Chapter Fifteen

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Tina leans toward her phone's camera. The video is shaking, as if it were filmed during an earthquake.

Which means Tina's hand is shaking.

The pictures I've seen didn't do Tina's beauty justice. They didn't capture her charisma or husky voice. Her brown eyes have impossibly long lashes, her full lips are glossed in cherry red, and her sleek hair is highlighted with streaks of gold.

The pictures also didn't show what she looked like when she was frightened.

"Babe? I just got another one."

She holds up a flowered envelope. Her name is printed on it in block letters, and I recognize the address as the Barclay home.

It looks like a party invitation.

Tina pulls out the card and holds it up to the camera.

It's a cartoonlike image of a person staring up at a house. The house appears to be completely empty—the front door and windows are thrown open, revealing the lack of furniture.

It's a farewell card, the kind a friend might send to someone who is moving.

But Tina had no plans to leave the Barclay home. She'd only been working there for six months.

Tina opens the card. There's a preprinted stock message: I'm sorry to see you go .

And below that, in block letters written in black ink: GET OUT, TINA.

"Who's doing this to me?" Her voice quivers as it rides the edge of anger and fear.

Then she whirls around. When she turns to face the screen again, the whites of her eyes are visible.

"Thought I heard something. But they're all out. Even the grandma." She swallows. "I hate the noises this creepy house makes."

The camera reveals a slice of Tina's third-floor quarters: I see a bed with a blue-and-white patchwork quilt, and a knotted rug on the wood floor. The window Tina tumbled through—the tall, wide one that is only a foot or so off the ground and would never pass code today—isn't visible in the shot.

"I think—" Tina's voice abruptly cuts off. Her head whips around again. "Someone's up here."

An instant later, I hear a voice call out: "Boo!"

Tina flinches. "Rose! You scared me."

Rose comes into the video frame, peering at the camera. "Sorry. What are you doing?"

I'm transfixed. This is the Rose of before. Her voice is clear, her eyes bright and alive.

"Don't sneak up on me like that, okay?"

Tina's hand reaches out for the camera. The video stops.

I stare down at the final image, frozen on my screen.

Tina, unsmiling. The remnants of fear twisting her features.

Rose, looming over her nanny's shoulder. Smiling.