by Micol Ostow
But I’m not just anyone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The farmhouse came into view in the distance, on top of a hill, like something out of a scary movie. The original log cabin portion was over three hundred years old. It connected through a series of corridor additions to a stone house from the eighteen hundreds, and then a more “modern” wing of the traditional wooden saltbox style that still predated anyone in my own family’s arrival in Maine by more than a few decades. Despite the incongruity of its components, the house itself felt solid, knowing—the saltbox windows like wide, piercing eyes standing guard, keeping close watch on any would-be trespassers.
Like me.
I pulled to the side of the path, searching for enough of a clearing in the woods that I could park but still be mostly hidden from view.
It was still bright out, daylight high. But I plucked my black knit beanie from the glove compartment and put it on anyway. It felt appropriate.
Now the question was: Why would the Dewitts go to such lengths to terrorize the school and the town? And worse, why would they make their own daughter disappear?
* * *
The log cabin was the oldest structure—and the one with the sturdiest cellar, originally used for storing food for winter, but retrofitted as a storm shelter. I remembered Daisy’s uncle, who lived on the farm as well, showing the space to us. “This here’ll keep you snug through Armageddon,” he said.
Armageddon … or a kidnapping.
I was prepared for a series of obstacles, or at least elaborate locks. But when I got to the entrance to the cellar, it was just a regular old set of metal doors, the kind that opened like a book, held together with a chain, sure, but a chain clamped with a simple padlock.
I pulled out my lock-picking kit. Don’t leave home without it.
My pick snapped, half of it breaking free and landing in my cupped palm like some injured insect.
Crap.
I grabbed my bag and rummaged through it, looking for something useful. Aha! A pot of lip gloss. I dug out a paper clip and scooped up a healthy dollop of the gloss, sliding the clip into the lock and jiggling it around until the broken half of the pick popped out.
Take two.
This time, the lock gave way immediately. Note to self: There’s a reason that people talk about “greasing the wheels.”
I pulled the doors apart, recoiling from the screech of rusty metal scraping against itself, bracing myself for what I’d find when I climbed down the ladder into the dank space.
“Daisy?!”
Somehow, improbably, a four-poster bed was down here, made up impeccably like something out of a fairy tale, which made the scene even more sinister. And there was Daisy—gaunt, pale, but otherwise intact, from what I could see—curled up in a ball, sleeping.
“Daisy!” I called again, more insistent this time.
She sat up with a start. “Nancy?” She blinked, disbelieving, but I could see when she fully registered that I was really there. Her eyes filled with tears. “We have to get out of here.”
* * *
“So, let me get this straight,” I said, after I’d had a few beats to process the fact that this was actually Daisy, right here before my eyes, not only fully intact and doing fine but apparently not nearly as nonplussed about having been kidnapped by her whole family as I would have expected. “You knew about this?”
“Not right away,” she admitted. “I told you—how my parents were being so weird about the reenactment? Like they didn’t want me to take part in it?”
“Um, yeah,” I said, my head spinning. “Daisy!” The reality of her standing in front of me came over me again, overwhelming me, and I had to throw my arms around her, to touch her and know that she was here, that we were both really, actually here. Her perfume: still the tuberose. “I can’t believe this.”
“I know. Well, so, it turns out there is someone out there who knows about the Naming Day curse. A few someones …
“And they’re all related to me.”
“Your family kidnapped you,” I said. Even standing here, looking at her, it was almost impossible to fathom. “How? Did they hurt you?” Hot rage rose in me just thinking about it.
“No, I’m fine, I promise. Just … shaken. I think they, uh, drugged me,” she said.
“What?”
“A sleeping pill, nothing dangerous,” she said, waving it off. I didn’t buy that wave one bit, but now wasn’t the time to press her. She’d need all kinds of support from me just as soon as I got us out of here safely.
“What?!” I stared at her. “Daisy, that’s crazy dangerous! How can you—? Wait, tell me later. Just—what is going on?”
“When it became clear that I wasn’t going to quit the reenactment, like, even after the raven and that message in the grass, I guess they came up with plan B. And they took me here. It’s not that bad, except for the total lack of Internet. And I guess it’ll be over soon. It was … well, it was never supposed to go this far. I don’t think.” Her voice wavered, and I knew she was just barely holding it together.
“Daisy,” I said, horror in my voice, “the minute your own family drugged you, it officially went too far.” I looked around. “It’s over now. Who’s here with you?”
“Just my uncle,” she said. “I think my parents are back in Horseshoe Bay, keeping up appearances.”
“Right.” The town hall meeting. I thought back to Mrs. Dewitt’s performance. She was truly a pro; she should’ve been the one heading out to Hollywood to try her luck at a movie career instead of Melanie.
I looked at my phone. One bar. Daisy was right about the lack of Internet or any other kind of connectivity. Still, I texted 911 and tried to drop a pin for my parents, Lena, and Parker, just in case.
“We’re getting out of here,” I said.
I grabbed Daisy by the wrist and led her toward the cellar doors, still flung open. She scrambled up, and I followed.
I stepped out into the sunlight, then froze, hearing a twig crack behind me.
Then everything went black.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I woke with a headache and my wrists tied behind me.
“What’s going on?” My tongue felt thick and fuzzy in my mouth.
“We did not escape,” Daisy said simply. Her voice was eerily removed in a way that made me realize I’d need to be more than sharp enough for the both of us. I turned to my left, where her voice had come from, realizing that the throbbing in my head worsened when I moved it. She, too, was tied to a chair—one of the straight-backed, antique kitchen chairs from the stone house that, impossibly, I remembered from the sleepover.
The room was dark enough that I couldn’t quite see where we were or who was with us … but I could feel a presence, and I could hazard a guess.
“Uncle Horton?”
“Present and accounted for.”
A slim, spidery figure crept from a shadow, holding a kerosene lantern. The glow from the lamp made his gaunt cheekbones even more hollow, so that it appeared a ghoul or a phantom loomed over us.
Quickly, I took in the details of our surroundings:
Bound to a chair.
No window.
One door.
Daisy.
Horton.
I wiggled my wrists again the rope. No give.
“What the hell are you doing?” I demanded, trying to keep my voice even despite the thudding of my heart in my chest. I remembered Daisy saying it was never supposed to go too far. Famous last words.
“Oh, sweetie, you were always too suspicious for your own good,” Horton said. “We never did think you were a great friend for Daisy.”
“ ‘We’?”
From out of the shadows, a group of people came forward, each holding a lantern of their own. Time to readjust that assessment of your surroundings.
I didn’t recognize them all … but I did see Daisy’s parents, front and center. So they weren’t still in Horseshoe Bay. Coincidence, or did they kn
ow I was close to figuring everything out?
Mrs. Dewitt was wearing yet another one of her bird scarves, I realized with dawning horror.
“I guess if anyone would know about the Naming Day curse, it would be this family,” I said.
“The Naming Day curse, yes,” Mr. Dewitt began, clearing his throat like a he was about to deliver a Shakespearian monologue. “Local lore—obscure though it may be, and not by accident—says that a group of youths from the first settled colony went missing without a trace. But what’s always left out of the tale is that the man who was meant to have caused the disappearance—”
“He was a Dewitt,” I said, without missing a beat. Of course. It all made sense. I could see all too well now why Daisy’s family wouldn’t want her to participate in that.
“Exactly. Jonathan was wrongly persecuted. He was innocent.” Mr. Dewitt’s features were warped with fury, and he seemed unable to go on.
Mrs. Dewitt stepped in. “And thus, we have our own cross to bear, and a curse of our own. When the Naming Day Festival was reestablished, we Dewitts supported it. We had to, to maintain our standing in the community, such that it was. But over time, tragedy followed that accursed celebration. And any year that a Dewitt got near a reenactment, devastation ensued. A Dewitt may not participate in the show.”
“That’s the curse?” A shiver went down my spine. Though there could have been correlation, there was no way what the Dewitts were saying could actually be attributed to anything beyond the real, physical world. All of this—it was all just a product of how bitterness warped and twisted the family. And that was just as frightening. “And your family was powerful enough to remove any mention of it in our town records or history?”
“My dear”—Mrs. Dewitt gave me a chilling smile that showed no teeth—“you have no idea how powerful we are.”
Oh, I had some idea. These were people who thought curses were real. Who probably wouldn’t have balked at the image I’d seen in my rearview mirror.
“I get it now,” I said. “You removed any trace of the curse in the town records. Meanwhile, Dewitts’ participation in the reenactment was rare enough and inconsistent enough that no one else ever realized what exactly the ‘curse’ was.”
“No wonder you’re known as the girl detective,” Mr. Dewitt said. “Correct … and eventually, it became just another urban legend. Mostly buried.”
“Why didn’t you tell me, though?” Daisy asked.
“We keep the details of the curse buried,” Horton reiterated through clenched teeth. “It’s the only reason we’ve managed to pull ourselves out from infamy as much as we have. But given the stakes, we thought invoking it might yield quicker results, and no one would have been the wiser. If it weren’t for you, Miss Drew.” The venom in his voice nearly made me shiver, but I was able to meet his gaze.
“I would’ve understood,” Daisy insisted. A tear slid down her cheek. “I wouldn’t have auditioned. This is … insane. You’ve got me fake-kidnapped.”
I shimmied in my seat, reflexively trying to raise my hand despite the fact that it was bound. “And me real-kidnapped.” Daisy was way more generous than me. But maybe that was because in her case, it was family.
“You think you would have understood, child,” her mother crooned, “but I know better. Your generation is so cynical… . You don’t believe in superstitions, or curses.”
“I mean, I’m beginning to be persuaded,” I said, thinking of those dangling legs and trying to push the image from my mind. “Not in the magical side of things, though. If there’s a Naming Day curse, it’s been caused by your whacked-out behavior.”
“Believe what you will,” Mrs. Dewitt said, giving me a scathing look. “But if my sweet Daisy going missing wasn’t enough to get the town to cancel Naming Day, maybe yet another disappearance will do the trick.” She narrowed her eyes at me. “Or maybe we need to come up with a more … permanent solution for you.”
Daisy was crying in earnest now, deep sobs that sent her chest straining against the ropes that bound her to the chair.
The air was filled, suddenly, with the sound of birds squawking. I looked at Daisy. “What’s going on?”
The sound of wings flapping … the incessant beating rhythm from my nightmares … it rose up around us, pressing in from all sides, until it felt like it was coming from inside my body.
“Something’s coming,” Daisy said.
I cocked my head, concentrating. Slowly, I realized that beneath the sound of the frantic birds, I heard something else.
Something that made me smile.
My arms were still tightly bound behind me, thick twine biting into my wrists.
But my ankles were starting to come loose.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
One thing that good old Uncle Horton hadn’t realized when he was tying Daisy and me up, apparently, was just how close he’d left one of his lanterns to my chair. And how loosely he’d bound my legs.
I flexed an ankle, testing a theory.
I turned to Daisy. “Be ready to follow my lead.”
“What?”
I strained with my ankle, reaching—
And knocked the lamp over, sending glass shattering and a lick of flames along the wall.
The Dewitts began to shriek, immediately panicking and running in different directions like … well, “chickens with their heads cut off” was the obvious metaphor, but given the circumstances, I was more inclined to compare them to ravens.
“Daisy!” Mrs. Dewitt’s eyes were wild, panicked.
“Don’t worry!” I said. “I’ve got her.” I held up my hands, now free, and quickly untied my legs, rushing to Daisy to untie her ropes too.
“How the hell did you … ?” Daisy started.
I cut her off. “I’m resourceful.” I grabbed her hand. “We have to get out of here.”
“I can’t just leave them… .” She glanced at her family. “I know, they’re monsters, but still.”
“We’re not leaving them.” I paused, giving her a minute to take in the sound that had been steadily rising in the distance.
Finally, her face lit up as she realized. “Sirens.”
I nodded. “It turns out, one bar was enough.” I held out a hand. “You ready now?”
“Yes, please.”
We ran.
EPILOGUE
I can’t believe instead of starring in the reenactment, I’m stuck here.”
Daisy frowned at Lena and me from her hospital bed.
The fire department had arrived shortly after I’d sprung Daisy and me from our ties, and we’d escaped the farm without anyone getting seriously hurt. The Dewitts were down at the police department with McGinnis and Karen, being questioned. My father, who’d met Daisy’s and my ambulance at the hospital on Karen’s tip, assured me they’d probably be there for a while. In a way, it was ironic: In the end, the Dewitts got what they wanted. Naming Day was off.
Somehow, I didn’t think it was quite the happy ending they’d been hoping for, though. And I doubted the celebration was off for good, either. Even if the Dewitts wouldn’t be able to hold their secrets so tightly for very much longer. And their insistence of Jonathan’s innocence—which lined up with Glynnis’s suspicions about a scapegoat—nagged at me. Who was guilty, then? An unsolved mystery, likely never to be solved. But at least my friend was safe.
I turned my attention back to Daisy. “It’s just for one night, for observation,” I said. “You were held captive. You were drugged. I’m kind of okay with an abundance of caution.”
“Easy for you to say.” She sniffed. “You’re footloose and fancy-free.”
“Not quite,” I said. “I still have to go down to the station tomorrow with my parents to give an official statement about what went down at the farm. And I have a feeling my parents are gonna be very attentive for at least the next few days.”
Dad had made it clear that concern for my well-being trumped any anger over my putting myself in danger to inves
tigate Daisy. But that didn’t mean that anger, too, wasn’t still layered in there, waiting until the initial shock of the ordeal had worn off.
It was going to be a long weekend. But I didn’t mind—too much. Daisy was back, safe. The mystery was put to bed. Life was pretty good, all things considered.
“Special delivery!” A giant bouquet of balloons appeared in the doorway.
“Daisy, your boyfriend’s legs have arrived. With the balloons from Up, apparently,” Lena said.
“Don’t be jelly,” Daisy said, blushing with pleasure as Cooper wrangled the arrangement into the room and quickly crossed to her bedside.
“Here,” Lena said, taking out her phone. “We can revisit the glory of Naming Day through my masterful social media campaign.”
She passed the phone to Daisy, who scrolled through, a small nostalgic smile crossing her face. She squealed. “Oh, remember this one? My best friends are starving!”
“I remember waiting for almost an hour for an order of cheese fries,” Lena said.
“Let me see.” I reached for the phone. Friday—one week ago, which felt more like five months. There we were, beaming away, with no idea what Naming Day would have in store for us. “We were such innocent babes in the woods.”
“Well, at the beach,” Daisy corrected.
“Though I did have a brief detour to the woods,” I reminded her. “For sleuthing purposes.”
I blinked. For a second, it seemed like the phone screen shimmered. I squinted.
There, in the picture, hovering over my head …
A face. Faint, but there. Gaunt and scared. But angry, too.
I blinked, and it was gone. It was just a shot of the three of us again—Lena, Daisy, and me, hopeful and bright and eager for whatever Naming Day would bring.
“Nancy?” Daisy asked, uncertain. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
Definitely not. “Just delusions born from exhaustion.” I passed the phone back to Lena. “It’s nothing.”
