Page 94 of Stay Buried

The woman turned, looked at Ashley.

Her heart sank.

This was not her mother.

Idiot.

“I’m… I’m sorry,” Ashley stammered. “I thought you were someone else.”

But she couldn’t turn away, couldn’t take her eyes off this woman’s face. The resemblance was striking. The woman had the same nose, same shape eyes as her mother and Ashley herself. She looked, Ash realized, very similar to the photo she’d seen this morning of her great-grandmother, Margaret Endicott.

A relative. Ash was sure of it.

“I’m Ashley Flanders,” Ash said. “My great-grandparents were Thomas and Margaret Endicott.”

The woman looked at Ashley, expression unchanging. “I know who you are.”

“Are you an Endicott?” Ashley asked.

The woman blinked at her. She looked around the pub, which was empty except for the woman behind the bar polishing glasses, who waswatching them but pretending not to. Ashley recognized her from yesterday—the unfriendly waitress with the dyed red hair.

Her mother’s doppelganger sighed, resigned. “My name is Cheryl Banks. Josephine’s my mother.”

Ashley’s mind spun. She thought of Frankie’s diary, of how Margaret was sent off with her brother and his family. Their last name had been Banks.

Without being invited, Ash sat down at the table across from Cheryl.

It was like she was sitting across from her mother’s sister—the resemblance was that strong. She guessed Cheryl was about her mother’s age. Her eyes were green, and her hair was dyed a dark chestnut, but Ash could see light roots at the base. She had the same crow’s feet as her mother, the same lines at the corners of her mouth.

“The usual, Cheryl?” the waitress called from behind the bar.

Cheryl nodded.

“What about your friend?”

“She’s not my friend,” Cheryl said. “I don’t know her at all.”

“Coffee, please,” Ash said, feeling the caffeine might help clear her head.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Cheryl said flatly.

“Have you been following me? Watching me?”

Cheryl didn’t answer.

“I saw you yesterday when we were heading into your mother’s house, just down the street. And today you were in the woods, weren’t you, following me?”

“Listen.You need to leave town,” Cheryl said in a fierce whisper, in a voice that sounded so much like her mother’s from her dreams that a chill passed through Ashley.

“You mean because of the mark painted on my motel room door?”

“Because of this fucking place!” Cheryl snapped. “It’s like a poison that seeps into your skin. It’s… evil.”

Ashley chuffed out a nervous laugh. “If you hate it so much, why do you stay?”

Now it was Cheryl who laughed, but with bitterness. “You think I have a choice?”

Ashley opened her mouth to ask what she meant, but the waitress was approaching and Cheryl said in a loud voice, “I don’t know why you’re bothering me. I can’t help you.”