“Not here. Not yet.”
Derek stepped back, but his eyes promised something ugly, something that was only postponed, not canceled. Vincent straightened his jacket, the mask of civility back in place.
“You have until the end of the week to reconsider. After that…”
He shrugged. A casual gesture that made my blood run cold.
“Well, mountain living can be dangerous. Accidents happen.”
They got back in their SUV and drove away, leaving the smell of exhaust hanging in the clean mountain air like a threat. Lily’s hand found mine. Her fingers were trembling.
“Ethan,” she whispered. “What are we going to do?”
I did not have an answer. All I had was a burning certainty that we were exactly where we were supposed to be and a growing fear of what it would cost to stay there.
That night, we slept in the shed wrapped in blankets we found in our grandfather’s hidden room. The wind howled outside like something hungry, and every creak and groan of the old wood made us jump awake, reaching for each other in the darkness. I must have finally fallen asleep around midnight, because when I woke up, the sun was streaming through the grimy windows and someone was pounding on the door. I grabbed the first thing I could find, a heavy wrench from the workbench, and crept toward the door. Lily was awake behind me, clutching a hammer.
I yanked the door open.
It was not the Holloways.
It was Walter from the general store. He was seventy-four years old, a Vietnam veteran with hands that still knew how to work and eyes that had seen too much. Beside him was his wife, June, seventy years old with silver hair and the kind of eyes that made you feel like everything was going to be okay. She held a basket covered with a checkered cloth, and the smell of fresh biscuits drifted toward us like a promise.
“Heard you two spent the night up here,” Walter said. His voice was gruff but not unkind. “Brought some breakfast. My wife makes the best biscuits in three counties. Figured you might be hungry.”
June pushed past him into the shed, taking in our makeshift camp with a practiced eye.
“When did you children eat last? You look half-starved, both of you.”
Lily lowered her hammer.
“Yesterday, maybe. I don’t remember.”
June made a sound that conveyed exactly what she thought about children going hungry. Within minutes, she had spread out the contents of her basket on the workbench. Fresh biscuits, scrambled eggs, thick strips of bacon, a thermos of hot coffee that steamed when she poured it.
“Eat,” she commanded. “Both of you.”
Then we talked. We ate. The food was the best thing I had tasted in years, maybe ever. Real food made by someone who cared. Lily ate until I thought she might be sick, then looked at me with wide eyes like she could not believe what was happening.
When we finished, Walter leaned against the doorframe and fixed us with a steady gaze.
“I knew your grandfather,” he said. “Forty years, give or take. He was a good man. Best stonemason I ever saw, and I’ve seen a lot. Built half the foundations in this county. Never charged more than people could pay, and sometimes not even that.”
“But something happened,” I said. “Something with a man named Marcus Holloway.”
Walter’s face darkened, shadows moving behind those pale eyes.
“Yeah. Something happened. Holloway was a bad man. The worst kind. He had his fingers in everything. Drugs, extortion, worse things that never got talked about in daylight. Your grandfather got mixed up with him somehow, trying to help someone. That was William’s way. Always trying to help. And after that…”
He paused, looking out the window at the mountain.
“William just disappeared.”
“He didn’t run,” Lily said quietly. “He was hiding.”
Walter nodded slowly, a muscle working in his jaw.
“I’m starting to understand that now.”
