Ultimate Supernatural Horror Box Set (116 page)

Just turn the knob and push.

“Grant, you okay?”

He realized he’d stopped walking.

Was standing with the tip of his nose several inches from Paige’s door, his flashlight pointed at the carpet.

“Yeah, this way,” he said, pulling himself away from the door.

They moved together to the end of the hall.

Turning the corner, they came to the guestroom.

Grant stopped at the closed door.

“What now?” Sophie asked.

In all the turmoil, Grant realized he’d overlooked the fact that this wasn’t just going to shock Sophie, it was going to hurt her as much as it had hurt him. She’d known Don too, and not only in a professional capacity. During her cancer scare, Don had availed himself to her. His wife had gone through a similar ordeal the year before. His insight, coupled with an uncanny ability to demystify fear and help people stare it right in the face, had gone a long way toward getting Sophie through those excruciating days between the biopsy and the results. He had become as much a fixture in her life as he had been in Grant’s. Don was a healer, and he had touched them both in their darkest moments.

“Instead of calling you last night,” Grant said, “I called Don. He came over, tried to talk to Paige. She was acting crazy. Saying there was something upstairs in her bedroom. That she couldn’t leave the house. I thought she was psychotic.”

Grant opened the door.

“Don offered to come upstairs and walk through her bedroom. Prove to her there was nothing strange going on. That it was all in her mind.”

“Is this her bedroom?” Sophie asked.

“No. This is where I found Don. After he’d been inside her bedroom.”

“What do you mean ‘found him?’ Is Don okay?”

“No.”

She snatched the flashlight out of his hand and started into the guestroom.

“Sophie, it’s not pretty.”

She was already crying. “I’ve seen not pretty before.”

“But anyone you loved?”

She was shining the light all over the room.

“Where?” she asked.

“Bathroom.”

She dragged Grant toward the doorway.

He didn’t want to go through it again. Once in real life, once in a dream—that was all he had in him.

Sophie stopped.

Her shoulders sagged, and he heard the air go out of her, like she was deflating.

She leaned against the doorframe and put the light on Don.

She didn’t make a sound.

In twenty-four hours, the nose of the room had changed markedly, like a wine opening up. Not exactly fetid, but rich and dank—the intensity of a greenhouse with a disturbing note of sweetness creeping in.

“Oh, Don.”

“He broke the mirror and cut his own throat with a piece of glass,” Grant said.

Under the fading illumination of the flashlight, the blood on the checkerboard tile looked as black as oil. It had lost its lustrous sheen, now dulled, congealed, and spiderwebbed with cracks like the surface of a four-hundred-year-old oil painting.

Even in the bad light, the changes in Don were evident. The skin of his face looked loose and waxy and drained of color save for a few dark spots where the blood had pooled underneath.

Sophie still hadn’t taken her eyes off him.

She said, “He went into Paige’s room. Then he came in here and killed himself. That’s what you’re saying happened.”

“No, that’s what happened.”

“Have you called Rachel?”

“Not yet.”

Sophie glared at him. “You’ve let her just wonder where her husband is for the last twenty-four hours?”

“And what would you have done?”

“She must be out of her mind by now. We have to call her.”

“Are you crazy?”

“Are you?”

“And tell her what exactly? I still don’t understand what’s—”

“We have to bring some people in on this, Grant. Don’t you think it’s time for that? I mean, Jesus Christ, look at this.”

He stepped back out of the doorway, dragging Sophie along.

Said, “We don’t know what we’re dealing with yet.”

“All the more reason.”

“You don’t understand. When people set foot in this house, it changes them.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Seymour? He was a client of my sister’s. He came here just before he disappeared.”

“Seriously?”

“Something happened to him in Paige’s room. You obviously saw the effect it had.”

“Grant—”

“Barry Talbert too. He was here this week. And another man came last night. Went up with Paige into her bedroom, and then walked out like a goddamn zombie. Just like the man you saw twenty minutes ago.”

“This man last night ... did he have wavy gray hair? Strong build? An inch or two over six feet?”

“Yeah, his name is Jude Grazer. He’s a doctor. How do you know about him?”

“When Stu called me, I was at this little diner in North Bend watching Grazer, Talbert, and Seymour having coffee in one of the booths.”

Grant felt a coldness move down the center of his back. He said, “These men were there
together
?”

“Yep.”

“Doing what?”

“No idea. But they were acting very strange.”

“What were they talking about?”

“Nothing that came close to making sense.”

“Why would they be together? There’s no connection between Seymour and Talbert.”

“Um ... your sister?”

“And you just left them?”

“Only when I thought you might be in trouble. But Art took my place. He’s there now, won’t let them out of his sight.”

Grant sat down on the end of the bed.

“What do you think would happen, Sophie, if I called in the cavalry right now?”

“The cavalry would come.”

“And then what? When I told them this crazy story I just told you. When I showed them Don. When you told them how I’d disarmed you and cuffed you to a staircase, and then to me?” He held up their chained wrists. “How exactly would all of that go over?”

Sophie stared at the floor.

Grant said, “Interrogation. Psyche eval. Suspect. And what would happen to my sister?”

“I respect you, Grant. You know that. And so do a lot of other people. Sure. There’d be questions—”

“That I don’t have answers to. I can’t explain it. Not any of it. And on top of that, I can’t leave this house.”

“What do you mean you can’t leave?”

“I can’t physically leave this house. It has some kind of power over me. I tried last night after what happened to Don. When I got to the bottom of the front porch steps, this pain hit me. I threw up. My head felt like someone was beating me with a baseball bat. I would’ve died. The only relief was crawling back inside.”

“I don’t even know how to respond to that, Grant.”

“You think I don’t get that? That I don’t fully understand that no one’s going to believe me? And does that give you some small insight into the choices I’ve made during the last twenty-four hours?”

Sophie let out a slow, trembling breath. “I want to believe you, Grant. I do.”

“I know. And I know it’s hard.”

“What exactly do you think is happening inside this house?”

“I have no idea.”

“But it’s focused in the vicinity of Paige’s room?”

“Yes.”

“Have you been in there?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because everyone who sets foot inside comes out massively fucked.”

“Except your sister.”

“Did you just talk to Stu on the phone, or did you actually meet up with him before you came here?”

“I swung by the coffee shop. Why?”

“Didn’t he have something for me?”

Sophie’s eyes lost their thoughtful intensity. “Yeah, actually. A manila folder with some papers inside.”

“Where is it?”

She hesitated. “In my car. What’s in the folder? I haven’t looked.”

“Background history on this building. Prior residents. Ownership. Information that could possibly help us.”

“Will you trust me to go out and get it and come right back?”

“Absolutely not. Sorry.”

“It’s okay, I wouldn’t trust me either. It’s not really in my car. I left it in the basement.”

Chapter 26

The flashlight was practically worthless by the time Grant and Sophie reached the foyer. In the kitchen, Paige was flipping grilled cheese sandwiches at the stovetop. Grant swapped the flashlight for a pair of candles, and with his partner’s wrist still chained to his, he pulled open the door to the basement.

The darkness hovered as thick as water, and it seemed to push back against the candlelight with a palpable force, limiting the sphere of illumination to only three or four feet. Clearly, the brownstone’s recent renovation hadn’t laid a finger on this creaky set of stairs, each step bowing under Grant’s and Sophie’s weight.

The fifteenth step spit them out at the bottom and Grant held the candle above his head to get a better look.

Walls of crumbling brick climbed to pairs of windows—two near the top of the wall that faced the street, two along the back wall. One of these had been shattered. Shards of glass glinted on the rough stone floor.

A hot water boiler occupied one gloomy corner.

An electrical box another.

These were the only things in the basement that looked to have been built in the last fifty years.

There were mouse droppings everywhere, and the cellar-temperature air reeked of must.

Grant moved past an upright piano against the wall that stood draped in cobwebs. A third of its yellowed ivory keys were missing.

They stopped at the remnants of a work bench underneath the broken window.

The right-hand side of its surface had been smashed in.

“This where you dropped down into the basement?” Grant asked.

“Yeah.”

“Lucky you didn’t break your legs.”

“It was so dark, I couldn’t tell how far the drop was.”

Grant spotted a manila folder next to a rusty vise.

He set his candle down and opened it.

The first page was a spreadsheet entitled “Prior Tenants - 1990 to Present.” It consisted of three columns (Name/Dates of Occupancy/Contact Info) and nine rows of names.

Under the spreadsheet were a number of reports, each individually stapled, and all spring-clamped together. Grant recognized Stu’s handwriting on the first one.

6 out of 9 background checks, best I could do

Under the reports, he found one last item—a Residential Seller Property Disclosure. Across the top of this form, Stu had scrawled ...

you owe me for this one

“This everything you asked Stu for?” Sophie said.

“Mostly.” Grant leaned down, squinting at the poor photocopy of the property disclosure, but the light was bad. “I can’t make any of this out.” He reached into his pocket, pulled out Sophie’s phone. It still had a three-quarter charge.

“Grant?”

“Yeah?”

“I can’t believe I’m about to have a serious conversation about this, but I have an observation.”

“Shoot.”

“In thinking about Seymour and Talbert and the other men, there’s a common theme which you appear to be overlooking.”

“What’s that?”

“Your sister.”

“Meaning ...”

“This is
her
house. It’s
her
bedroom they’re all walking into and coming out like zombies. Or killing themselves.”

“Point being?”

“You’ve got all this background info on the house—and that’s useful—but are you sure you’re not missing something that’s staring you right in the face?”

“My sister is as much a victim—no, more so—than anyone. She’s a wreck.”

“But you have no idea what she’s been doing for the last five years. I mean ... do you really even know her?”

“You’re suggesting maybe Paige is the cause of all this?”

“I’m saying you seem to be looking everywhere but the obvious direction.”

“She wasn’t even in her room when Don went up there, Sophie. And you think she’s somehow causing me to become violently ill when I step outside?”

“Who the hell knows? Assuming everything you’ve told me is true, we’re dealing with a rulebook we’ve never seen before.”

“Yes, she’s an addict and a prostitute who has fucked her own life from every possible position, but that doesn’t mean ... what are you saying exactly? That Paige has put a—for lack of a better word—
curse
on this house? On me? On everyone who walks in? Does this mean she’s a witch? Come on.”

“Remember what you wrote in my birthday card last month?”

“Sure.”

“Say it back to me now.”

He shook his head.

“You forgot.”

“To Sophie. You’re the best partner I’ve ever had because you see cases from angles I could never reach.”

“Still believe that?” she asked.

“I do.”

“Still want to dismiss my input so quickly?”

One of the steps creaked bloody murder.

Grant turned and stared at the shadow of his sister.

Paige stood as still as a statue halfway down the staircase.

“Everything okay?” Grant asked.

“Dinner’s ready.” Her voice was flat, void of emotion, unreadable.

“Great.” He closed the manila folder and shelved it under his arm. “We’re coming up.”

Chapter 27

They sat at one end of the dining room table which Paige had forested in candles and cleared of the stacks of bills and junk mail. The grilled cheese sandwiches had been cut into triangles, and Paige ate quietly, eyes locked on her plate.

Grant and Sophie sat side-by-side, still cuffed together, perusing the contents of the folder. While Sophie skimmed the background reports, Grant studied the seller’s property disclosure, a form required by state law to be completed by a seller of real property in a real estate transaction. The seller was obligated to disclose the presence of any structural, water, sewer/septic, common interest issues, and the like to the buyer.

Additionally, in most states, including Washington, material facts—anything that could influence a buyer’s decision to purchase a home—had to be disclosed. This included a death on the property, particularly if violent or gruesome.