The Dead and the Dark(48)

Ashley wondered how many times she’d caught herself staring at those eyes, deep and brown and dark enough to swallow sunlight whole. Ashley’s chest felt tight. She tore herself away, focusing back on the cabin.

“Brandon…” Paris sighed. “Kind of? He was a quiet kid. There were only twelve of us in the class of ’97. I knew him, but I didn’t know him. I don’t think anyone really did. I saw him every day but I think I only talked to him once.”

“I know the feeling,” Logan whispered under her breath.

“But yeah, me and Alejo go way back. We used to spend our summers out here on my dad’s boat. We kind of drifted apart when he went off to a fancy college. I still love him, though. He was like Snakebite’s golden child. Everyone loved him.”

Ashley inched her way into the cabin and closed the front door. Logan seemed wholly uninterested in using any of her dads’ gear now. She only wanted to interrogate Paris. Ashley tried not to be vaguely irritated.

“Why’d you guys stop being friends?” Logan asked.

“We didn’t stop being friends.” Paris continued to pace the cabin before taking a seat on the ratty sofa. “Well, mostly. I don’t know. It sounds so bad, but in a way, when your dad came home and told everyone the news about him being … you know … I was kinda grateful. Like, I was mad that people were so awful to him over it, but it was kind of a relief, too. I got to step out of his shadow.” Paris shook his head. “Wow, that sounds terrible.”

“Yeah,” Logan said, “it does.”

Paris eyed her. “I don’t mean it in a bad way.”

Ashley laughed uneasily. Logan shot her a look.

“What is this place?” Ashley asked. She was careful not to mention that John had found the cabin on his father’s maps. Things with John were already tenuous enough—she didn’t need to snitch on him, too.

“It used to be a gorgeous little cabin.” Paris frowned. “Obviously, it’s not in its prime anymore.”

“Do you know who lived here?” Ashley asked.

Paris’s brow furrowed in confusion. He looked at Logan. “I do. I thought you two … Well, now I don’t feel it’s my place to say.”

Ashley and Logan eyed him impatiently.

“I guess it’ll come out one way or another since it technically has to do with both of you. You can’t tell your parents I told you about this.” Paris put his cowboy hat back on. “I know the property is Tammy’s. For whatever reason, she sold the place to your dads. Maybe she gave it to them. I don’t know. But they’re the ones who built it.”

Ashley blinked.

Next to the piano, Logan exhaled. “They built it?”

“Yeah.” Paris nodded, solemn. “I wasn’t as close with your dad at that point. I think the two of them just wanted a way to get a little farther out of town.”

Ashley eyed the walls, the crumbling ceilings, the shattered windows. Brandon and Alejo had built this place by hand, and this was what was left of it. It was as though the wood itself exhaled disappointment. “What happened to it?”

Paris shrugged. “No idea.”

The three of them remained for a moment in silence. Logan’s eyes were wide, but she said nothing. Ashley felt the urge to go to her side, to put a hand on her shoulder and make sure she was all right.

She didn’t know why.

“If you girls don’t mind, I’m gonna check down closer to the water.” Paris stood and made his way out the front door, leaving it open behind him. “Hang tight until I get back.”

When he was gone, Logan dropped her tote bag. It landed on the wood floor with a sickening thud. She said nothing. She only paced the main room, eyes closed as if trying to imagine what it looked like before the destruction. Ashley tried to picture it, too. There had been life here once. It felt miles away now.

When she opened her eyes, she froze.

Brandon sat on the couch in the corner of the room, looking out the window facing the lake. His expression was blank, eyes glassy and fixed on the distant shore.

It took Ashley a moment to realize that Logan didn’t see him. The ghosts were back. The girls weren’t alone.

Ashley braced herself against the wall.

Logan turned to face her. “What’s going on?”

“I, uh—” Ashley swallowed and motioned to the couch. “He’s here. Brandon. The ghost version. Something’s weird.”

The scene was dark and cold and wrong. The wrongness of it permeated the air, casting a shadow over the cabin so deep it was difficult to breathe. Ashley felt the darkness like an oily film on her skin.

Logan blinked. She moved to the couch and pulled several devices from her bag, methodically turning them all on.

Brandon’s ghost was silent, just like the last time Ashley had seen him. He ran his hand through the space next to him, eyes fixed on the lake outside. His expression was steely. It wasn’t an expression at all. He was a shell, as if there were nothing human in him.

A voice whispered, but she couldn’t make out what it said.

“Do you feel that?” Ashley asked.

Logan arched a brow. “Feel what?”

Ashley’s jaw chattered in the cold. It made no sense—outside the lakefront window, the sun shone warm and golden over the dirt. She’d just been outside, she’d just felt the heat. But inside the cabin it was as cold as winter. Voices whispered outside, soft as running water. Too many voices, as though there were a crowd gathered just outside. Ashley’s stomach sank with the distinct feeling that something was circling them, pressing at the walls, looking for a way inside.