House of Darken (Secret Keepers #1)(3)

After about thirty seconds of her rotating the map, I leaned over her shoulder. “Do you want some help?” I asked.

Without hesitation, she thrust the paper toward me. “Yes, please, this damn thing makes no sense. It’s upside down or something.”

Michael chuckled, very used to his wife’s lack of map-reading skills. “We’re on Marine Drive,” he told me, before pulling out a piece of paper from his pocket. “And our house is on … Daelight Crescent.” He squinted in the dim light, repeating it: “Fourteen Daelight Crescent.”

I scanned across the map, searching for both streets. I found the one we were on easily enough, but the other was not jumping out at all. After a few minutes I was about to tell them they had the wrong address when I finally noticed it. The name was tiny, almost unreadable.

It was across the other side of town, near the water. I figured out the quickest route from where we were and directed Michael. The storm was hanging lower now, which gave me almost no visibility in the back seat, and since there were no interior lights I had to hold the map very close to my face while lifting it up near the window to capture the final rays of the dying light. I memorized the route as best I could.

After driving for about fifteen minutes I leaned forward. “Should be around here somewhere.” I had abandoned the map. It was way too dark to see.

“There!” Sara gave a shout.

She must have picked up the flash of a sign in the lightning sprinkling the sky, because there were very few streetlights out this far. Michael and I had missed it completely; he had to swing the car around and go back again. This time he approached slowly, indicating to turn before we realized that Daelight Crescent was actually barred by a huge, imposing wood and iron gate. The design was intricate and expensive: shiny wood, polished metal accents. It towered into the sky, making me feel small and insignificant.

We all stared in silence. Michael and Sara exchanged a look.

“This can’t be right,” Michael murmured, turning from his wife and leaning forward to see better through the front windscreen. “This was the cheapest rental we could find here. It’s only seven hundred a month. They didn’t mention security gates. There’s no way we can afford this street.”

Michael wasn’t kidding. Our place in New Mexico barely had a front door, let alone something that resembled the sort of gated community movie stars hid away in. A tap at the window then made us all jump. The man standing outside of Michael’s window had taken us by surprise.

He was a large, imposing guy, holding what looked like a heavy-duty LED camping lantern. Michael slowly rolled down the clunker’s old sticky window. It stopped about halfway, unable to go any lower.

The man inclined his head toward Michael and I caught a glimpse of dark skin and eyes, and very white teeth flashing as he spoke. “Can I help you, sir?”

His accent was mild, hard to place, and his tone very polite. I studied his dark uniform, trying to make out details in the light from the high-tech-looking lantern he held. The word “security” was finely stitched in white across the pocket, and it all clicked into place.

Apparently this was a compound for movie stars, and somehow we had scored a place in there for seven hundred dollars a month. No catch either, no doubt. I slumped back in my seat as I waited for the guard to tell us we were in the wrong place.

Sara spoke up, answering his question from before – which she often did when her husband got flustered. “We arranged to rent a house, 14 Daelight Crescent. We might have the wrong street, though. We only have an old map to navigate from.”

“Who did you rent this property through?” the guard asked. Hmmm … curious. I expected him to immediately usher our old clunker away, lest it taint the rich folk.

Michael, who no longer looked flustered, leaned over the back seat and yanked up a folder from the floor. Riffling through it, he pulled out a few pieces of paper and handed them over to the security guard. “This was the site,” Michael said. “We’ve already paid first and last months’ rent.”

The man took a step away and I saw a flash of light as he lifted the lantern closer, reading over the documents. He stepped back to the car window a few minutes later, just as the first drops of rain started to hit. The storm was about to rage at us.

“Well, everything seems to be in order here. You’re one of the lucky few allowed to live on Astoria’s most exclusive street. There will be security cards in your house, one for each of you. Please keep them on you at all times. And make sure you stick to your side of the street.” He cleared his throat. “That’s an official rule – don’t cross to their side of the street and you won’t have any trouble.”

With that weird and kind of insulting advice, he turned and marched off. Within seconds, the double gates were silently swinging open.

Our side of the street. Their side of the street. What crap was this? Did they segregate people here? Because I was not cool with any sort of segregation.

Except for assholes – they could walk straight off a cliff.

My parents had always drilled the importance of equality into me, that I should treat people as I would want to be treated, no matter their personal circumstances. Despite the fact that sometimes people hit my bitch switch – my redhead temper could get the better of me – for the most part I tried to be a decent human being. I actually tried even harder now my parents were gone. I had to make them proud.