Page 94 of Lovely Darkness

Sasha snorts. “I told you he wasn’t that bad. He’s kinda likable, right?”

I reluctantly have to agree. None of these people are anything like what I was expecting. Including Nick Tate. “Hey.” I say. “Are you doing OK with all this Nick stuff?”

Sasha takes a moment to consider my question, then bobs her head in a noncommittal way. “I guess. I don’t really care about Nick Tate anymore. The reunion was… emotional. And I’m a little worried about what he might do next. He’s kind of unpredictable.”

I chuckle. “That’s an understatement.”

“But before this is all over, and before I leave here, I’m gonna make one thing very clear. Nick Tate needs to stay away from Lauren.”

“Lauren?” The word floats towards us from across the room. We turn in surprise to see Donovan Couture sitting up in bed, very much not in a drug-induced coma. “Sasha Cherlin. You and I both know that Nick Tate needs to stay away from all of them.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE - NICK

I pull into a long driveway that leads to a unique modern farmhouse. It’s dark green in color, kinda blending in with the pine forest surrounding it. It’s a newer house. Huge rustic, raw-wood beams frame the porch. And it’s shaped funny. Not anything like a regular farmhouse. It’s got a center portion with two wings on either side slanting out in a diagonal.

The roof is tin, the siding is wood, and the chimneys and skirting are all lined with rock.

I stop the truck, turn it off, and the four of us stare at the dark house in silence for a few moments.

Finally, I break it. “Well. What are we doing here?”

Indie gets out, then Nathan. They shut their doors, leaving Wendy and me alone.

“Wendy, we should just leave.”

“Why?”

“Because whatever’s here that they want to show us, you don’t need to see it.”

“I’m curious though.”

She’s sitting behind me, so I have to turn all the way around and peek over my seat to see her. “You remember that cat, right?”

She smiles. And it’s a little bit sad. So I like this smile. It says a lot of things, but mostly it says, I’m OK. “We’re here. We came all this way. I wanna see it. I want to know more about these girls.”

That’s not good.

But I’m not gonna fight her on this. It’s a losing battle. So I open my door, close it, then open hers and wait for her to get out.

“OK,” Indie says. She’s smiling like she just won something.

And she did, I guess. She got us here.

“I’ll be right back,” Nate says. He doesn’t wait for anyone to argue with him, just walks around the back side of the house. A couple seconds later the sound of breaking glass fills the forest, and then a few more seconds after that he opens the front door. “Let’s go.”

We go inside and pause in the foyer. It looks like people still live here, but there’s a layer of dust on the tables lining the entry that is clearly visible in the moonlight filtering in from the front windows.

“Now what?” I ask.

Nate nods his head towards a hallway. “The bedroom is back here.” Then he starts walking and I follow.

Indie and Wendy come along behind me as we weave our way through the living room, then a hallway, then finally a bedroom. Or one might call it a bunk room. Because there are several built-in bunk beds.

Nate flips on the light so we can see it better. I raise an eyebrow at him. “Lights? Is that a good idea?”

He shrugs. “Why not? We came all this way, might as well see it properly.”

It’s a very nice room. Very high-end rustic. The kind of room you see in magazines. And even though there’s a layer of dust in here too, it looks less like an abandoned room and more like a forgotten one.