Cruel Minds (22 page)

A wave of claustrophobia passed through him as he made his way along the corridor. This house was beginning to feel like a tomb. He checked the art room, then the meditation room. Both were empty and silent. Moving into the foyer, he saw Helen’s blood and froze on the spot. He’d never been so afraid. Stepping around, he rattled the locked door to Pamela’s office, then checked the front door. Both bolts had been pulled back.

A sliver of fear slipped down the back of his t-shirt. He turned and faced the stairs.

“Emily? Are you up there?”

He already knew the answer.

Cursing under his breath, he took two steps at a time, until he reached the landing. Silence greeted him. He fumbled along the wall until he found the light switch. Orange ceiling lights flickered to life.

Jerome moved along the corridor. He knocked on Emily’s door, then opened it without waiting for an answer. As expected, the room was empty. He made a quick search of the other rooms in the vain hope that he’d find her snooping through someone else’s possessions. But it was just that—a vain hope.

Stood in Melody’s room, he reminded himself of all of the foolish and dangerous things Emily had done in the past; albeit for the greater good. When he looked at it that way, heading outside to find Melody while a maniac was on the loose wasn’t really anything out of the ordinary.

He would have to go after her, wouldn’t he? He would have to go out into the dark to find her. Not to rescue her—Emily Swanson would not tolerate being rescued—but to back her up. Jerome didn’t know who he was angrier with—Emily for lying to him, for putting herself in danger yet again, or with himself for being so gullible.

“Damn you, Emily Swanson.”

Wondering what his next move should be, Jerome turned to leave the room. Something flashed in the darkness. Melody’s tablet lay on the bed, the standby light pulsing like a winking eye. He looked back at the open door. Curiosity momentarily getting the better of him, he picked up the tablet and swiped a finger across the screen. Light spilled out, illuminating the angles of his face. Thumbnails of photographs presented themselves. There were pictures of flowers growing in the meadow and pictures of foxgloves in the forest. They were followed by a series of photographs showing wreaths and garlands roughly fashioned together and placed at the base of a tree. Jerome flicked through each one. They’d be taken at different times of the year. In some pictures, the ground was covered in autumn leaves while in others, fresh grass sprouted between the tree roots. But one thing was certain—the images were all of the same tree. As he used his finger and thumb to enlarge one of the images, Jerome felt blood rushing in his ears.

There, carved into the bark, was the chaos star. This was the tree that Oscar had been hanged from. But why had Melody been leaving flowers there and taking pictures? Anxiety churning his stomach, Jerome flicked past the photos, until he came upon some very different images. They’d been taken in and around the house. There were pictures of Sam, Marcia and Pamela. And there was a picture of someone else.

Jerome’s jaw swung open. His eyes grew round and wide.

The photograph had been taken from the upstairs corridor, a candid shot through the half-open door of one of the guest’s bedrooms. The man seemed unaware of the photographer’s presence. He was shirtless, his body taught and lean, a mess of dark curls covering his head. Eyes as black as onyx stared into space. There were scars on his chest—thin parallel lines of angry raised flesh that were not the results of any form of surgery. But it wasn’t the scars that had gripped Jerome’s attention.

Mind racing, he zoomed in on the image. There was something on the man’s left forearm. A blemish or a birthmark. Jerome enlarged the image further. He leaned closer to the screen. It was no blemish. It was a tattoo. Eight arrows crossed each other like a compass—four long pointing north, east, south, west, and four short, placed symmetrically in between. It was a chaos star—the same symbol that had been carved into the tree and that had been painted in Sam’s blood.

As for the man, Jerome recognised him instantly.

“Franklyn Hobbes,” he whispered to the darkness.

But why was there a photograph of him on Melody’s tablet? She’d been nowhere near Meadow Pines the night Franklyn had attacked Marcia and then disappeared into the forest, had she?

A deep tremor of worry shuddered through Jerome’s body. He stood and peered out of the window and over the black trees.
Had she?
His thoughts tripped over each other. He looked back at the tablet, at the image of Franklyn Hobbes. Suddenly, Jerome wasn’t worried about Emily being out there alone looking for Melody, he was worried about Emily finding her. He needed to speak to Pamela. He needed Helen to wake up.

Pulling himself from the window, he snatched Melody’s tablet from the bed and turned towards the door. Just in time to see it slam shut. He heard a key slide into the keyhole, then a crunch of gears as the lock slammed into place.

“Hey!” He ran to the door and pulled on the handle. He curled a fist and hammered against the wood. “Who’s out there? Let me out!”

A shadow cut through the light seeping in beneath the door. Then, Jerome heard footsteps pounding downstairs and along the hall, heading straight towards Pamela and Helen.

W
et soil slurped around her ankles. Emily pressed her weight onto the shovel, scooping up dirt and flinging it onto a growing mound. The rain continued to fall, slapping against her raincoat and filling the deepening trench.

The more Emily dug, the more her arms ached. She concentrated on the rhythm of her movements: the thrust of the blade into the earth, the force of her foot against metal, the pressure of gravity as she swung soil onto the mound.

She now stood in a hole approximately three feet deep. Brown, murky water splashed against her shins. The ground beneath was a thick sludge that sucked on her shoes and threatened to swallow her whole. Resting for a moment, Emily leaned over and repositioned the torch.

Above the rain, she heard a loud snap. Snatching up the torch, she shined the light into the trees. The noise came again. Someone was moving in a circle around her, getting closer. She held her breath, trying to make her body quiet and still. The thump of her heart and the blood pulsing in her ears made it impossible.

At the peripheries of the light, she saw something dart through the bushes. Then, as she snatched up the shovel and brandished it in front of her, the bushes parted. Two glittering black eyes stared at her. Emily slowly lowered the shovel. Frozen to the spot, the deer regarded Emily with a frightened look. Rain glanced off its svelte body. Its ears twitched. Just for a moment, the horrors of the day were forgotten. Emily stared at the deer in wonder, longing to extend a hand and feel its warm skin against hers. The deer bowed its head, turned, and bolted off into the darkness.

Relaxing her aching shoulders, Emily felt the sudden urge to laugh. Instead, she replaced the torch between the tree roots, took up the shovel in both hands, and resumed digging.

Minutes passed. The rain refused to ease off. It was becoming increasingly difficult to deepen the hole without it filling with muddy rainwater. It wasn’t just spilling in from the surface, it was seeping through the earth itself. Emily stopped digging and spent the next minute scooping up water and throwing it out. It was a hopeless task; like Sisyphus from Greek mythology, doomed in an endless cycle of pushing a boulder uphill only to watch it roll back down.

Giving up, she pushed the shovel back into the mud and dug faster. Her muscles complained. Doubt and frustration plagued her. It was the flowers that had brought her here. The flowers and the tattoo. But perhaps she had confused their meaning. Perhaps she was out here digging up nothing but dirt and rock while someone else was drawing their last breaths.

She had her answer a minute later. The shovel struck something that didn’t feel like earth or stone. A tree root, she wondered, as she cautiously poked around with the edge of the shovel. She stared into the dark pool that sloshed about her knees. She grabbed the torch and pointed it downwards. The water was too murky to penetrate.

Repulsion crawled up Emily’s spine as she realised what she would have to do. Tossing the shovel onto the ground, she set the torch on the edge of the pit. Then, taking, a deep, calming breath, she sank down into the icy water. It rushed through her jeans, biting her legs and making her bones ache. Emily clenched her teeth and peered into the murk. Then, she thrust her hands under the water.

The earth was already taking back what the shovel had found. She clawed at the wet soil, raking it back. Her fingers brushed against something soft and sinewy. Emily cried out. Her back slammed into the side of the earth. Trembling with both cold and fear, she took in another breath, balanced herself, and plunged her hands into the water once more.

She dug back the earth and found what she’d been looking for. Ignoring the bile rising in her throat, she ran her fingers along its round contours, tracing the forehead, the nose, the hollows of the eyes.

Her hand moved lower, scooping earth away from the neck, the shoulders, the left arm. Her fingers moved down and rested upon the hand. Gently gripping the wrist, Emily freed the arm and lifted it out of the water.

Nausea choked her. She stared at the limb in horror, almost letting go. Without the protection of a coffin, nature had gone to work on the body, sucking it dry of nutrients, withering it like a dead tree. But even though decomposition was occurring at an accelerated rate, the skin still clung to the bones like old leather.

Terror devoured Emily’s insides. She fought it, pushing it to the corners of her mind. Scooping up a handful of water, she poured it over the arm, then gently wiped away the remaining dirt.

The tattoo was faded, barely there, but she could see the arrows pointing outwards in the shape of a star. It was the same symbol carved into the tree above her. The same symbol drawn in Sam’s blood. Horror swarmed over Emily’s skin like flies. She let go of the limb and watched it sink beneath the muddy pool.

Franklyn Hobbes had never left Meadow Pines. He was dead. Murdered. Buried in a shallow grave. And Melody had been there the night he’d been killed.

Hoisting herself out of the pit, Emily pulled her knees up to her chest and shuffled backwards until she the felt tree trunk press up against her spine. The cold dug into her ribs and nipped at her skin.

Two options presented themselves. Either Pamela had told the truth—or what she believed to be the truth—or she had lied to cover up Franklyn’s murder. If she was being honest, how could Melody’s presence be explained? Franklyn had visited Meadow Pines twice. Melody had not been in the photograph taken on his first visit. Yet, there were images of Franklyn on Melody’s tablet, as well as photographs of flowers left on his grave.

Emily’s thoughts turned to Pamela. By the time Franklyn Hobbes had returned to experience his psychotic breakdown, Meadow Pines had been facing financial trouble. Pamela had said it herself—involving the police would have led to public knowledge and an irreparably damaged reputation. She had covered up Franklyn’s attack on Marcia. But what if she had also covered up the truth of what had happened afterwards?

Emily’s mind spun a dizzying web of scenarios and possibilities. Unearthing Franklyn’s body had only resulted in unearthing more questions. As she mentally played out the events of the last two days, her eyes wandered back to the shallow grave. Whatever had happened that night, it was clear that Melody was at the centre of it all. Why else would Pamela cover up her presence? Why else would there be pictures of Franklyn and his grave stored on her tablet? And there was something else. Following Franklyn’s disappearance, Melody’s face had appeared in Pamela’s photograph album with such frequency that one would be forgiven for thinking she’d taken up residence at Meadow Pines.

As much as she didn’t want to believe it, Emily could only reach one conclusion: Melody had killed Franklyn Hobbes and Pamela had covered it up.

Perhaps Melody had acted in self-defence. Perhaps not. A threat to Meadow Pines would be a threat to her only real escape from desperate loneliness. What had happened in Melody’s life for her to have ended up in the wastelands of society, unwanted and unloved? Emily felt a rush of empathy, of sadness. She tried to think of an alternative explanation for the evidence that she’d uncovered that would relinquish Melody of guilt, but no matter how many paths she followed, they all ended at the same destination.

Melody killed Franklyn Hobbes. Did that mean she had also killed the others?

Emily stood. She looked down at her wet and soiled clothing, at her shivering hands. Had Oscar shown Franklyn’s picture to Melody? Had she flown into a blind panic and killed him before he could find out what she’d done? But what about Sam and Marcia? Why had she hurt the people that she claimed were her friends?

Emily’s head spun. She could feel the beginnings of a headache. Every question she asked was like a blooming flower, the petals unfurling to reveal yet more mysteries. Emily didn’t have the answers. But she knew someone who just might.

Picking up the torch, she cast one final look at Franklyn’s grave, pulled up the hood of her raincoat, and started back towards the house.

She had just reached the meadow when a shrill scream soared high over the treetops. Emily stopped dead in her tracks. Like a dying star, the scream faded, leaving only the fizz of drizzle on grass. Blood pulsing in her ears, Emily turned away from the house and headed north, back into the forest. Ten minutes later, she came to a stop behind the thick trunk of a pine tree. The rain had finally relented. Above the canopy, clouds were dispersing. In the near distance, Emily saw moonlight glancing off the lake like shattered shards of mirror.

Switching off the torch, she tucked it into her coat pocket and moved up to the next tree. She cocked her head and listened. There had been no more screaming. Now, she heard the lake lapping softly against the shore and somewhere overhead, the low hoot of an owl. She moved closer. A light cut through the trees, yellow and bright.