Lost Among the Living(107)

“Have you ever thought that there’s something creepy about Old Barrons Road?” she asked. “I mean, have you ever been out here? It’s sort of uncanny. It’s like there’s something—”

“I can’t take much more of this,” Jamie said. “Get back in your car and drive home, or I’m coming to get you.”

“I’ll go, I’ll go.” Her hands were tingling, even the hand that was frozen to her phone, and she still had a jittery blast of adrenaline blowing down her spine. That was a footstep. A real one. The hill was hidden through the trees from here, and she suddenly longed for the comforting sight of the fluorescent gas station lights. She took a step, then realized something. She stopped and turned around again, heading quickly for the gates of Idlewild Hall.

“I hope that sound is you walking toward your car,” Jamie said darkly.

“There was a sign,” Fiona said. “I saw it. It’s posted on the gates. It wasn’t there before.” She got close enough to read the lettering in the dark: ANOTHER PROJECT BY MACMILLAN CONSTRUCTION, LTD. “Jamie, why is there a sign saying that Idlewild Hall is under construction?”

“Because it is,” he replied. “As of next week. The property was sold two years ago, and the new owner is taking it over. It’s going to be restored, from what I hear.”

“Restored?” Fiona blinked at the sign, trying to take it in. “Restoring it into what?”

“Into a new school,” he replied. “They’re fixing it up and making it a boarding school again.”

“They’re what?”

“I thought you knew. I thought everybody knew.”

Fiona took a step back, still staring at the sign. Restored. Girls were going to be playing in the field where Deb’s body had lain. The construction company would build new buildings, tear down old ones, add a parking lot, maybe widen the road. All of this landscape that had been here for twenty years, the landscape she knew so well—the landscape of Deb’s death—would be gone.

“Damn it,” she said to Jamie as she turned and walked back toward her car. “I’ll call you tomorrow. I’m going home.”