Page 52 of Forever After Fall

“It’s Halloween. I can just say it’s a costume. That was the plan.” He grins at how clever he thinks he is.

If he’d escaped and run off to Denver or even Colorado Springs, it probably would have worked. But in this small town where everyone knows everyone else’s business? There isn’t a soul alive who doesn’t know he was shipped off to prison.

“There are people here, though, who know you. Who’ll recognize you.”

I’m too scared to tell him how batshit this whole plan is, probably quite literally if I could see more of this room. I glance up at the rafters, nervous I’ll find more friends up there. What I can see of it is clear, but there are copious amounts of spider webs drifting from one beam to another, wafting in the breeze that seems to be coming in through a few loose shingles in the roof. I’m already wondering if I could climb up there and bust the rest of them out, shimmy my way down the roof, and slide down a downspout. I’m not an athlete, though, and the chances I end up falling off the roof instead of escaping are probably pretty high. For right now, waiting and seeing what Chris does, using a moment to my advantage, is my best plan.

“Fair. We’ll have to wait until things die down. What time does the festival close at night?”

“Ten.”

I keep my answers short. I don’t want to offer more information than I have to. I don’t want to still be here at ten or whenever he plans to try to sneak out, but it’ll be long before then when someone notices I’m gone. If Anson isn’t already concerned because I’m not where I said I’d be, he’ll find my truck still parked behind the ranch house when he goes to leave. My purse and keys will be tucked in the closet. He’ll know I’m still here somewhere, then he’ll find me.

I have to hang on to that hope. I can’t think about how he might not know there’s an attic or how massive this ranch is. I trust Anson more than anyone else in this world and as long as I have him looking for me, I can keep hoping this nightmare ends soon.

“Then I guess we wait until ten.”

“Can you make it that long? That looks like a lot of blood.”

“I’ll have to. We don’t have a choice, do we?”

I hate the way Chris says we. There is no we anymore. There’s just him and me. Stuck in this hellhole attic together while he tries not to bleed out, and I hope that Anson can figure out where we are. Because he’s the only person I want to see in the world right now.

TWENTY-THREE

Anson

When I don’t find Bristol in the haunted house as I expect, I don’t panic. She’s been so busy setting everything up for Halloween night that it doesn’t surprise me I could have missed her speeding off to some other part of the ranch. But when I search the inn, the house, the bunkhouse, all the vendors’ booths, the hayride station, and talk to half the people working here, and no one’s seen her in a couple of hours, I feel a knot in my stomach start to form.

The last time I saw her was when she was finishing up decorations in the haunted house. The house is a maze of small rooms in true late Victorian style, so it’s possible I was chasing her through them without even knowing it and just missed her when she circled back to the kitchen or the parlor. I decide to make one last round to check for her. That’s when I find the blood. Just inside the front door, nearly hidden in the pattern of tree rings in the wood. Three little dots.

I look around, seeing if I can find more, and I do. Another two dots. Then another. Then a splattering of four and a smear of another just beyond it. The knot in my stomach tightens. I have to tell myself it’s not hers. It can’t be.

I follow the trail that leads me to the stairs and up them. It stops in the hallway, and I have to make my way through several rooms to find where it picks up again.

Then it stops abruptly right in the center of a light blue rug. My heart is hammering away in my chest like a ten-pound hammer. I can feel it in the air. Crackling with the uneasy feeling that something has gone wrong. I glance around, wondering if she could have gone out a window or disappeared downstairs. The trail ended once. Maybe it could end again.

But as I turn to leave the room, I catch the attic door in the ceiling out of the corner of my eye. There’s the slightest hint of a rusty red stain on the cord that’s dangling down. When I go to reach for it, I hear the distinct squeak of a floorboard above my head. Someone on a beam that hasn’t held human weight in years.

“Bristol?” I call out her name, desperate to have her tell me she’s okay and explain to me what the fuck is going on. There’s no answer.

I stare up at the ceiling, holding my breath to see if I can hear anything else. A moment later, there’s another creak of wood above my head. It could just be an animal. But how would it open the attic door?

No. It had to be a person. A fear confirmed when I look over at the window and see the faint outline of a bloody handprint on the frame. Like someone touched it briefly as they looked out the window. The print is broad, the fingers long. Definitely not Bristol’s. A man’s.

So whose blood is it? Theirs? Bristol’s?

I feel sick. Panicked. I briefly think about snapping the cord down and storming into the attic.

But Bristol wouldn’t climb up into the attic bleeding of her own volition. There’s no way she’d go up there at all voluntarily after the bat fiasco. Which means if it’s her blood and she’s up there, someone’s taken her up there. And I don’t have so much as a knife on me right now.

So first things first. I need a weapon. Second things second, I need backup. I have to tell Hazel or Ramsey. I’ll need their help to take the next step and have someone get eyes on this house so they don’t manage to sneak away.

I take my time walking out of the room. I don’t want anyone to get the impression I’m in a hurry or notice my panic. If my theory’s right, Bristol won’t be safe if they know we’re coming.

But who are they, and why the fuck would they do this?

“Anson!” Hazel calls. “Oh my god! I’ve been looking for you. Do you know where Bristol is?”