Page 66 of The Last to Vanish
I headed down the hall, to the storage closet that shared a wall with the outside. The one that didn’t require a key, with the cleaning supplies and furniture gathering dust, stacked along the wall. The room was dark and shallow, with unfinished gray cinder blocks, and it smelled like chemical cleaner and earth.
I opened the phone box near the entrance that Harris had pointed out last time, trying to find the issue. All the wires appeared connected. Just in case, I pushed them in securely, one by one. I should’ve asked for more specifics when he was here.
Maybe there was another box in the other storage area. I used my key to access it, since this one was typically kept locked—filled not only with the linens and the lost and found bin, but with records and finances and the history of this place. There were no other electronic boxes along the walls, that I could tell. All I noticed now were the empty spaces that had been left behind when Cory cleared out some of Vincent’s boxes, earlier in the week.
The room felt so much larger, open and light. I peered behind the vacant shelving now, checking any visible wall space, but there was nothing.
I left the door open and checked the storage area next door again, thinking I might’ve missed something, with the lack of light in the unfinished space. There was nothing along these walls either, but I noticed how much smaller this room was than the one next door. How the back wall, behind the piles of furniture and the bucket and mop and chemicals on a corner shelf, was left raw and unfinished, as opposed to the one next door. As if this room was closer to the earth.
And then I was thinking of Landon West poking around. The things Georgia might’ve told him, showed him. In the upstairshall, he’d been looking at the blueprints, asking questions. Looking forme. Asking if Celeste and Vincent had built this place all on their own.
What could he have seen in here? What was it, in the blueprints, that had him so curious?
What was it that had prompted Celeste to remove them from the wall soon after, claiming they needed a new frame?
Had Landon called her on her home line? Stopped her in the hall? Did he go to her house, or catch up with her on a hike?
I felt every hair raise slowly across my arms, my legs, the back of my neck, thinking through the possibilities. A faint buzzing sound, and I didn’t think it was from any overhead light.
There was no record of any interview between the two of them, but there was a check mark next to her name in his journal. He must’ve called. He must’ve asked something.
Had he asked if she’d met the Fraternity Four? If she’d taken their picture? Had he pushed harder, asking if there was something hidden within the walls of the inn itself, and not lost out in the woods?Your imagination is running away with you again.
Be careful, Abigail.
She was sosmall. In a decade, I’d seen no sign of threat, or force. She tended a garden, and walked a mountain path, and handed off the long hours and hard work to me and, more recently, to Georgia.
I wasn’t sure how long I’d stood there, the room buzzing, my imagination running away from me. I stared at that far wall, breathing too shallow, feeling the room contract on me. And then I slowly backed away and closed the door behind me.
I COULDN’T GET ENOUGHfresh air into my lungs. Imagining what could be hidden in the space behind the cinder-block wall. Thinking about who had built it, and when.Why.
I stumbled along the perimeter of the inn, hand to the wall, to steady myself. Trying to talk myself down—my overactive imagination getting the best of me yet again. My feet kicked up gravel as I walked up the incline from the employee lot, to where I could get the best cell service.
And for the first time in a long time, I wondered who I could call. Like Georgia must’ve felt when she figured out who that camera belonged to, I considered reaching out beyond the boundaries of Cutter’s Pass. SayingThere’s something wrong, something very, very wrong here—
I caught sight of movement in the windows of the inn that faced my way, from the back office behind the lobby. You couldn’t see through them well—too much reflection, too much protection—but I could just make out the outline of a person at the window, staring out. I recognized her posture, her movements, the hand she raised toward me. Celeste, watching me.
Everything within me stilled. I raised my cell toward her, pointed to it, so she would know—I’m handling the phone lines, just like you asked.
I could see the outline of her as she nodded in return. Then I turned around, keeping my back to her as I called Harris.
As often happened, my call went to voice mail. But seeing as it was Sunday, I wasn’t sure when I’d hear back from him. He must take a day off on the weekends. He must take time for his family. I debated leaving a message at all, except he’d told me, as we’d both stood in front of his home, that I could call him any time. That I should.
“Harris, it’s Abby,” I said. “We’re having some more issues with the phones at the inn. I checked that juncture box, but it all looks okay. I must be missing something. Hate to bother you on a weekend, but it’s not just the lobby phone. It’s also my apartment. I’m not sure how widespread the issue is. If you get a chance, can you give me a call, walk me through it?”
I wasn’t holding out luck for a response anytime soon. He was probably enjoying the day with Samantha and Elsie, probably drove out with them to Springwood, staying far away from this place—he knew better, after all.
I peered over my shoulder again, expecting to see Celeste still watching. I’d felt her eyes, the entire call. Except I must’ve been imagining it, because there was no one at the glass window.
A car pulled up the road, turning into the inn’s parking lot. New guests, checking in, probably. Celeste would be occupied.
There were some things I wouldn’t have considered doing, hours earlier. There were some things I wouldn’t haveconsidered, hours earlier. But I knew I had one single opportunity right now, and I needed to take it.
I checked over my shoulder one last time, making sure I was alone. And then I headed for the carriage house. I needed to see what she’d taken from the storage area, what was so important to have Cory bring to her home—I needed to besure.
As I took the narrow steps up from the garage-level entrance, I tried to picture it: the Fraternity Four and Celeste. This person who knew every inch of the mountain like the back of her hand. I pictured her as she was in the photos in the hallway of the inn, youthful, adventurous, someone who could see a vision through to completion.
Would she have met them at the tavern? Would she have taken their picture, and then taken them into the woods? And then what? Who was this person whom I’d respected and idolized and taken such solace in?
