Page 39 of The House That Held Her

Shannon pushes open the door, guiding me inside. The overhead lights glare down, brutally ordinary against the horror we’ve just left behind. She guides me into the living room, to the sofa. I sink onto the cushions, noticing Nate’s blood smeared across my palms. My stomach twists; I want to scream, but no sound escapes.

All I can think is: Nate is dead. He was supposed to be safe, far away, alive. Now there’s blood on my hands—his blood. My eyes flick to Shannon. She’s trembling, her shirt soaked with tears, and guilt crashes down on me. Why am I still breathing? Why do I get to exist while he’s?—?

A surge of hatred for this house grips me. This goddamn place that’s seen so much violence, so much pain. I hate it for bearing witness, for standing here unchanged when everything else is ruined.

My head feels like it’s splitting open. I shut my eyes tight, trying to slow time, to shrink the crushing tide of grief. Nate’s face flips to another memory: a battered young girl huddled in the corner of a locked bedroom. Bruises, scratches, helpless tears. Lila is another one of the many victims of my inability to protect anyone I love.

It’s too much. My chest constricts; my vision darkens. I let out a ragged exhale and feel myself slip off the couch, my legs giving way beneath me. Shannon’s voice warps, fading to a distant hum.

And the last coherent thought crashing through my mind is one simple, harrowing truth: They would all be better off if I had never existed.

27

Iwake with a jolt, disoriented and drenched in sweat. Nightmares mixing with memories seem to blur at the edges of my vision, and I struggle to piece together which is which. I blink, forcing my gaze to focus. I’m on the living room couch, and across the room, Shannon is curled in an armchair, legs tucked in tight, head leaning back. A faint gleam catches my eye—a knife, resting on the side table beside her, reflecting the dim morning light.

My pulse hammers as last night’s horrors throb at the back of my mind. I feel suddenly untethered from time. Hours, minutes, days—I can’t tell how long I’ve been lying here. My phone… Where is my phone? I pat at my pockets, search the cushions, no luck. Staring around the room, I see Shannon’s bulging bag of police documents and the plot map scattered on a side table, the edges crinkled from being carried around. It all looks so out of place, like a bizarre staging of my own panic.

I swallow the dryness in my throat and rise slowly, not wanting to wake Shannon. My body aches. Each step toward the kitchen feels deliberate, each board creaking like a siren in this quiet house. The click of ice hitting a glass, the hiss of the faucet, the low hum of the fridge’s water dispenser—every noise is jarringly loud.

I take a cold sip, lifting my chin and my arm overhead to stretch the knot out of my lower back. My hand brushes something small and familiar on the counter—a dead iPhone. It must have been tossed aside when we made it home last night.

I have no energy, no idea what to do next. All I want is to curl up and vanish. Instead, I shuffle toward the staircase, haunted by a sickly ache pounding at the base of my skull. The first step up triggers a flash: Nate’s headless body, that brutal slash of red against sterile white porcelain. My stomach roils, and I cling to the banister, knuckles whitening.

Another step. I see Shannon’s face, terrified, transfixed by the gruesome scene. I press my lips together, trying to swallow the surge of nausea.

Next step. The grueling walk back in total darkness, the twisted branches of dead citrus trees scraping at my sleeves.

When I reach the landing, my heartbeat is a wild staccato inside my ribs, yet I feel oddly numb. I walk into the bedroom, setting the phone on its charger with a kind of distant detachment. My reflection in the dresser mirror stops me; I barely recognize myself—pale, eyes sunken, like the essence of who I was has seeped out through the night. Maybe a shower will help. Maybe I can scrub away the scent of blood and terror from both my body and subconscious.

I pull off my stained sweatshirt, goosebumps raising on my arms as the cool air hits my skin. My bra strap slips down one shoulder. I reach for the button on my jeans, but a prick of alarm cuts through my haze. Something is off.

The chest.

I glance to the corner of the room. It’s empty. Yesterday, that battered old chest was there—I’m sure of it. My heart stutters, and adrenaline flares in my veins. How could it be gone? My mind scrambles to retrace every step—police station, Marty Hughes’ store, Hawthorn House—but I can’t shake the looming, gut-twisting realization: someone took it.

I hurry to the top of the stairs and crouch, inspecting the wood for fresh scratches or dirt. Nothing. It’s impossible that someone alone carried that massive chest down these steps without leaving a mark. Had there been a group of people creeping around her home? Or what if they used another way—what does that mean? My pulse is a drumbeat in my ears.

I grab hold of the banister again as my world spins. It feels like my feet have been pulled out from under me and are now floating in the air, high above my head. George Hawthorn was obsessed with hidden rooms, secret compartments. What if there is another one up here–a way for someone to take the chest without using the stairs?

I move through the upstairs hallway, rummaging desperately. I shove aside chairs, test the walls, check every seam for a disguised door. A surge of adrenaline propels me. Whoever did this stole not just the chest, but likely the skulls as well. They might be the one responsible for the horror in that basement. And if I catch them here, that would put me face to face with a killer.

Another realization hits me like a freight train, pulling the wind from my lungs. If someone else has access to this house, this floor; if someone else intentionally took the skulls that day, but left the chest, they did it for a reason–to humiliate me in front of the police, in front of Walter. Someone wants to paint me as crazy.What the fuck is happening?

I search and search and come up with nothing. No hidden door, no secret panel. My frustration reaches a boiling point. Nate’s voice echoes in my mind—his warmth, his laughter—and then the image of his headless body crashes in. Rage and grief sear my chest.

I yank books off a shelf, flipping them aside and screaming at the silence. I’m not thinking clearly. I slam my fists on the bathroom door so hard my arms shake. Tears blur my vision, but I refuse to stop.

A bottle of shampoo meets my hand, and I hurl it at the mirror. The glass shatters like ice, shards catching the light as they scatter across the sink.

“Why?” I scream, voice cracking against the tile. My knees buckle; I collapse onto the cold floor. My sobs tear out of me, raw and ugly. It’s all too much—fear, helplessness, guilt—piling up until there’s nothing left of me to fight back.

“Margot!”

I hear Shannon’s voice ring out, a burst of alarm in the hallway. She rushes in, kneeling by my side, clutching my shoulders with urgent care. “What’s going on? Are you hurt?”

I shake my head, tears blurring my words. “The chest… It’s gone. It was here, and now it’s just…gone. Someone took it.”

Shannon wraps her arms around me, and I fold into her, trembling with sobs that rack my whole body. She holds me like a lifeline, letting me weep until my chest starts to burn. When my cries subside, she pulls back, pressing her forehead gently to mine.

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