CHAPTER FORTY-NINE - DANNY
Everything about this plan is wrong and every one of us knows it.
Even Charlie and Brenden have gone quiet. Alec steps forward, crossing the threshold, and it takes all my self-control not to pull him back by the sleeve of his suit coat and tell him it’s not worth it. Whatever it is he’s looking for, that’s not what we’re gonna find here. We should just back up and leave.
But of course, that’s not what happens.
Russell pushes past me and follows him in and then, as if we’re connected by some invisible tether, we all step inside.
I hold my breath. Waiting for it. Waiting for the bullets to come streaming from the rooms on either side of the foyer. Waiting for the hot sting of death, and the inevitable collapse to the ground to bleed out.
But it never happens.
And then there’s a rush of air as we all exhale and look at each other.
For some reason I find Eliza’s gaze and she finds mine. We lock eyes and I read her.
She’s scared.
As she should be. I think we’re all scared even though there is no apparent reason for it.
Something happened here. Something is still happening here.
“Well,” Russell whispers, respecting the silence. “Now what?”
Alec tilts his head, looking up the staircase. And then without speaking he walks towards it.
This time I do reach out and grab his sleeve. “Let’s just leave,” I say.
“No,” Alec says, shrugging me off. “I have to go up there. I need to see.”
“See what, mate?” Charlie asks. “There’s nothing to see.”
“Shhh,” Alec snaps, still looking up the stairs. “Do you hear that?”
“Hear what?” Christine says. “Alec, I don’t—”
“Shhh,” Alec says again. “Listen.” He points a finger up the stairs. “Do you hear that? Sounds like… clicking. Like a pattern of clicking.”
“Oh, shit,” Eliza says.
“What?” Christine asks, moving in closer to her.
Eliza looks down at Christine and says, “It’s code. Can’t you hear it?”
“Oh, shit,” Christine says.
“What?” I ask. I want to shake them both and make them talk.
“It’s Morse code,” Russell says. “Listen.”
We all crane our necks. Let the silence wash over us.
And then… in the stillness comes a tapping.
S. O. S.
Alec starts up the stairs. I reach for him again but he’s practically running and the chance to go back disappears with him as he enters the darkness ahead.
The rest of us have no choice but to follow.
There’s a collective drawing of weapons. Someone beside me, maybe Brenden, maybe Christine, loads a round into a chamber.
At the top of the stairs Alec hesitates, arm out in front of us, telling us to stop.
He looks up towards the third floor and we all follow his gaze.
S. O. S.
He starts running again. His long legs taking the stairs three at a time. I do the same and overtake Russell, then bound up past Alec because I see now that he is not holding his weapon. He’s being drawn upward by some spell and he’s forgotten to arm himself.
“It’s a trap!” Russell yells. “Alec! Alec, stop, it’s a trap, mate!”
But Alec doesn’t stop and neither do I. I reach the top of the stairs first, gun panning back and forth as I move forward, checking the empty rooms, finding nothing.
The tapping is coming from the end of the hallway to the right, and I move forward quickly, jostling with Alec to enter the last room at the end.
But I get there first. Gun drawn, high ready, finger about to squeeze the trigger…
And I stop.
Because I have no idea what I’m looking at.