“No sweat,” Heath assured him, swinging his duffel over his shoulder, and taking the handle of my suitcase up while he was at it. “We pack light.”
As we thanked Merrick and turned toward the stairs, Heath leaned in to kiss me sweetly on the cheek. “How you holding up?”
I put my hand on his shoulder and moved close to him. “I think I’m asleep on my feet.”
“I hear you,” he agreed, before pointing across the huge front hall to a sign. “There’s a dining room here,” he said. “Should we get some food to take up to our rooms?”
I sighed and closed my eyes. “If you’re hungry, go for it, but I’m passing. All I want to do is fall into bed for the next twelve hours.”
On the way up the stairs, Heath stopped to reach over and steady me, because I was swaying so badly that I was in danger of falling back down the stairs. At the top he offered me the handle of my bag and said, “Sweetheart, you’ve gotta pull it for a little ways while I look at the map, okay?”
I nodded dully and shuffled along clumsily behind him. I never lifted my gaze from the backs of his shoes and I couldn’t tell you how long it took or how many corners we turned, but eventually we ended up at a locked door and Heath inserted his key, turning it with some effort to gain us entry. The door gave way with a loud creak, and if I’d had the strength, I would have commented on how appropriate the setting was for two ghost hunters like us.
The corridor beyond was dim and dreary. It was also quite damp and a chill went through me, raising goose bumps along my arms. Heath and I both hesitated in the doorway, and with effort I focused on the atmosphere. “The VIP wing is haunted,” I said.
Heath eyed the corridor warily. “It’s thick in here, Em. Do you want to go back and have Merrick assign us another room with the riffraff?”
I smiled wearily. “Wait till Gilley hears he was labeled part of that crowd and we were given VIP status.”
“He’ll demand to stay in this section too, even with the additional spook factor.”
I knew Heath was still waiting for me to decide what to do, but I was so numb with fatigue that I was having a really hard time thinking. I didn’t like the feel of the place, but it was such a long way back, and Merrick had suggested he was going to help out somebody in the kitchen, so even if we went back down and asked to be reassigned, in all likelihood we weren’t going to have anyone to assist us for some time. “Let’s just stay here the one night and ask for another room in the morning,” I said at last.
Still, Heath seemed to hesitate, and he looked around worriedly. I could see the goose pimples on his arms too. “Unless you think we really should go back?” I added with a sigh.
Heath’s eyes flickered to me, and he softened. “I think it’ll be okay,” he said. “After all, the worst spooks at this place are supposed to be haunting the moat and the moors. One night won’t kill us.”
I trudged through the opening, blinking heavily. “Exactly. Even the dead won’t wake me tonight.”
Heath grabbed for the handle of my luggage again, and I stumbled along clumsily, fighting to keep my eyes open and my legs moving. Heath then passed me and led the way to our room, which by now felt like it was located on the other side of the moon. At last he stopped at one of our assigned rooms and inserted another key. Pushing the door open, he motioned with his arm for me to move ahead, and when I did, I nearly came up short. The room was quite small, as in barely enough room for the queen-sized mattress. It was also dark and musty smelling, like it hadn’t been aired out in a very long time. “This is the VIP suite of rooms?” I said.
Heath eyed the numbered keys in his hand, then backed out and looked down the hall. “He also gave us the room next door.”
“Is it any bigger?” I asked. Truly if I had known the rooms were this small and this musty, I would’ve insisted we take a regular room.
Heath moved out of sight for a minute and I heard him turning the other key in the door. He then reappeared and said, “It is a little bigger. Come on, babe, let’s get you to bed.”
I shuffled out of the room and over to the one next door, which still smelled pretty musty, but at least was slightly bigger. Once inside I shrugged out from under the strap of my messenger bag, letting it fall to the floor, then wiggled out of my coat, letting it plop on top of the bag, and crawled onto the bed, finally falling face-first into the pillow. The most effort I exhibited after that was to curl around into a fetal position and exhale a relieved sigh. I’d sleep in my clothes and be happy for it. And that was one of my last clearly conscious thoughts, but even as it entered my head, I could feel Heath tugging off my boots, jeans, and sweater before covering me with the comforter. I also think he kissed my cheek and told me he loved me, but that part I honestly could have dreamed.
I slept like the dead (no pun intended) for several hours until something roused me from a lovely slumber. I remember opening one eye with a slight whimper. I was still heavy with fatigue. What had it been that’d woken me up?
I listened for a minute, and could hear only the rhythmic sounds of Heath’s steady breathing next to me. I closed my eye with a little sigh, ready to tuck back into la-la land, when something from the other side of our door made me snap the lid open again.
I listened, and this time I could hear a sound like a woman crying from the hallway. At first I just listened, wondering if perhaps she’d simply had a spat with her boyfriend or her spouse, but I hadn’t heard any arguing, and didn’t Merrick say that he’d put us in an unoccupied part of the castle? Then I immediately wondered if Heath had locked the riffraff door behind us. Knowing him, he hadn’t; he wasn’t someone who looked down his nose at anybody. If some guest of the castle wanted into this section, Heath would hold the door for him.
The crying just beyond our door continued, and I waited for the woman to move back to her room, but the sound of her pitiful weeping went on and on. Finally and with a grunt of irritation I pushed up off the pillow and shivered in the damp night air.
Hugging my sides, I moved to the door and tried to feel for the peephole, as there was no light coming through from out in the hallway.
It took me a second or two to understand that there was no peephole—the Welsh maybe aren’t as paranoid about strangers at their door as we Americans. I stood there for about five more seconds, wondering what to do, and after listening to the woman continue to sob in distress, I decided what the hell, it wouldn’t hurt to check on her. Hiding my nearly naked bottom half behind the door, I turned the knob and pulled.
The door opened with a considerable squeak, and as I leaned out, I could see someone huddled in the hallway startle at the noise. Even though the corridor was dimly lit, I could make out the figure of a woman dressed in a long white nightgown and a black knit shawl, cowering against the wall. She got up when I leaned out to take a look, and she began to limp along down the hallway while trying to cover her face with her hand and the shawl. I stared at her for a moment, and one thing became quite clear: Judging by her disheveled appearance and the purple bruises I saw on her wrists and forearms, the poor thing had been in some sort of awful scuffle.
“Are you all right?” I whispered. Her demeanor was so timid and frightened that I was afraid I’d scare her even more if I spoke at full volume.
She simply shook her head and tried to limp away, pulling her shawl even more closely about her. But then she happened to glance back at me over her shoulder and through her tangle of hair I could see a black eye and a puffy lip. Someone had roughed her up pretty good.
“Ma’am?” I said. “Do you need some help?”
She ducked her chin again and limped with a bit more effort to put some distance between us.
I hovered indecisively in the doorway for a few anxious moments. Should I go after her and try to help or console her? What the heck happened to her, anyway? Had sh
e been attacked by someone she knew? Or was there a predator on the loose in the castle? Whichever, the woman needed medical attention—that much was clear.
Finally I backed into the room and hunted around in the dark for my jeans. At last I found them on the floor by the bed and shuffled into them as quickly as possible. My sweater was harder to locate, as it had ended up partially kicked under the bed. Heath stirred a little when I muttered in irritation, but otherwise he didn’t wake up.
After hastily getting into the sweater, I darted to the door, opened it as quietly as that awful squeak would allow, and ran out into the hall. . . which was empty.
There was no sign of the woman. Undaunted, I moved down the corridor, listening as I went for the sound of her whimpering, but nothing came to my ears. At the end of the hallway I looked first right, then left, but couldn’t see anyone about. “Dammit!” I muttered. Which way had she gone? Had she come to this wing to hide from her assailant? Had she perhaps moved back through the riffraff door to her side of the castle? And where the heck was that door, anyway? I realized I hadn’t paid any attention to where the door was located in this maze of corridors.
I moved to my right first and went quietly along the hallway, listening for any sign of the distraught woman. I thought about calling out to her, but she seemed so spooked by my appearance that I didn’t want to send her any deeper into hiding.
Still, as I traveled up and down both the right hallway and then the left, I could find no sign of her, or the main corridor leading out of this wing of the castle.
“Well, that sucks,” I muttered when I turned a corner and saw that it was a dead end. Only an open window greeted me. The wind was pulling the two halves of the shuttered casements back and forth, and I was a bit scared that the glass would break if the wind was strong enough, so I moved to close the two panes. As I reached for the separate halves, I heard a loud splash from below. It was still very dark out, but I could just make out the gleam of the water in the moonlight. I peered into the dim waters of the moat, but saw nothing that would have been responsible for creating such a loud splash. “Weird,” I whispered, closing the window and throwing the lock.
A shiver went up my spine and I felt more than a little creeped out all of a sudden. I had a fleeting thought that the woman I’d seen might have gone through the window and into the moat, but wouldn’t I have seen her jump?
I shivered anew and turned back toward the way I’d come. I’d taken only about five steps away from the hidden corner with the window when the bulb right over my head suddenly went out, plunging me into an even murkier gloom. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up on end, and I looked around uneasily. A cold chill also seemed to fill the hallway, and suddenly I really didn’t want to be in that hallway. I wanted only to get back to my room—stat.
I started trotting in that direction when all of a sudden I heard a sort of low, guttural growl, but not quite like a dog might make. It was a rumbling of sorts, like the sound a cat makes right before it hisses, only this particular rumble was much deeper and had more timbre.
It came from behind me and reflexively I paused to look over my shoulder. There was nothing in the hallway, but I could identify where the low rumble was coming from—it was from the last door on the left where I’d been standing only seconds before.
The rumble grew louder, more carnal and vicious, and for a moment I stood frozen, my brain trying to make sense of what was happening even as the internal warning bell we all carry sounded, demanding that I turn tail and run.
Just as I was about to take off, however, there was a screech from behind the door, followed immediately by a tremendous crash against it. I jumped and let out a frightened squeal, staring hard at the door, which sounded as if it was rattling on its hinges.
It was as if someone. . . or something had just launched itself right into the door at full force. The low rumble picked up again, and I didn’t wait around for that door to break down and whatever was behind it to come out and get me. I bolted.
Just as I reached the intersection to my hallway, I heard another tremendous crash and the sound of splintering wood. Whatever had been in that room was now breaking out of it.
I rounded the corner and ran like my life depended on it—which, let’s face it, it probably did. I dashed down the hallway listening for the sound of that door giving way, but all I heard was that terrible low growl, until one last crash and a tremendous boom let me know the door had given way.
As I ran, the lights above me went out one at a time the moment I passed underneath them, and I could feel that I was on the verge of being plunged into total darkness.
Ahead I could see our door; it was still slightly ajar and one light was still lit in the hallway, drawing me like a beacon. I was just a few yards away when I heard that terrible rumble again, followed by the sound of something very big giving chase.
I could hear the pounding of its feet charging toward me. It sounded as big as a tiger, but I dared not look back. I kept my focus on making it to the door of our room and used my arms to pump faster and faster. Even as I tore down the corridor, I could feel a bone-chilling cold engulf me and its appearance was so startling that it almost caused me to stumble.
Somehow I managed to keep my footing and ran as if my feet had wings. “Heath!” I cried as the bitter cold wrapped itself around me and threatened to freeze me from the inside out. “Heeeeeeeeeath!”
The pounding footfalls of the thing giving chase drew nearer and nearer. Whatever it was, it was faster than I was. Abject terror seeped into my bones like that frigid cold, and as I opened my mouth to scream, the last bulb went out overhead, enveloping me into total darkness.
Behind me the footfalls sounded like they were right on top of me now, and just as I was about to be tackled, a light inside our room came on and the door pushed open, flooding the hallway with light, and Heath stood in the doorway looking at me as if he could hardly believe his eyes.
I barreled into him, throwing us both into the room, and somehow reached back to slam the door behind us. “What the. . . ?” he gasped as my momentum shoved him right onto the bed.
“Shhhh!” I whispered, shivering while I whipped around to throw the dead bolt. A second later whatever was giving chase slammed right into the door with such force that I was knocked back off my feet.
Chapter 2
I fell right into Heath, who grabbed me around the waist, twisted on the mattress, and pulled me to the floor. He then tugged me around the far side of the bed, positioning me as close to the far corner as possible, before putting himself and the bed between me and the door. I wrapped trembling arms around him, and from over his shoulder I watched the door with thundering heart and heaving lungs, waiting for whatever had slammed against the door to strike again.
I could see the wood had splintered from the force of whatever had hit it, and the screws in one hinge appeared to have been compromised. Another solid slam and the whole thing would give way.
But the seconds ticked by and nothing else happened. Still, we huddled in that half-crouched position for many minutes, waiting and watching, but only silence filled the room and the hallway beyond.
At last Heath turned to me with big wide eyes. “What the hell was that?”
I could only shake my head. I had no earthly idea.
Slowly he helped me to my feet and sat me down on the bed, where he ran a hand over my cheek and studied me with grave concern as if he was looking for any sign of injury. Finally he said, “Tell me everything.”
At first I didn’t quite know where to start. I must’ve started and stopped my story six different times, and I could see the confusion in Heath’s eyes, but I wasn’t able to make sense of all that’d happened since I’d been awakened either.
“You say this woman was hurt?” he asked when I’d finally gotten most of
the story out.
I nodded.
Heath eyed the door warily. “Could she still be out there?”
“I looked for her and I didn’t see any sign of her. I’m not sure what happened—she could’ve gone back to her side of the castle or maybe she headed to the front desk for help.”
Heath squeezed my hand before moving to the door. He put his ear to it first and listened closely; then he turned the dead bolt very slowly so as not to make a sound. He placed his hand on the knob, then seemed to think better of it.
Turning back to face me, he took in the room, and I could tell what he was thinking—he wanted to have handy anything he could use as a weapon. The room was so spartan there wasn’t much to utilize, but finally he grabbed the small metal trash bin and edged back to the door. He looked at me over his shoulder and I nodded. Opening the door a tiny crack still caused the door to squeak. I braced myself, not knowing what to expect, and Heath put his eye to the crack. I could already see that the overhead lamps had come back on in the hallway, as the slight opening allowed in a thin ray of light.
For several seconds I watched Heath just stare out into the hall, but then he backed up a bit and opened the door a little farther. I crossed the room and stood behind him, trying myself to get a peek. What I could see was an empty corridor, still dimly lit but clear of anyone or anything that might cause us alarm.
Heath then stood back and I followed suit. As he did so, he pulled the door open all the way and considered it. “What?” I asked.
“Whatever hit the door should’ve left a mark,” he said, but I couldn’t see any outward sign of damage from the force of the impact of whatever had slammed against the door. Only the splintering of the wood and the compromised hinges on our side showed any sign of damage.