Epilogue

EPILOGUE

Camryn

Strong arms encircle me from behind, and Dominic buries his nose in my neck. I smile softly while rearranging a vase of flowers on the kitchen island. He picks me fresh ones every day because he knows it makes me smile. That's what I love the most about him—he will burn down the world to keep me safe and happy.

I turn in his arms and interlace my fingers behind his neck, breathing in the earthy scent clinging to his clothes. "You smell of the forest."

He brushes a strand of hair behind my ear. "Have I ever told you how lucky I am to get to call you mine?"

"Once or twice."

His chuckle drifts across my face. "I tell you every day." He kisses me. "Multiple times a day." Another soft kiss. "Every chance I get."

"Time is a concept," I reply, tipping my chin to give him access when his lips travel down the curve of my chin. "I'm so lucky you're stuck with me."

"Stuck with you?" His mouth returns to mine, hungry and impatient. He smiles into the kiss and hoists me up on the island, hands on my hips. "There's no place I'd rather be than here, with you. Forever."

Claws patter on the floor, and Bruno enters the kitchen, wagging his tail. Dominic bends to ruffle his fur, and I let my eyes drift past him to the windows. Outside, the tall oak tree sways in the evening breeze. The sun is setting, casting hues of orange.

"Good boy," Dominic says to Bruno before he straightens, obscuring the whispering forest. I drink him in, feeling lucky to call him mine, as I reach out to trail my fingers through his stubbled beard. It doesn't matter how many years pass; Dominic will never cease to steal my breath. "You're my home," I whisper, meaning it. I was lost before he made me fall madly and helplessly in love. "As long as I'm with you, I don't care about anything else."

His eyes soften, his Adam's apple rolling with his next swallow. He picks a flower from the vase and slides it behind my ear. Darkness falls on the kitchen as the late evening sun dips behind the horizon

Dominic reaches for the hem of my shirt, grazing my humming skin with his fingers. I lift my arms and let him undress me. "Promise me we will always be together. No matter what, and no matter where."

He cups my face with his big hands and presses his forehead against mine. "I promise. Nothing will ever come between us." Our mouths collide in a hungry, frenzied kiss on the island in the same room where we were introduced to our forever.

Dominic saved me that day. Not only from the demon but also from my own shadows. Love conquers evil. I finally believe it. Even if happy endings sometimes look a little different.

I'm shoving his shirt off his shoulder, desperate to trace every ridged muscle on his sculpted chest, when headlights appear in the window. We pause, staring at each other, mouths connected. When was the last time we had visitors? Dominic curses under his breath.

In unison, we scramble to the window, almost tripping over Bruno. Dominic retrieves my clothes, and I clutch the items to my chest to hide my modesty. We stare out at the car, but it's too dark now to make it out. Dominic slides his fingers through mine and brings my knuckles to his lips, his soft kiss making me shiver. "Can you see who it is?"

Grace

"I don't know about this," I say, fidgeting in the backseat when James cuts the engine. The house looms up ahead like a monstrous beast stretching tall into the dark night sky, mist clinging to the dewy, overgrown grass.

"Are you scared?" he taunts, eyeing me in the rearview mirror with his condescending signature smirk that makes me want to put on a brave face. To rise to the challenge. I look past him to the derelict house, my throat bobbing on a swallow. Rumors are just rumors, right? Nothing more.

"How is the house still standing? Look at the sagging roof," Brielle, my best friend, says beside me. Timothy hands her a beer and then offers me one, but I shake my head.

James pushes open the door and steps out, disturbing the mist on the ground. The headlights are still on, lighting up the front of the property as he pops his head back inside. "Let's go."

I exit the car, reluctantly shutting my door, the dark windows giving me the chills. Brielle is right. The house looks like it's barely standing. The glass is long gone from some of the windows. The roof sags. Tiles have slid off and lie buried in the tall grass.

"Is it even safe?" Brielle asks, motioning to the house. "I don't think we should enter."

"Of course it's safe," Timothy says, looping his arms around her and steering her toward the house.

"It looks like it'll collapse any minute and bury us in the rubble."

"Trust me, babe. It won't." Their voices drift away.

James joins me, and I try not to blush when he brushes his shoulder against mine in a playful way designed to make me loosen up. "You're thinking too hard."

"I'm not…" I clear my throat. Truth is. I am. And I hate that he thinks I'm boring compared to the usual girls he dates. I'm nothing like them. I don't even know why he's here. With me. Well, that's a lie. Timothy and Brielle dated for less than a month when James suggested we visit the abandoned house on the outskirts of town. Not only is it next door to a notorious serial killer's farm—though the farm has long since been demolished to allow nature to erase its ugly past—but this house in front of us has its own dark history. "You've heard the rumors. Maybe we shouldn't be here."

He interlaces his fingers with mine and pulls me forward. "I'll keep you safe, Grace. I promise."

I don't believe him any more than I believe my dad when he promises to spend more time with me, but I allow James to lead me to the house. I'm tired of doing everything that's expected of me. James makes me feel like I can be anyone I want to be. And I want to be like the girls I've seen sitting on his lap in the cafeteria. Those girls would be excited to enter this house. They would giggle and flick their glossy hair.

"What do you know about this property?" he asks as we ascend the rotten porch steps. Miraculously, they don't collapse. I shiver despite the muggy heat. "A family disappeared."

"See that tree?" he points to a large oak tree out the front. Behind me, Timothy opens the door and enters with Brielle. "Mr. Kriger hung himself after murdering his family. They found him dangling from that tree."

I really don't want to look at the thick, crooked branches any more than I want to enter behind Timothy and Brielle.

James lights a flashlight and puts it beneath his chin. "Mr Kriger murdered his family and then committed suicide. But one of the daughters survived and was found wandering in the woods, muttering to herself about a demon. Crazy shit that no one believed. She was sent to Cross Hills Asylum, where an evil doctor impregnated her."

"He died from a snake bite," I reply when he takes my hand and guides me into the musty-smelling house, leaves crunching beneath my feet. James slides the flashlight's beam across the hallway. The wallpaper is gone, torn away in great strips, and the walls are covered in black mold and vines that have somehow found their way inside.

"Before Magdalene Kriger died, she gave birth to a daughter—Camryn Barker. Birth name Kriger. "

"I know this story," I reply, removing my hand from his to hug my arms around myself. It feels wrong to be here, almost like we're trespassing. "Camryn, her boyfriend, Dominic, and three friends were found murdered twenty years later. Anyone who lives in our little town or watches true crime stories on YouTube knows this."

"That's true. Then you also know that on the one-year anniversary of their deaths, her adoptive mother hung herself from the tree outside. History repeats itself." James looks excited, but I feel sick. "Camryn and her boyfriend bled out on the floor over there," he says as we enter the kitchen.

Timothy places his six-pack of beers on the island.

"There are different theories, of course, as to how they died," James continues.

Brielle lights candles around the room, drifting around me like a ghost. Speaking of ghosts, I swear a cold breeze sweeps past me. I shiver almost violently.

"Some say Dominic flipped and killed them all before he self-mutilated himself with a saw."

"That's a ridiculous theory," Timothy says, using the island's edge to flick off the beer lid. "He had been shot, stabbed, and tortured."

"Maybe they were defensive wounds?" Brielle suggests, shrugging.

"So you're saying he stabbed one of the victims to death with a knife, took a hammer to one of the other victims, and then axed his girlfriend before finally shooting himself in the shoulder and using a saw to try to cut himself in half?" He chuckles, shaking his head. "Unlikely."

"You believe the demon theory?"

He rights an upturned, rotten chair and tests its durability. When he's satisfied the legs won't snap, he sits down. "There was a salt circle on the floor beside the bodies. Why else would they paint one unless they were trying to trap a demon?" He takes a swig of his beer. "According to the reports, they researched demonology in the weeks leading up to the death."

"Besides," James says, pulling me against his chest and wrapping an arm around my waist, "we all know the rumors about this town. The mysterious, quite frankly weird shit that happens here. It's like the land is cursed or something. Who knows what evil has been drawn here."

I like his heat behind me. I like how small I feel in his arms. What I don't like is how the candles flicker around us, as if we're not alone. This room's windows are still intact, so there's no breeze.

"Think about it. Maybe the police were right, and the boyfriend murdered everyone. But what are the odds the Kriger family was murdered and buried beneath the floorboards in the basement, and then the youngest Kriger grows up and moves here—to this little town and this house—with her adoptive mother? Months later, she's dead. A year after that, her adoptive mother hangs herself from the tree—the very same tree where Camryn's grandpa hung himself decades earlier. You can't deny that it's weird."

Brielle turns away from the window. "Josephine from my science class once told me she'd seen a young man with an axe when she and Lori entered the woods."

Timothy chuckles around the rim of his beer. "Everyone knows you don't enter the woods. They're haunted."

"So is this house," Brielle says. "Can't you feel it?" She rubs her arms.

"Aww, babe, want me to warm you up?" Timothy wiggles his brows.

"About the man with the axe," James replies, sliding his duffel bag from his shoulder and placing it on the island. "He's become a bit of a folklore in this town. No one knows who he is, exactly. Some believe he was Wilfred's cousin who was visiting for the summer. Little is known about him, other than that he disappeared shortly before the Kriger murders."

Goosebumps dot my arms.

Timothy drains the last of his beer. "I heard a rumor that claimed he was fucking Magdalene Kriger."

"Fucking? Really?" I sneer.

"What?" he asks, chuckling. "People bumped uglies back then. Maybe Magdalene's father found out and killed him."

"It's possible," James says, removing a box from his bag. "They did find unidentified skeletal remains in the basement believed to be male."

"I like to think they were madly in love," Brielle says, giggling.

"Just like I'm crazy about you." Timothy nips at her earlobe with his teeth. "How about we go somewhere more private? Give those ghosts a show."

I stiffen, placing my hand on James's arm. He pauses, lifting his gaze from the box in front of him. "Did you hear that?" I ask.

"Hear what?" He looks confused.

"A dog barked." I walk across the room and peer into the dark hallway. Silence greets me. Heavy silence. Another chill breezes past, and I slowly look at the door leading to the basement.

"Babe, there's no dog here," he calls out, removing the lid.

My eyes widen when I turn around to see him lift out a spirit board. "What's that?"

"It's a spirit?—"

"I know what it is." I march over. "Why did you bring it here?"

He chuckles, unsure, exchanging glances with a snickering Timothy and Brielle. "It's just a little bit of fun, Grace. Relax. You're too serious about all of this."

"Relax?" I all but shriek. "A lot of people were murdered here, James. Can't you feel it?"

He rests both hands on the counter, the muscles bulging on his arms. "Feel what? Huh? What do you feel? Ghosts? Spirits? Pixies, maybe?"

"You're mocking me." I swallow hard, feeling hurt.

Even Brielle is stifling laughter, and she's supposed to be my best friend. My eyes burn, but I refuse to cry. The spirit board taunts me. My every instinct tells me to leave, but it only makes me double down.

"We came here to have fun." James waits for my response. "No one is keeping you here. You're free to leave." He raises his eyebrows, shadows flickering over his features from the candlelight. "Are you in, or are you out?

The others join him at the island.

"What if…" I clear my throat. They watch me expectantly. "What if we…wake something dormant? Something..."

"Something what?" There's a tinge of impatience in James's tone.

"Evil," I whisper, unable to look up from the darkened, stained wood beneath my feet.

Blood.

I think I'm trembling with nerves, but I don't know, because James is watching me with that dark twinkle in his eyes that has seen plenty of girls set fire to their reputation. I'm smarter than this. I don't fall for bad boys' charm or peer pressure.

"We're not going to wake anything dormant."

"How can you be so sure?" I ask.

His gaze never wavers. "It's been twenty years since Camryn Kriger and her friends died here. Don't you think the demon would have shown its face by now if it was still around?"

"Maybe it's dormant?—"

"It's a demon. Not an infectious disease. A spirit board from Walmart isn't going to awaken Sleeping Beauty. I promise you."

I want to believe him, I do, but I have a bad feeling about this.

"I'll ask you one more time," he says, his voice deepening. "Are you in, or are you out?"

I roll my lip between my teeth.

What's the worst that can happen? Do I believe in the demon story? That we live on cursed land?

I join them at the island. "What about the Kriger murders?" I lock eyes with Timothy. "You seem to believe in the demon theory. What if they were killed by one, and we call it here somehow?"

His lips tug to the side. "Babe, I've watched enough of that really old show Supernatural to know how to beat a demon's ass and send it back to Hell. I'm a real-life Dean." He gestures to James. "And that's Sam."

Brielle giggles, rolling a lock of hair around her finger. She looks at Timothy like he hung the moon and the stars and the galaxies. "I can't believe you watch that old show."

"It's basically a classic."

"Fine…" I inhale a steadying breath, feigning confidence. "Let's do this."

James's teeth gleam in the candlelight when he smiles at me. He puts his finger on the dial, and I follow suit. Brielle and Timothy don't hesitate, unlike me.

"Close your eyes," James orders. "Let's focus."

My heart is beating out of my chest. This is reckless. Everyone knows not to play with the occult.

"We welcome you, spirit, to our circle. We invite you to enter us and communicate through us."

A cold sweat breaks out across my neck.

"Is there anyone here with us?"

I gasp and open my eyes when the dial moves toward the ‘Yes.'

James's eyes sparkle with excitement. "It wants to communicate with us."

The dial moves before he can ask another question, and silence settles over our group as we watch it move from letter to letter.

"R," I whisper. "U."

"N," Brielle finishes, slowly lifting her gaze. I'm sure I'm as pale as she is in the flickering candlelight.

"Guys…" Her voice shakes. We straighten up, watching the candles go out one by one. "Something is wrong."

To our left, the windows blow open, and a gust of wind whips my hair around my face. At the same time, the spirit board shoots across the room, crashing into the wall. I let out a scream, but it's drowned out by my terror.

We run out of the house like we're on fire, almost tripping down the slippery porch steps. James throws open the car door and shouts at us to hurry. I've never run so fast in my life. The moment, I stumble into the passenger side, we're out of there, skidding on wet dirt. I haven't even closed my door yet.

We barely make it halfway down the road before the car sputters and dies, rolling to a slow stop, smoke pouring from the hood.

James curses, slamming his hand down on the wheel. Then he exits the car and throws the door shut so hard that the car jostles.

He's leaning over the open hood, swearing up a storm as he touches something smoldering hot, but I tune him out when the trees by the roadside catch my attention.

"Guys," I whisper, opening the passenger door. My friends are too busy talking about what happened back at the house to hear me, so I raise my voice. "Guys!"

Timothy and Brielle finally look at me from the backseat.

"Listen…"

They look at each other, confused, and then at me. "Listen to what?"

"Can you not hear that?" I exit the car and walk closer to the forest's edge. The fir trees stretch out before me, their branches moving softly in the late-night summer breeze.

Brielle slides down her window and pokes her head out. "What is it, Grace?"

I'm transfixed, listening to the wind shifting through the branches. "The trees whisper."

THE END