Total pages in book: 180
Estimated words: 176012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 880(@200wpm)___ 704(@250wpm)___ 587(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 176012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 880(@200wpm)___ 704(@250wpm)___ 587(@300wpm)
Finding the padlock I’d left on the floor, I slip it through the hole I drilled in the latch and lock myself in—or anyone else out.
It’s the one entrance that remains unlocked unless I’m inside, but since I changed the Frosted locks today, without any help from my brothers, no one can get in the shop unless I’m here anyway.
I quietly step down the tunnel, the same feeling I had before making the hair on my arms rise. The feeling like I’m never alone in here. I come upon the main room, the gaming console still sitting in the same place and the scent of popcorn, old pizza, and chilled brick hitting my nostrils. The long hallway to my right disappears into a black void, and eyes watch me from the empty corners of the great room. It’s like that old, philosophical question—if a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, did it happen? That’s how Carnival Tower feels. Like it’s still alive when no one’s here.
Flipping on the overhead light, the room is awash, and I wince, blinded. Turning it off, I blink my way over to the sofa table and turn on a lamp. A warm glow fills the space, and I let out a sigh. Better. If Hawke ever used the big light, I would’ve certainly noticed from the outside before now.
The words on the wall across the room brighten. Vivamus, moriendum est.
Did Hawke write that on that wall?
Maybe Hunter. Dylan and Kade aren’t sentimental like that.
Or maybe it was here before.
The outline of the mystery spans a third of the massive wall, and I walk over, taking pictures with my phone. I zoom in, getting a closer look at yearbook printouts, news clippings, and a couple of police reports they’ve collected. There are copies of text conversations, and as I back up and take in the wide array of evidence, I see it’s arranged to look like a map. A city map. Everything is posted on the wall, Weston High School, Knock Hill—a once affluent area of townhouses in Weston—Shelburne Falls High School…
And my shop.
Several clippings are spread over High Street, red yarn stretching from every poignant location to another and numbered in chronological order.
A narrow, winding space of brick is visible between the two towns, representing the river. Something about the shape of it—the lines of water—reminds me of something. Like branches…
I scan the pictures, documents, texts, and accounts of the urban legends, piecing together what my nieces and nephews have learned so far.
Carnival Tower used to be a speakeasy a hundred years ago. My shop was the business front, and Rivertown Bar & Grill next door was a house. Until about twenty years ago anyway.
One night, a young girl was babysitting there, and a thug from Weston came hunting for revenge. She didn’t know that his older brother was behind the mirror, hiding in the speakeasy where I am now, watching them have some fun.
Don’t lean back into mirrors.
I grew up hearing that. A silly kids’ superstition that mirrors are doorways or windows or something. I never paid it much attention. I mean, how often does anyone find themselves leaning into mirrors?
But now I know. Every story starts with something true, I guess. Does Lucas know about these legends, since he grew up here too?
I move over the evidence, inching down as I follow the yarn across the map. By the looks of things, they didn’t have as much fun as planned that night because the brothers wanted to carry it out a little longer. They lured her to Weston in the prisoner exchange that happens during Rivalry Week every October between the high schools.
In fact, this more than two-decades-long tradition was their idea, it appears.
I told you she always liked me more, I reread one of the printed-out texts.
My blood goes cold, seeing pictures of the house. Their house in Weston. The raw, hard floor of the bedroom where she slept those two weeks.
Winslet MacCreary.
I move back down the map, searching. I saw her name somewhere else too. I spot it, in Hawke’s writing, as well as the names Deacon, Manas, and their deceased brother, Conor. Jogging back over to the coffee table, I pick up the diary I noticed last time I was here and dig out the picture of the sexy blonde, her naked parts expertly shielded by her long arms and angle in the photo.
Winslet.
According to the evidence, she didn’t return the love—obsessive love, from what it sounds like—of Conor Doran. His twin, Deacon, also a football player for the rival town, Weston, came for revenge on Grudge Night after his brother killed himself over her.
Their older sibling, Manas, was really the one in charge, though.
I peel open the cover of the diary again, hearing the brown, leather spine softly crack.