Page 33 of Trust No One

Shutting off the app and shoving the phone in my back pocket, I moved to the kitchen. More lights on. More relief.

At the old gas stove, I filled a copper kettle at a farmhouse sink. On the front burner, I twisted a knob, and a blue flame danced and flickered around the edges of the copper.

At the kitchen window, I stared out over the expanse of tall grass. Beyond the grove of trees circling the family graveyard.

Used to be, the light in Mom’s room was always on. She hated the darkness. Amy learned that lesson quickly the first time she’d shut it off. Mom’s screams, she’d said, could wake the dead.

Amy.

I’d not thought about her in years.

And now she was back in my head.

Amy had been awed by Hale House—the grand entrance foyer, the black-and-white-checkered floor, the glaring oil portraits, the brass sconces. She’d never seen anything like it.

“Wow,” Amy muttered.

This corridor was my portal between the modern world and a past that threatened to trap me. “You’ll get used to it.”

“Never.”

Amy didn’t see shadows or smell sadness. She saw old money, luxury, and stability.

Her careful fingers ran over the bullnose banister as her gaze danced with excitement. And hunger.

She’d staked her claim on the Hale household.

I led her upstairs, where we went past Mom’s locked room and my open door to a small room with views of the back lawns and gardens. There was a Queen Anne four-poster bed with a canopy, a dresser with ten drawers, a centuries-old rich red carpet, and a crystal vase filled with wildflowers I’d picked.

“This is mine?” she asked.

“Do you like it?”

She smoothed a reverent hand over the chenille bedspread. “Looks like it belongs to a princess.”

Her enthusiasm was charming, harmless, then. And I was grateful for the nighttime help.

Later there would be troubles. But that day, only relief.

Weeks later, Maria cornered me in the kitchen. I’d stumbled in the back door after a night out with Judson.

“What are you doing here?” The buzz of beer still hummed in my system.

“I think she’s stealing.”

“Amy?”

“She wears your clothes to school.”

I opened the refrigerator and grabbed a bottle of water. “There’s nothing in this house I want.”

“I found her in your room,” Maria said.

“Doing what?”

“Looking around.”

I gulped cool liquid. “I still don’t know why you’re here.”