Home Before Dark

by Riley Sager

  Dane edges forward again until mere feet separate us.

  “Take one more step and I’m calling the police,” I warn.

  “You can’t do that, Maggie,” he says. “That’ll send me instantly back to jail. No one will believe me. They’ll just see an ex-con who almost killed a man. I won’t stand a chance.”

  “Maybe you don’t deserve one.”

  Dane swoops in close. I try to yank my phone from my pocket, but he slaps it out of my hands. It hits the wall and drops to the floor several yards away.

  He grips my shoulders, shaking me. “Listen to me, Maggie. You need to pretend you never found out about me and Petra.”

  He stares at me with a mean scowl and even meaner eyes. There’s anger in them. A darkness that makes me wonder if it’s the last thing Petra ever saw. I look away, spot the knife I brought with me still on the desk, and reach for it.

  Dane sees it, too, and lunges for it.

  That’s when I run.

  It starts with a push off the desk, followed by a quick arc around Dane. When he comes at me, I shove him in the chest.

  Hard.

  He lurches backward into one of the bookshelves, his arms flailing, loose books tumbling around him.

  I run.

  Down the steps.

  Into the second-floor hallway, where I can hear Dane coming after me, his footfalls fast and heavy down the stairs from the third floor.

  I keep moving. Breath hard. Heart hammering.

  I hit the main staircase at a full run, pounding down it, trying to ignore the sound of Dane barreling across the hallway behind me. And how fast he’s moving. And how he’s surely gaining on me.

  He’s also at the stairs now. I hear his boots slam the top step and feel the shimmy of the staircase as he thunders after me.

  I up my speed, my eyes on the vestibule and, just beyond it, the front door. In the slice of time it takes to move down the last two steps, I try to gauge if I can make it to that door before Dane catches up to me.

  I decide I can’t.

  Even if I can get through that door—which is debatable—I’ll still need to elude Dane’s grasp long enough to get off the porch and into my truck.

  That’s not enough time. Not with the way he’s storming up behind me.

  I change tactics. A split-second decision that, at the bottom of the stairs, jerks me away from the vestibule and into the parlor.

  Dane doesn’t break stride as he veers in the same direction, panting my name so hard and so close I feel his breath on the back of my neck.

  I ignore him as I propel myself through the parlor and into the Indigo Room.

  It’s dark inside.

  Good.

  I need it that way.

  There’s just enough light for me to see the hole where a length of floorboards used to be. Even then, a person would need to know it’s there to avoid missing it entirely.

  Dane doesn’t.

  I skip over the gap in the floor and jerk to a stop before whipping around to face him.

  Dane slows but keeps on coming.

  One step.

  Two.

  Then he drops, plunging through the hole and vanishing so thoroughly that the only sign he was ever there at all is the sound of his body hitting the kitchen floor far below.

  JULY 15

  Day 20—After Dark

  “We need to leave,” I told Jess. “Right now.”

  “Why? What’s going on?”

  “Maggie’s not safe here.”

  I snatched the camera off the desk, along with two boxes of film. Then I hustled Jess out of the study and down the steps.

  “I don’t understand what’s happening,” she said.

  We reached the second floor, and I turned around, snapping a picture of the stairs behind us.

  Click.

  Hum.

  Slide.

  “There is a ghost in our house,” I said while waiting for the picture to develop. “Indigo Garson. She’s been making fathers kill their daughters. Curtis Carver didn’t murder Katie. Indigo forced him to do it.”

  I thrust the Polaroid at Jess, making sure she saw the figure of Indigo caught hobbling down the steps, the coins over her eyes reflecting the camera’s flash. Jess clamped a hand over her mouth, trying to suppress a scream. It leaked out anyway, squeaking between her fingers.

  “Where’s Maggie?” I said.

  Jess, her hand still covering her mouth, cast her wide, shocked eyes in the direction of Maggie’s bedroom. Behind us, a volatile heat drifted from the third-floor stairs. Indigo announcing her presence.

  “We need to get her out of there,” I whispered. “Fast.”

  We both ran down the hallway, Indigo’s presence hot on our backs. Inside the bedroom, Maggie sat on her bed, her knees to her chin. Flames of fear danced in her eyes.

  “You’ll have to carry her,” I told Jess. “I don’t—I don’t trust myself to do it.”

  There was no second-guessing on Jess’s part. She went straight for the bed and scooped Maggie into her arms.

  “Mommy, I’m scared,” Maggie said.

  Jess kissed her cheek. “I know, honey. But there’s nothing to be frightened of.”

  It was a lie. There was plenty to be afraid of.

  Especially when the armoire doors flew open. A blast of hot air burst from inside, sending Jess reeling backward. Maggie rose from her arms, as if lifted by the scalding wind. She was then pulled toward the armoire, riding through midair, a screaming, crying tangle of limbs and hair.

  Indigo had our daughter.

  I reached the armoire just as Maggie vanished into it. When the doors began to close, I threw myself between them. The wood squeezed my ribs as I reached into the armoire—now a dark, fathomless space. I screamed Maggie’s name and flailed my arms until one of my knuckles brushed her ankle.

  I clamped my fingers around it and began tugging, hand over hand up her leg. When I reached her knee, I pulled harder until Maggie abruptly broke free from the armoire. We fell to the floor, Maggie on top of me, still screaming, still crying.

  Behind us, Jess began to move the bed, shoving it against the armoire to block the doors. While it wasn’t enough to trap Indigo inside, I hoped it would at least let us escape in the next few minutes.

  That job done, we left the room and ran down the hall. Jess with Maggie, me with the camera, snapping off a shot of the empty hallway behind us.

  Click.

  Hum.

  Slide.

  I checked the photo as it spread into view.

  Nothing.

  Down the steps we went, Jess in the lead. Maggie had gone limp in her arms, frozen with shock. At the bottom of the stairs, I took another photo.

  Click.

  Hum.

  Slide.

  Still nothing.

  “I think she’s gone,” I announced.

  “Are you sure?” Jess said.

  “I don’t see her.” I held up a hand, seeing if I could feel Indigo’s white-hot presence. “I don’t feel her, either.”

  I took one last picture—Jess holding Maggie at the base of the stairs.

  Click.

  Hum.

  Slide.

  “We can’t stay here,” Jess said. “We need to pack up and leave before she comes back.”

  “I know.”

  I checked the photo still developing in my hands, the image of Jess and Maggie emerging from the whiteness.

  Behind them—hovering right at Jess’s back—was Indigo Garson.

  I looked from the picture to my wife and daughter, still in that same position.

  Then Maggie flew to the ceiling.

  It happened in a blink.

  One second she was in Jess’s arms. The next she was on the ceiling,
being dragged across it by an unseen force.

  Jess and I could only watch in terror as Maggie thrashed against the ceiling, screaming as she continued to be moved against her will. When she came within arm’s reach of the chandelier, she grabbed it and held on with all her might. The chandelier rocked back and forth. A few of its glass globes shook loose and crashed to the floor around us, the shards scattering.

  Above us, Maggie had been wrenched free from the still-swaying chandelier and was once again being pulled across the ceiling. Jess kept screaming her name, as if that could free her.

  But I knew there was only one way to make Indigo let go of Maggie. Since her goal was to hurt me as much as her father had hurt her, I needed to remove myself from the equation.

  Or at least pretend to.

  I dropped to my knees, surrounded by pieces of glass from the broken chandelier.

  Shards bring luck.

  Grabbing the largest glass piece I could find, I pressed it to my neck and shouted to the ceiling, “Indigo, let her go or I’ll kill myself!”

  Jess looked at me, horrified. “Ewan, no!”

  “Trust me, Jess,” I whispered. “I know what I’m doing.”

  Indigo wouldn’t let it get that far. If she wanted Maggie dead, then she needed me to do the deed. That wouldn’t be possible if I was already dead.

  “I’m serious!” I yelled. “You know you can’t do this without me!”

  I pressed the shard deeper against my neck, twisting it slightly until the tip of glass pierced my skin. A thin line of blood ran down my neck.

  Maggie dropped without warning, her descent dizzyingly fast. Jess and I both lunged for her, our arms entangling, forming an accidental cradle into which our daughter landed.

  She had been in our arms for barely a second when a wave of heat bore down on us from above. Hotter than earlier. A full blast of fury.

  Noise rose all around us—a sudden, violent hissing that seemed to come from every corner of the house. A moment later, snakes began to fill the room.

  Red-bellies.

  They appeared instantly, emerging from darkened corners and out from under the floorboards. I saw them on the second floor as well, slithering across the landing on their way down the stairs.

  Within seconds, we were surrounded, the snakes sidewinding their way toward us. Quite a few hissed their displeasure, their open mouths exposing teeth as sharp as razor blades.

  I pushed Maggie into Jess’s arms, still fearful of what I might do if I continued to hold her. I then began to fight off the snakes, trying to clear a path toward the vestibule. I kicked. I stomped. Some snakes backed away. Others struck at my feet.

  One lunged for Jess. I kicked it out of the way before it could make contact.

  “We need to hurry,” I said. “Run!”

  That’s exactly what we did. The three of us ran through the vestibule. Toward the front door. Onto the porch.

  The snakes followed, pouring forth from the open front door in a writhing, teeming mass.

  Indigo Garson was with them, unseen but definitely felt. White-hot air burned at my back as I guided Jess and Maggie down the porch steps and into the car.

  “What about our things?” Jess asked as she climbed into the back seat with Maggie.

  “We need to leave them,” I replied. “It’s too dangerous. We can’t ever come back here.”

  I started the car and peeled down the driveway. Behind me, Maggie knelt on her seat and stared out the back window.

  “She’s still following us!” she cried.

  I glanced in the rearview mirror, seeing nothing. “Miss Pennyface?”

  “Yes! She’s right behind us!”

  Just then, something rammed into the back of the car. A hard, shocking jolt.

  Jess screamed and reached for Maggie. I gripped the steering wheel, trying hard not to run off the road and into the woods, which is exactly what Indigo wanted. I slammed my foot down on the gas pedal and continued to speed down the twisting drive, tires squealing all the way.

  The car was hit by another invisible force, this time on the passenger-side door. For a brief moment, I lost control of the car. It skidded onto the grass alongside the drive, perilously close to the trees. It was only through sheer force of will that I was able to right us and continue down the drive.

  Jess, thankfully, had left the front gate open when she and Maggie returned, allowing me to drive right through it. As soon as we were off the property, I leaped from the car and slammed the gate shut.

  Heat bore down on me as I fumbled with the keys, frantically trying to lock the gate. It burst through the gate’s wrought-iron bars, turning them hot. If hell does exist, I suspect it feels a lot like the angry heat I experienced the moment I turned the key and locked the gate.

  That was the moment the vengeful spirit of Indigo Garson realized she had failed.

  We’d escaped Baneberry Hall, our family still intact.

  And there was nothing she could do to lure us back there.

  Others might one day pass through that gate, travel up that winding drive through the woods, and enter Baneberry Hall. If so, I wish them nothing but luck. They’ll need it to survive such a place.

  As for me and my family—my sweet Jessica, my beloved Maggie—we have yet to return. Nor do we intend to ever set foot inside that place.

  For us, Baneberry Hall is a house of horrors. One that none of us may dare enter again.

  Twenty-Four

  Half a dozen emergency vehicles sit outside Baneberry Hall, their flashing lights painting the house in alternating shades of red and white. In addition to Chief Alcott’s cruiser, there’s an ambulance, three more police cars, and, just in case things really get out of hand, a fire truck.

  I watch from the porch as Dane is loaded into the ambulance. He’s strapped to a stretcher, a brace around his neck. His fall through the floor didn’t do much damage, all things considered. As the EMTs wheeled him out, I heard murmurs of broken bones, maybe a concussion. Whatever happened to him, he was injured enough to allow me to flee the house and call the police.

  Now Dane is on his way to the emergency room and then, presumably, jail. He stares at me as the stretcher is pushed into the back of the ambulance, his expression pained, his eyes accusing.

  Then the ambulance doors are slammed shut and Dane vanishes from view.

  As the ambulance departs, Chief Alcott emerges from the house and joins me at the porch railing.

  “Did he confess?” I say.

  “Not yet. But he will. Give it time.” The chief removes her hat and runs a hand through her silver hair. “I owe you an apology, Maggie. For saying those things about your father. For thinking he did it.”

  I can’t be mad at her for that. I thought the same thing on and off throughout this whole ordeal. If anyone should be ashamed, it’s me.

  “We’re both guilty on that front,” I say.

  “Then why’d you keep looking?”

  I’ve been asking myself that same question for days. The answer, I suspect, lies in something Dr. Weber told me. That it was my way of writing my own version of the story. And while I did it for completely selfish reasons, I realize now the story isn’t solely mine.

  Petra’s a part of it, too. It doesn’t change what happened. Elsa’s still without her older daughter, and Hannah no longer has a sister.

  But they have the truth. And that’s valuable.

  I should know.

  Chief Alcott departs with the rest of the emergency vehicles. They form a line down the driveway, their sirens on mute but their lights still flashing.

  Another car arrives before they fully vanish down the hill, its headlights unexpectedly popping over the horizon. For a brief, blinding moment, it’s a kaleidoscope of lights as the two cars slow down and pass each other. Blue and red and white. All flashing through the
trees in spinning, disco-like fury. The emergency lights disappear. The headlights grow brighter as the car rounds the driveway and comes to a gravel-crunching stop.

  I can’t see who’s inside. It’s too dark, and my eyes are still stinging from the lights of the emergency vehicles. All I can make out is a person behind the wheel, sitting in complete stillness, almost as if they’re tempted to start driving again.

  But then the driver’s-side door swings open, and my mother steps out of the car.

  “Mom?” I say, shocked. “What are you doing here?”

  “I could ask you the same thing.”

  She remains in the driveway, looking exhausted in her travel clothes—white slacks, print blouse, a pair of strappy sandals. Shed of their sunglasses, her eyes are bloodshot. Dark half-moons droop beneath them. She carries no luggage. Just a purse that’s about to slip from her shoulder.

  “For God’s sake, Maggie,” she says. “Why did you come back here? What did you think that was going to accomplish?”

  “I needed the truth.”

  “I told you the truth,” my mother says. “But you couldn’t leave well enough alone. Because of that, I had to fly halfway around the world, and then I get here and see all those police cars. What the hell have you been up to?”

  I bring her inside. There’s a moment’s hesitation at the front door, making it clear she has no desire to enter Baneberry Hall, but she’s too tired to put up a fight. Once inside, the only thing she insists on is going down to the kitchen.

  “I don’t want to be up here,” she says. “Not on this floor.”

  Down we go, into the kitchen, taking seats across from each other at the butcher-block table. There, I tell her everything. Why I decided to come back. What happened when I got here. Finding Petra’s body and suspecting my father and realizing the true culprit was Dane.

  When I finish, my mother simply stares at me. She looks so old in the harsh and unsparing light of the kitchen. It illuminates the ravages of time she usually tries so hard to cover up. The wrinkles and age spots and gray strands sprouting along her hairline.

  “Oh, Maggie,” she says. “You really shouldn’t have done that.”