Kill Creek Read online

  Moore touched the back of a chair.

  The living room.

  A thought drifted quickly through the dark expanse of her mind, and she snatched it up.

  The living room.

  A place that is alive.

  Moore had always hated the term living room for exactly that reason. It conjured up images of a family gathered to spend quality time with each other in some ridiculous Norman Rockwell wet dream. She knew some people were convinced this existed in their lives, but Moore refused to believe it. There were always secrets. Daddy is having an affair. Mommy is popping pills. Junior spends a little too much time torturing bugs in the driveway. And Baby . . .

  Well, Baby makes mistakes, doesn’t she? Baby runs off because she thinks she’s in love.

  “It’s a shame Goodman only got to enjoy this place for such a short time,” Daniel said.

  Moore gripped the back of the chair, digging her silver nails into the fabric. “Come on. What did he really think was going to happen?”

  They all turned to her.

  “What do you mean?” Wainwright asked.

  “I mean, Goodman was a white dude shacking up with a black girl in the years before the Civil War. What did he think? That the murderous cocksuckers from the slave state next door were just going to let that happen?”

  “He loved her.” It was Kate, staring at Moore over the barrel of her camera lens. The camera clicked as she snapped a still photograph.

  “And it got them killed. What good is that?” Moore asked.

  “They couldn’t help how they felt.” Kate held her finger on the button and rattled off a burst of photos, all of Moore staring back at her. “Maybe they knew that death was a possibility. Maybe it made their love . . . stronger.”

  Kate turned her head slightly to steal a glance at Wainwright. He was watching her with a strange sense of wonder.

  Baby thinks she’s in love, Moore thought again. She clenched her fists. “That’s some bullshit. Death doesn’t make love stronger. Death only makes things dead.”

  The camera went rat-a-tat-tat as Kate fired off another burst.

  “I think you have enough pictures of me,” Moore said coldly.

  Kate lowered the camera. “You’re right. I got what I need.” She switched the setting back to “Movie Mode.” The camera beeped softly, once again recording video.

  “What’s next?” Daniel asked.

  Wainwright motioned through the archway, toward the foyer. “Well, now’s as good a time as any to bring in your bags. Then I’ll show you to your rooms.”

  ELEVEN

  1:28 p.m.

  SAM COULD FEEL his every move being watched.

  It’s Kate.

  She stood several yards away, hip-deep in the tallgrass. She cradled her camera like a child, eyes on the LCD screen as she captured every moment in high-def.

  “They’re fucking,” Sam heard Moore say as she lifted her bag from the back of the van.

  “Who?” Daniel asked, blanching at her vulgarity.

  “Wainwright and the camera girl,” Moore explained. “She’s that rich twat’s woman. So quit eyeballing her tits.”

  “I’m married,” Daniel said.

  “And that’s stopped one hundred percent of no one,” Moore replied, shouldering her bag.

  On the porch of the house, tucked back into the shadows created by the overhang, Wainwright waited for them to retrieve their luggage. As always, the Adudel book was clasped in his hands.

  “What do you think he’s really up to?” Sam quietly asked the others.

  Sebastian followed Sam’s eyeline. “Who? Mr. Wainwright? He’s harmless. Or as harmless as an arrogant billionaire’s son can be.”

  “They’re both weird as shit,” Moore said.

  Because they’re hiding something, Sam thought. And then, almost immediately, he scolded himself: You don’t know that. Stop looking for problems where there aren’t any. You’ll drive yourself crazy.

  Sam said aloud, “You all saw how he reacted in the bus, when he realized I hadn’t read the book.”

  “Maybe he just wants us to be as excited about this place as he is,” Daniel suggested.

  Moore leaned into the back of the bus for her bag. “Or maybe he secretly brought us all here to kill us. He and his little Manson girl are going to torture us, murder us, and then upload the whole goddamn thing to the internet. He’ll be the most famous name in horror by noon tomorrow.”

  Sam glanced over at Kate, noticing for the first time the shotgun microphone mounted atop the camera and the earbud wire snaking up from the camera’s headphone jack.

  Did she hear that? Sam wondered.

  Kate lowered her camera and gave a knowing smile.

  Sam followed the others across the foyer to the door of the elevator. Behind them, Kate stopped at the foot of the staircase.

  “I’ll meetcha up there,” she said, her charming Southern twang competing with the clatter of the elevator’s accordion door. And then she was gone, bounding up the stairs to the second floor.

  The rest of them crammed shoulder to shoulder into the tight confines of the elevator, their bags by their sides.

  Sam suddenly found it difficult to breathe. Why are we taking the elevator? We barely have any luggage. Why does Wainwright want us in here?

  “Is this really necessary?” he asked aloud. “We’re going up one story.”

  “Rachel would have wheeled her sister into this elevator,” Wainwright said, as if this explained it. “It was Rebecca’s only way to get around the house.”

  Sam pressed his back against the wall of the elevator.

  Wainwright reached for the control panel. In addition to the requisite Door Open and Door Close buttons, there were three more, one for each floor. Wainwright pressed the button marked “2.” The elevator jolted violently as, somewhere in the shaft above, a cable was drawn over a pulley.

  Sam knew the thought was ridiculous, but he couldn’t help thinking it: He wants to kill us. He wants this to drop with all of us on board.

  Daniel shifted in place, suddenly worried. “You had this thing looked at, right? To make sure it’s still safe?”

  Moore tried to reposition herself around Daniel’s bulk. “I don’t think the elevator is the problem here, big guy. Maybe you should take the stairs.”

  “It’s safe,” Wainwright told them. It offered very little reassurance.

  The chain clicked above them as they began their surprisingly long journey to the second floor.

  “The elevator was the fastest way for Rebecca to get around the house. Not that she used it much. In the two years she lived here, her final years, Rebecca almost never left her bedroom on the third floor.”

  The elevator came to a shuddering stop. Wainwright pulled the accordion door open, revealing Kate, already there, focusing the wide-angle lens of her camera. Without looking up from her monitor, she stepped to the side, clearing the way for the group.

  There were five bedrooms on the second floor, all indistinguishable from the outside, each marked by a heavy wooden door. Wainwright walked backward as he led the group. Kate trailed behind.

  “Slaughter, this is you,” Wainwright said, pointing to the first door on the right. “You’ll find everything you need for a comfortable night. A nice big bed. Dresser for your clothes.”

  Daniel gave a little smile of appreciation and disappeared into his room.

  Wainwright turned back to the others.

  His face, Sam thought. Why does it look like flesh draped over flesh?

  With his hands tucked into the pockets of his jacket, Wainwright sauntered down to the next door, the first on the left.

  “Sebastian Cole.” Wainwright tapped the door lightly as if christening it. This time, he did not wait for the named to enter the room. Instead he gave a sigh, apparently bored with his own game. “Ms. Moore—”

  “You can all stop with the Ms. bullshit. I don’t hear you saying Mister when addressing everyone else.”

>   “Right,” Wainwright said. “Moore, the next door across the hall, that’s you. And, Sam, you’re next-door neighbors with Mr. Cole.”

  “What about Kate?” Moore asked. “Where will the lovely lady be resting her head?”

  “Kate and I are sharing the room at the end of the hall,” Wainwright explained.

  Moore gave a sharp laugh, like the thrust of a knife. “Can’t pass up the chance to squeeze the peach, eh?”

  “I’m not biting, Moore.”

  Moore blinked, feigning innocence. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Sam watched the two of them. They were strange animals that had never been introduced, and he had no idea which was the more dangerous one.

  Wainwright turned to face her. “I know you’re looking for a fight. Let’s just try to be polite, yeah? We’re all civilized people.”

  Moore’s eyes narrowed. “Speak for yourself. And I didn’t come here to be lectured.”

  “No, you came here to plug your new project, the one you hope will make everyone forget you’ve been shut out of the Cutter movie.”

  “How did you—”

  Wainwright continued, “You all came here for similar reasons. You came because you know what I can do for you. You know how popular WrightWire is. But just because you’re all here for selfish reasons doesn’t mean we can’t have a bloody good time.”

  “And what about you? What are you here for?” Sam asked.

  Wainwright smiled as warmly as his rubbery flesh would allow. “I’m here to geek the hell out with some of my heroes, mate.”

  The fuck you are, Sam thought.

  Moore gave an incredulous snort, seeming to sense Sam’s suspicion.

  “I’m quite serious,” Wainwright said. “It’s an absolute thrill to have you here. Four legends. One amazing night.”

  “Five legends, if you count the house,” said Kate from behind the camera. They all turned to her. The budding filmmaker was unable to resist this perfect staging of faces. Her finger flipped the setting from video to still.

  “Say boo,” she said as the shutter clicked.

  Sebastian closed the bedroom door behind him, the latch snapping obediently into place. With a weary sigh, he set his suitcase on the floor and took the bedroom in. It was a fairly Spartan arrangement. A red-and-black patchwork quilt covered a four-poster bed. A streak of gold snaked its way through the quilt’s pattern like arms of ivy along a fence. Flanking the bed were two dark oak nightstands. On the left nightstand was a single brass lamp, its shine long tarnished, its shade brittle with age. On the nightstand to the right there was nothing but a fine layer of dust.

  That’s where Richard’s reading glasses would have been, Sebastian thought. He could still picture them, rectangular lenses in simple wire frames.

  The only adjoining room was a bathroom. The door was half-open. From where he stood, Sebastian could see only a fraction of the space. Tiny white tiles covered the floor. They were clean and perfectly spaced, glowing in the early afternoon light.

  Sebastian placed his suitcase on the bed, running his fingers over the worn, well-traveled leather before popping open the latches. He took out the meticulously folded clothes—a pair of slacks, a white button-down shirt with thin blue stripes, a clean pair of black socks—tomorrow’s outfit. Tomorrow, when this self-indulgent stunt would be over.

  He placed the clothes in the empty top drawer of a nearby dresser. In the second drawer he placed his pajamas, a cotton plaid top, and drawstring pants. Old man pajamas. Just like his father had worn.

  His father. Not even seventy years old, dressed in those same striped pajamas, his face slack, a rivulet of drool winding down his gray-stubbled chin. Sebastian remembered the moment so clearly, reading his father the poems of W. S. Merwin. Sebastian could remember every single verse, every nod of his father’s head, every drop of saliva from his lips. A man in his sixties shouldn’t have been so sick, but there he was, detached from the world. The worst part had been his father’s eyes, vacantly staring out into the great Nothing, blind to his own son sitting before him.

  That is horror, he thought. That’s the true awfulness I hope to capture in my books.

  Sebastian took a deep breath and centered himself.

  The only things left in the suitcase were his notebook (containing several pages of nearly undecipherable notes he had jotted down during the plane ride), his pens (down to three, the fourth left in his room at the hotel in Kansas City), his copy of The House on the Borderland, by William Hope Hodgson, and a dopp kit containing his toiletries. The toiletries—a toothbrush, travel-size Crest toothpaste tube, bar of soap, metal comb, and small vial of aspirin—would go in the bathroom.

  He was reaching for the dopp kit like he had done a hundred times before when, just like that, the fog returned.

  Sebastian sat gently down on the bed, his eyes moving quickly about but looking at nothing specific. Instead he looked inward, searching his mind for any train of thought. It lasted only a moment, and then the dominos fell, each more specific than the last. He was in a house. Not his own. His residence was in New York, just outside of Ithaca. This was a house by a creek. What was its name?

  Kill! his mind shouted suddenly. The startling word brought a cover of cold sweat to his skin.

  Kill, it repeated, over and over. Kill. Kill. Kill.

  “Kill Creek.” He said the name again, “Kill Creek. You’re in the house on Kill Creek.”

  His hands were shaking. He closed his eyes and heard his heartbeat, deep down in the hollow of his chest, an angry fist pounding ribs.

  “It’s only a moment,” he whispered to himself. “You’re fine.”

  He opened his eyes. His hands had stopped shaking.

  He locked in the moment: You’re at the house on Kill Creek. You’re here for a publicity stunt. Your name is Sebastian Cole. You’re a writer.

  The bedroom was impossibly silent. Not a single sound from the hall or the nearby rooms. Nothing from outside, despite the thin barrier of the single-pane window.

  The house is listening, he thought, and immediately wondered where such a ridiculous notion had come from.

  Snatching up the dopp kit, Sebastian pushed open the bathroom door the rest of the way and moved inside. He unzipped the dopp kit and removed the assorted toiletries, placing them in the medicine cabinet above the pedestal sink. His toothbrush slid off the shelf. Sebastian saw it fall and bounce off the edge of the sink, but he could not catch it before it hit the floor.

  He bent down and picked the toothbrush up off the crooked, filthy tiles. The thought of using it now made Sebastian’s throat tighten a bit.

  He froze, the toothbrush gripped tightly in his hand. The tiles had been clean when he first saw them. He was sure of it. They were white and—

  White and straight. He stared down at the floor. It was exactly as it had been. Not a smudge, not a fleck of dirt, each white tile meticulously placed.

  Sebastian shoved the toothbrush into the medicine cabinet and slammed the door closed. On the outside was a mirror, a large smudge streaked across its surface. His reflection was an ambiguous blob floating in the air.

  He scolded himself for letting his imagination run wild. Of course the tiles were the same. There was nothing otherworldly about this house. But he was a writer; it was how his mind worked, always looking for a story.

  He knew there was another reason why he had wanted to jump to the supernatural. If the rumors were to be believed, he was standing in one of the most haunted houses in the country. Yet except for the Adudel book, which Wainwright and Daniel treated so reverently, there were no documented occurrences, no unexplained phenomena recorded by giddy parapsychologists.

  Except Adudel. He’s a parapsychologist.

  “He’s a quack,” Sebastian said aloud, suddenly embarrassed by the sound of his own voice.

  Get a grip, old man. You’re talking to yourself.

  Sebastian rested his hands on either side of the sink and stared into the
smudged mirror. The amorphous blob of his reflection hovered before him.

  He glanced down and frowned. The faucet was dripping. Droplets of discolored water slowly formed on its lip and fell straight into the open drain at the bottom of the basin.

  Sebastian tried tightening the handles, first the hot, then the cold. The drip only worsened, the droplets forming more quickly.

  Something was strange. What was it?

  Think, old man!

  The droplets.

  They made no sound as they fell. The trap, hidden within the pedestal, couldn’t have been more than two feet below the drain. The water hitting the pipe should have made some kind of sound, no matter how faint. But there was nothing. Only silence.

  Sebastian leaned down, the vague impression of his reflection disappearing from the medicine cabinet mirror, replaced by the blurred image of the empty bathroom behind him.

  With his hands on the sides of the basin for support, he lowered his head into the sink, careful not to put his face in the path of the falling droplets. His left ear hovered inches away from the black hole of the drain.

  Without warning, the faucet gave an angry cough and spat out a thick brown substance that splattered the white bowl below. Sebastian cried out and flinched away, but not quickly enough. The brown liquid spattered his face.

  It’s shit, he thought in disgust. Actual shit. You’ll smell like this soon, old man. Sitting in a nursing home and filling your diaper for some poor nurse to change.

  He swiped at his face, smearing the liquid across his cheek. He held his fingers to his nose and sniffed. The brown liquid was not what he feared it was, although its scent was unpleasant, conjuring up images of things decomposing in darkness. He watched as the water from the faucet dripped brown for a few seconds, then became clear.

  The rhythm of the dripping water sped up, and now he heard what had been missing only moments before: the faint plink of the droplets hitting the trap.

  Sebastian snapped a towel from a small silver hook mounted on the wall and angrily wiped the liquid from his face. He looked into the mirror.

  A shape floated before him. A wrinkled face, obscured by the smudged glass.