)___ 585(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
I should drive past him at full speed because the man on the road might be the man who’s been murdering women in these parts, and stopping for him is the dumbest thing I could do. And yet my foot is coming off the gas because even though my aunt’s words flash through my head—don’t let him in—and even though I just heard about a possible serial killer, there’s a terribly unwise and reckless part of me that wants to roll down the window and say his name.
Alasdair.
I give my head a shake, trying to clear the fog that feels less like my usual fibro brain and more like the weather that snuck into my bones. I drive past him at five miles an hour, and as the car passes him, he doesn’t turn his head. He doesn’t lift a hand. He doesn’t seem to register me or the car at all.
Probably better that way.
I watch him in the rearview as my speed picks up. He’s still walking, head down now, his dark hair shadowing his face. The fog closes around him. Within a hundred meters, I can’t see him anymore.
I drive home with both hands on the wheel, white-knuckled.
I lock the front door behind me. I double check the lock on the back door. Then I stand in the middle of the kitchen for a beat, trying to ground myself.
The cottage holds its breath with me.
Then the cottage exhales.
There’s a single soft sound from upstairs.
I freeze in place, holding my breath, my eyes seeking the ceiling.
What the fuck was that?
I wait for it to come again.
And it does.
Three steps.
Footsteps, or what would be footsteps if the cottage had anyone else in it. Slow, light, the kind of step a person takes when they are trying not to be heard. Across the guest bedroom floor…
Then it stops.
I do. Not. Breathe.
The cottage settles around me into its ordinary silence. The fridge hums. A bird outside calls once and stops. The rowan at the front step taps the window in the wind.
I immediately reason with myself, tell myself the cottage is old. Wood expands and contracts. Hinges sigh. Old houses make sounds people who have never lived in old houses don’t understand.
It’s just settling. Old houses settle.
And yet I’m having a hard time listening to reason.
I take Effie’s pen-knife from the kitchen drawer because I am not going up the stairs without something in my hand. I unfold it. The blade is short. It is more for opening letters than for anything else, but I could get a good stab out of it. The eyes, I’ll make sure to aim for the eyes.
I climb the stairs, the steps creaking loudly, which would make it impossible for me to ambush anyone up there.
Not that I plan on ambushing anyone. The knife is for defensive stabbing purposes only. I don’t even know why I’m going up there. I should probably run out of the house, though I’m afraid if I do that, I’ll have to live out one of the scariest scenes from The Amityville Horror, running onto the driveway and looking back at the upstairs window to find a giant pig with red eyes staring at me.
Somehow, despite the fear gripping my throat, I get to the second floor and see the guest bedroom door is ajar. I’m pretty sure I left it closed because I was worried about drafts and it making the door bang around, but maybe I didn’t close it properly. In fact, it is a bit breezy out, maybe what I heard was the door banging around a few times.
I take in a deep, shaking breath and push the door the rest of the way open with the back of my hand.
The room is empty.
The low rafters are above me and I duck instinctively, the way I have learned to duck since I cracked my head on them. The single bed is against the far wall under the small window. The pale quilt is smoothed flat.
But there’s something on top of it.
Something small and white…
I creep forward a step.
Is that a…?
I stop and gasp.
There’s a fucking jawbone on the bed.
It’s the shape of a canine’s lower jaw, the small sharp teeth still in it, dark at the roots. Probably a fox. Set on the bed like it’s been positioned there with intent. Centered. The teeth pointing toward the door.
Toward me.
I do not move for a long time.
I stand in the doorway with the knife in my hand and the smell of the old room in my nose and the jaw on the pillow watching me with its small dark teeth. The part of me that wanted to call this the cottage settling has gone really fucking quiet.
Why is there a jawbone here? Is a good question.
When did it get here? That’s an even better one.