“What if I have rabies?”
Peppers scrubbed his ankle with alcohol wipes. “Was that another
raccoon?”
“You signed
the papers.” Spears tapped on his laptop. “The agreement you signed specifically
included a waiver accepting personal risk. All of you signed it.”
Alan Miller
blinked. “Really? I thought it was just one of those 32-page terms of service
agreements that you click on but nobody ever reads.”
“So what happened last year?” I gulped
some lukewarm coffee.
We all sat
in the dining room, the thunderstorm still roaring outside at 3 a.m.
“Did you
watch the first season?” Kristen DeWolfe was drinking vodka with ice. “None of
us made it two nights. I was the last to go—”
“What?”
Peppers snorted. “You ran screaming out the door while I waited with Duane—” He
nodded to Catman—“waiting to see what came down the stairs. We waited for
hours. Then everyone was gone.”
“It made
for a decent finale.” Spears swigged a Sprite. “Enough to get us a second
season.”
“What happened
that made you run?” I was tired, scared, and exhausted. “Raccoons?”
Rachel
sipped a beer. “One of the stars hanged himself.”
“What?” I
almost dropped my cup. “And you didn’t tell me? Why are we here?”
“I offered
to let you binge it with me.” She kicked my ankle. “You wanted to watch The
Handmaid’s Tale.”
“You
watched it too.” I stared at Catman. “So why did he kill himself?”
“We don’t
know.” That was Spears. “No note, nothing. We had to pay out a lot of money to
the family. That’s why we almost didn’t get a second season. Then—”
“Jeremy,
shut up!” Catman pounded a fist on the table. “Look, we’re financing the third season
ourselves. Everything here, the food, the permits, the 5 million dollars—we’ve
got to find out what’s going on here.”
“Is that
what you really care about?” My voice was jittery. “Or just your ratings?”
“Jurgen.”
Peppers shook his head, looking as tired as me. “Stay calm. I found Jordan
Gibbons, and I want—”
“You found
him?” DeWolfe jabbed a finger. “I found him! You were right behind me, but I
found him first!”
“The point
is . . .” Catman waved a hand. “That’s why we’re all here. To find out what’s
going on.”
And to
split 5 million dollars. I looked at Rachel. She shrugged. “Whatever you want.”
I wanted to
go. Then the thunder boomed again, and I thought about trying to drive all the
way back to the airport through the storm.
And Catman
was right. I wanted to figure out what was going on here. As long as nobody got
killed.
Catman
stood up. “Let’s all try to get some sleep. We’ll start over in the morning.”
Thunder rattled the walls. “We’ve got lots to eat.”
“Just check
your rooms for cameras.” My legs were wobbly as I got up. “We found one in our
room. Be careful, unless you want to end up on the internet.”
Catman glared
at me. Spears closed his laptop.
Rachel
stood and patted my shoulder. “Come on, lover. Let’s get some rest.”
I might have slept. I
know I dreamed.
Rachel and
I were standing in the rain, holding hands, as a monster the size of delivery
truck stalked toward us on huge black paws. But our feet were stuck in the mud.
We couldn’t move.
So I reached
into my back pocket and found—a pineapple. I threw it at the creature’s face—
And missed.
Rachel
punched my shoulder. “A pineapple? Really?”
“Sorry.” I
tensed up, ready to die.
“Wake up!”
Rachel punched me again, and I opened my eyes. “Wha . . .?”
She was sitting up, shivering. “I want to try
to take a shower, if there’s any hot water in this place. There’s definitely no
heat.”
“Oh.”
Daylight. I rolled over. “Okay.”
I checked
my phone. 11:30. Out the window, clouds loomed in the sky, threatening more
rain.
Rachel came out of the bathroom,
shivering and pulling a towel over her shoulders. “I might have used up the
last of the hot water. Sorry.”
I washed up in the sink as best as
I could. Then I got dressed and we headed downstairs. Rachel wore her denim
jacket, jeans, and boots. She looked hot. I had my Chicago Bears sweatshirt. I
was pretty sure I looked dumpy and cold.
Spears sat
at the table, editing video on a laptop. Otherwise the dining room was empty.
I toasted a
poppyseed bagel while Rachel spooned fruit and yogurt into a bowl. “Where is everybody?”
Spears
glanced up. “Still asleep, I guess.”
I poured
coffee for Rachel and me and sat down. “So what really happened with season
two?”
He
grimaced. “I can’t tell you that.”
“You have
an NDA too?” I bit into my bagel.
“Sort of.”
Spears leaned back. His eyes looked as if he hadn’t slept at all. “After season
one the network got skittish. They’d only fund us if we agreed to all kinds of
conditions. When season two went off the rails . . . well, like Duane said,
we’re doing this on our own.”
I drank
some coffee. “What about Gibbons?”
“Nothing!”
That came from Catman, walking in behind me. “We just found him, hanging in a
room. Everyone freaked. I got the footage. But they ran, and so none of them
got the money. That’s why Kristen and Martin are so mad at each other.” He bit
into an apple.
“What did
the police say?”
“Suicide.”
Spears glanced at Catman. “No note, but no signs of being attacked or a fight.
He somehow hung a sheet over the
bathroom door, then climbed up on a wastebasket and kicked it over . . .” He
shuddered.
I hid my
own shudder. “Was he upset? Frightened?”
“We
all were. There was a ghost, and strange noises, moaning—”
“And
windows that wouldn’t stay shut.” Catman tossed his apple into a wastebasket.
“I know it sounds like a Scooby-Doo episode—except for Gibbons—but it was
pretty creepy.”
“Just so
long as it’s not old man Smithers trying to fool everyone into thinking his
amusement park is haunted.” I finished my bagel and got up to toast another.
“So what now?”
Catman
shrugged. “We wait until everyone’s up, and then we start over.”
It was 1 p.m. before everyone was up and fed. Peppers and
DeWolfe glared at each other without speaking. Miller and Jaime Kinsman sat
close enough together to make me suspect they’d hooked up. A nod and a grin
from Rachel confirmed it. “You don’t even have to be psychic to see it,” she
whispered.
“Okay.”
Catman stood up. “Let’s get started again. It won’t be as atmospheric in the
daytime, but we’ll probably all feel safer.”
“Let’s mix
up the groups.” Spears was shooting with his smartphone. “How about—”
“What are
we going to find?” Peppers growled. “We’ve already searched every room here.”
“Not the
attic and the basement.” Miller opened a fresh can of Coke.
“Okay,
let’s do Jurgen, Kristen and Alan in the attic,” Catman said. “And Martin,
Jaime and—”
“Wait a
minute.” Kristen DeWolfe jabbed a finger at Rachel. “You. The psychic. Is there
anything going on in this house?”
“Of course
there is,” Peppers snapped. “We saw it in the first season—”
“I want to
hear from her. Rachel.” DeWolfe folded her arms.
Spears zeroed in on Rachel’s face.
She sat forward. “There’s definitely . . . an entity. Maybe lots of small
entities making up one larger one.” She shrugged. “Or it might be raccoons.”
“What?” Peppers pounded a fist on
the table. “Be serious!”
I slid my chair back. “Hey, Martin?
Please don’t shout at Rachel.”
“It’s okay.” Rachel stiffened her
shoulders. “Look, animals can have hive minds. Hornets get frightened and angry
when you attack their nest. I can’t read minds. I only sense feelings. And
sometimes demons.”
DeWolfe snorted. “Fine. We’re looking
for raccoons or demons, or maybe demonic raccoons?”
“Something killed Gibbons.” Peppers
smiled at Rachel. “I’d like to talk to you later.”
“Sure.” Rachel pushed her red hair
back. “Anytime.”
That made me nervous. But I’d
learned from experience that Rachel could take care of herself.
“All right.”
Catman pointed to the door. “Let’s get going—”
Thunder rumbled.
The chandeliers swung over our
heads. Rachel covered her ears. Jaime Kinsman shot up from the table, pulling
away from Miller. DeWolfe shoved her chair back. Peppers looked at the ceiling.
Catman and Spears swung their
smartphones around, as if trying to catch all of us looking scared. The table
shook,
I grabbed Rachel’s wrist. “You
okay?”
“Yeah—”
The thunder boomed again. And this
time the walls and floor shook. Lightning strike?
Then the chandelier overhead dropped,
crashing down onto our table with a loud bang. My chair toppled back, and I
reached for Rachel. Peppers cursed. Catman shouted. “Get this! Get this!”
Chunks of the ceiling started
falling. I scrambled under the table, pulling Rachel with me. “What’s going
on?”
“I don’t know!” She grabbed me.
“The house is falling apart! I don’t know!”
I closed my eyes. Rachel’s head
sagged on my shoulder. I tried to hold onto her as I slumped to the floor.
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