Page 72 of Framed

Oh. I hadn’t considered that. What she must be assuming, after seeing bruises on my body after all this time. A tiny seed of guilt wormed its way through my irritation with her, and I let out a quick sigh. “No, I don’t. The bruises have nothing to do with him, Scarlett. Don’t worry about it.”

From the hard line of her mouth, I could tell she wasn’t going to listen to that last part. But at least she leaned back in her seat and shifted her gaze out the window again, instead of keeping it laser-focused on me.

I leaned over to snap on the radio, and we drove the final fifteen minutes to our destination surrounded by the muffled strains of crappy late-night rock music.

Finally, I took the last turn before the destination—Old Milton Lane. I was shocked the street even had a road sign. We turned off of gravel onto straight-up dirt, and bounced over potholes and uneven rocks, past fields and stalks of corn.

This was the literal middle of nowhere.

The hairs on the back of my neck rose. What the hell could be out here that our stalker wanted us to see? Why were they doing any of this? Tearing me and Scarlett apart, ordering us not to talk to each other, then setting Scarlett up to take the fall for my sister’s death. It made no sense.

Of course, I’d had similar arguments with myself over the years. I’d gone through phases where I taped all of my notes up side by side and tried to find connections between them, a pattern, anything to make sense of what was going on.

It never worked.

Beside me, Scarlett inhaled sharply. I glanced at her, and then I saw it. A single boarded-up house, just off the road. The mailbox had fallen down, but the post it used to be attached to still stood, numbers rusted but visible. 13452.

Now every nerve ending in my body jolted to high alert.

“This place is creepy as shit,” Scarlett whispered-yelled as if the house could hear her.

“You know it can’t hear you right?” I bit back a smile at her perplexed wide-eye stare at the house. But she was right.

All in all, it was creepy as shit. I parked alongside the mailbox—I didn’t want Scarlett any closer to that house than she needed to be.

“We getting out or are you just going to stare at the house like it ate your grandma?” Scarlett asked.

“It probably did eat her,” I muttered. As I spoke, I leaned across to open the glove compartment and pull out the gun. “Stay here,” I said, my tone brooking no room for disagreement.

Scarlett grabbed my wrist. For a second we both froze. In the dark, her eyes were huge, almost luminous. We hesitated, inches apart, so close I could taste that luscious mouth of hers again.

I watched the playback in her eyes. Every moment we’d shared in her bedroom. Every pulse of desire, yearning, pleasure. I watched her, and I knew she was thinking the exact same thing that I was. About how long it might be before we got to do anything like that again.

And about how desperately we both wanted to.

Then I pulled back, wrenching my arm free, and undid the safety on the gun.

Scarlett watched me, eyes wide, as I climbed out and slammed the door behind me. Is she actually going to obey me for once in her life? She must be more freaked out than I anticipated.

I circled the front of the car and walked past the mailbox, gravel crunching under my boots. But I only got a few paces before I heard the click of the car door opening once more. I grimaced and spun around, but Scarlett was already jogging up to me, expression hard.

“I told you,” she hissed. “Like hell am I letting you do this alone.”

I hesitated, torn between arguing and just picking her up bodily to throw her back into the car. But then I thought about how close the house was. How much noise she’d no doubt make if I hoisted her over my shoulder.

Fuck.

This place had “trap” written all over it. But hopefully, with any luck, only one of us would fall into it. I pushed Scarlett behind me, grip firm, so she’d know I was serious. “Fine. But stay behind me. First sign of trouble, you run.”

I held her gaze, waited until she gave me a jerky nod. It would have to do. With that, I faced the house once more and started up the driveway.

It looked abandoned. No lights visible, and all the windows were boarded up. I didn’t see any other car in the driveway, though it continued around back, so I supposed someone could’ve parked behind the house somewhere.

As we stepped up onto the porch, a cobweb caught my face. I grimaced and brushed through it, cursing under my breath.

Behind me, Scarlett grasped the back of my shirt. I didn’t tell her off. If anything, I understood the feeling. I wanted to whirl around, throw her over my shoulder, and book it out of here.

But whoever sent that note wouldn’t approve. And I’d seen firsthand how bad things could get if you ignored the things the notes ordered you to do.

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