Running Scared (Letters From Morgantown Book 1)

by Tracie Puckett

  “I never said I was going with him,” I said, glancing back to the screen. “He hasn’t even asked me.”

  Dad took my cell phone and waved it in front of my face. “I think he just did.”

  “That’s an invitation?” I asked. “That’s how he’s asking me?”

  “You see my point?” Dad asked. “Prince Charming, that boy.”

  “Should I answer him?”

  “You could, or you could ignore him.”

  “You’d love that, wouldn’t you?”

  “Walk your old man home,” he said, standing. He offered me a hand to help me off the bench.

  “Damn Jesse Crawford,” he mumbled under his breath.

  I smiled, secretly loving the torture. Choosing not to respond to the text until I got back home, I pocketed my phone again.

  Dad started walking, and I tried to follow right behind him; I took one step forward, stumbling. Somehow, though I’ll never figure out how, he’d managed to tie both of my shoes together back there on the bench. While I’d fussed with my phone, he’d plotted his revenge in the form of yet another prank, and I hadn’t even noticed.

  I lost my balance and fell forward, bracing myself with outstretched arms.

  “Are you kidding me?” I yelled, falling to the ground.

  I couldn’t believe it; after years of his practical jokes, I still hadn’t been prepared for the moment. He’d done it a million times before, and he’d gotten me again in a moment of distraction.

  “And she’s down!” Dad turned back, laughing from where he stood, only a few feet ahead of me on the path. Clapping his hands, he bent at the hips, laughing. “Oh, it’s too easy.”

  “You’re dead!” I yelled, barely able to spit the words through my laughter. “You are so dead!”

  Fumbling with my laces, I vowed to get him, to make him pay. But I couldn’t keep up. He’d taken off, rounded the corner with his laugh echoing through the trees. I gave up trying to untie the laces, kicked off my shoes, and set off after him. But after thirty seconds of searching without any trace, I knew my father was hiding.

  He watched me from the bushes. I felt his eyes on me.

  I stopped in my tracks, listening for a faint sound of laughter or breath, but nothing.

  “Dad?” I asked, suddenly unsettled by the quiet. I stopped on the path, turning a full circle where I stood. I couldn’t see anything beyond the pool of light at my feet, cast down by the lantern post behind me. It was too dark, and it was eerily quiet. The wind picked up, whistling as it tousled my blonde locks. My hair beat the side of my face. “Okay, come on. This isn’t funny anymore.”

  Still, quiet. I kept waiting for him to jump out, to yell surprise, or to sneak up behind me at any moment. So I kept turning, ready for whatever he could pull. Stopped in that one spot on the path, I turned slow circles, keeping my eyes fixed on the darkness around me.

  “Dad, come on,” I said, trying to laugh through my nervous breath. “This isn’t funny anymore! You know I hate the dark.”

  That should do it.

  He wouldn’t leave me out there to suffer the dark and quiet alone—not when he knew how much I hated it. I’d never gotten over that childhood fear of things lurking in the shadows. Any second now, he’d show his face. He’d poke up. He’d laugh at my expense, and we’d head for home, ready to eat whatever was left from our Thanksgiving dinner.

  “Okay,” I said, throwing my hands up. “Last chance, and then I’m leaving without you.”

  When he didn’t show his face, I suspected he’d called my bluff. He didn’t come forward, but I still felt his eyes on me. I started to tiptoe around the bushes, hoping to find him before he could take advantage of the moment and scare me.

  “Come out, come out, wherever you are,” I sang.

  A gunshot fired around the corner.

  My head snapped in the direction of the sound, and I suddenly felt it—very much alive and in the pit of my stomach, I felt my intuition spark. Something was wrong.

  “Dad?” I yelled.

  When he didn’t respond, I took off down the path to round the bend.

  Trust your instincts, Sydney.

  Something was terribly wrong.

  “Dad?” I yelled, turning the corner to finally find my father.

  Stopped cold at the sight of blood, my heart jumped to my throat. He was lying on the ground, gasping for air, struggling for breath. I rushed to his side, falling over him to find the wound in his chest.

  “No, Dad, please,” I cried, begging him to stay awake, praying he would hear my voice and stay with me. But all around me, the night fell darker—black as his eyes as they slowly fell shut.

  Chapter Four

  “Is she here yet?”

  I turned out of my room, ready to come back into the foyer when I heard an unfamiliar voice. For the first time in weeks, there was another female nearby. She’d sounded so much like Carrie that I rushed to the back of the privacy door, peeking through the inch-wide crack.

  But it wasn’t my best friend; it was another stranger.

  “Yeah, she’s here,” Chris said. “Try to keep it down, though. I just checked on her. She’s slept the day away.”

  I wondered what time it was. After a long shower, I’d decided to take a nap. But a quick nap turned into hours of sleep. I must’ve slept a lot longer than I’d meant to, because it was already evening; the sun was down. I’d lost an entire day.

  “Is she okay?”

  “Exhausted, I’m sure,” Chris said, answering the woman.

  Still peeking through the small gap at the door, I looked first to Chris.

  In a pair of gray sweatpants and a navy hooded shirt, he stood at the farthest wall, rolling streaks of white paint inches below the ceiling. Perched two pegs up on a step ladder, he focused his attention on painting, paying little mind to the young woman pacing the floor. With every step she took, her long auburn curls brushed the top of her back, and the two-inch heel on her shoes clapped.

  “Danielle,” Chris said, whipping around. “Would you please?”

  “Huh?”

  “She’s sleeping,” he said, and she stopped walking at once. “Thank you.”

  It was quiet again as Chris went back to painting, and with nothing to do now to keep her busy, the woman turned her gaze upon his backside. By the way she’d stopped walking at his insistence, and now the way she looked at him with a wide and fervent stare, I could see that she held Chris in high esteem.

  “You think you could take her shopping?” he asked, still working. “I talked to Theo this afternoon. He said she’s down to only a couple outfits; he wanted me to ask if you could—”

  “I’m happy to,” she said quickly. When he turned a look back to her, she batted her lashes and widened her smile. “When?”

  “I figured we’d let her get settled in,” he said. “Give her some time to adjust, and maybe you could take her out this weekend?”

  “Sure, yeah, absolutely,” she said, bobbing her head. “I’d love to.”

  She rocked back and forth on her heels, as if excited about the opportunity he’d handed her, but I sensed her elation had little to do with helping me and everything to do with impressing him.

  “What’s she like?”

  “She’s quiet,” he said. “Scarily quiet, considering she’s Theo’s niece.”

  “She’s been through a lot. She doesn’t have a mom, and she lost her dad in that fire,” she said, reminding him, and at the same time reminding me, of the story I was supposed to adopt as my own. That story they asked me to share couldn’t have been further from the truth. “I’m sure she’s not feeling particularly talkative. You should know; you went through the same thing sophomore year with Natalie. And again last year when Kathy died. We couldn’t get a word out of you for weeks.”

  The mention of Chris’s past brought his shoulders to his ears, and he stopped midstroke to turn back.

  “Let’s not do this, okay?” he said, pausing for another second before
he went back to his job.

  I didn’t want to cut into their conversation, although I felt like Chris would’ve welcomed the interruption. But I also didn’t want to turn back to my room and hide away for the rest of the night. I was rested, wide awake, and unusually hungry. I wondered if Theo was still around.

  I smoothed my hands over my messy hair and pushed through the half-open door to the foyer, hoping my presence wasn’t unwelcome.

  The hinges squeaked, grabbing Chris’s attention. For the first time since I’d peeked through the doorway, his lips widened into a full-blown smile.

  “Good morning, sleepy head,” he said, stepping down from the ladder. He set the paint roller aside in a tray and wiped his hands on a cloth.

  “Where’s Theo?” I asked.

  “He’s gone for the day, but—”

  “He’s gone? He left?”

  “Yeah. Is everything okay?” Chris asked. “What can I do? What do you need?”

  “Forget it.” I started back for my room.

  “Syd?” he said, stumbling forward to take my hand. I whirled back, dropping my eyes to his fingers as they clutched my wrist. “Sorry.” He pulled away and scratched the side of his head. “Are you hungry? Can I get you anything?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “This is Danielle,” he said quickly.

  An introduction meant that I wouldn’t be able to go back and sulk in silence. I couldn’t know Chris’ motives for certain, but it seemed as if he didn’t want me disappearing again; he wanted to make sure I was okay.

  “Hi,” I said.

  “Danielle’s in and out quite a bit,” he said. “She works a few days a week, picking up housekeeping and laundry when it’s needed.”

  I turned back to the woman. Like me, she wasn’t wearing a drop of makeup, and yet she glowed like a magazine cover photo. Her bright blue eyes were gorgeous against her pale skin and red hair, and I stared at her, wondering how anyone could be so naturally beautiful.

  I took two steps away, hoping that a little distance from her would keep me from feeling so dowdy. But just as I was taken by Danielle, she seemed confounded by me.

  “Wait, you’re the niece?” she asked, taking quick looks between Chris and me. “I thought he said young niece.”

  “She is young.”

  “I’m seventeen,” I said, speaking so they’d realize I was standing right in front of them. I’d gotten so tired of everyone doing that lately—talking about me like I couldn’t hear them. The police. The detectives. The marshals. And now Chris and Danielle . . .

  “I’m sorry,” Danielle said, shaking her head. “I assumed you were younger.” She looked to Chris. “I swear he said she was ten. He talked about her like she was a child.”

  “He didn’t,” Chris assured me.

  The room fell silent again as the three of us struggled to find our next words. Danielle seemed surprised, and maybe even a little upset, to learn that I wasn’t what she’d had in mind. Chris’s eyes were offering a silent apology for her sharp tone, and I was left wondering what I should say—if anything.

  “It’s Sydney, right?” she finally spoke again, making an effort to recover from her misunderstanding.

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s crazy that you’re finally here,” she said. “I mean, Theo’s been talking about you forever.”

  “A week, at most,” Chris said.

  “Well, it felt like an eternity! Once he knew you were coming, there was no shutting him up,” Danielle continued. “Visitors, collectors, stragglers—all normal. But a new face in Morgantown who’s here to put down roots? It’s unheard of. Word spread, and everyone’s dying to meet you. They want to know your life story; honey, they’re going to pick you apart.”

  “What?” I asked in an almost whisper. I turned to Chris. “Why?”

  “Danielle, stop,” he said, short of adding you’re scaring her.

  He stepped forward and put his arm around my shoulder, and my muscles tensed on contact. He was touching me. Why was he touching me? I stood rigid inside his friendly side-hug, and a loud ring cut through the silence, giving me a perfect opportunity to jerk away from him and move out of reach.

  A phone rang again from a small table near the stairs, but neither of the B&B workers could be bothered to answer it. Chris was too busy looking to me, concerned. Danielle was shifting her eyes between Chris and me, confusion overwhelming her.

  The phone rang again, and as if it’d just occurred to Chris that someone should answer it, he looked down to the dried paint on his hands.

  “Danielle, could you—”

  “Yeah,” she said, her quick word muffled under the sound of another ring. “I’ll get it.”

  Across the room, she picked up the receiver. “Morgantown B&B, this is Danielle,” she said, and I turned to watch her. Someone responded on the other end, and she quietly answered.

  On the phone. Of course, the B&B had a phone! I could call home . . .

  I didn’t have any of my contacts on me. Gary had taken my cell when we left, but there were a few numbers I’d memorized over the years, numbers that I knew hadn’t changed. Given the chance, I could call Rosa. I could call Carrie! And maybe, if I was lucky, one of them would get in touch with Jesse and let him know how infuriated I was that he—

  “You okay?” Chris asked, and my head snapped back in his direction. “You need to make a call?”

  “Huh?” I said, only then realizing that he’d caught me staring at Danielle, watching as she talked into the receiver. “Oh, I—”

  “You miss your friends,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

  “I do.” My shoulders fell. “More than you could know.”

  “You’re welcome to call them anytime,” he said. “In fact, if you want it, the phone’s yours as soon as she hangs up.”

  “Oh no,” I said, knowing I couldn’t make any kind of contact while Chris and Danielle were in the room. I shouldn’t make any kind of contact at all. But . . . “Maybe some other time, thanks.”

  The chance was there. I could call them. I could talk to Rosa and Carrie. I could hear their voices again. But as quickly as the idea dawned on me, I heard Gary’s voice echoing: No one has ever been hurt, found, or killed by following all the rules.

  It was a risk, and it was a dangerous one. But if I could talk to them for one minute . . . tell them that I was okay, and that I’d be home soon . . . it would make a world of difference. But the risk. God. It was a gamble, and I couldn’t let a simple desire outweigh a promise. I had to hold out; I had to keep reminding myself what was at stake. My life mattered more now than ever, because I could send a killer to prison. I made that promise to my father. There would be justice.

  “Okay, we’ve booked the Carlsons for the weekend,” Danielle said, hanging up the phone. “You think you’ll have all of this finished in the next day or two?”

  Chris looked to the drop cloths on the floor, his eyes surveying the mess of paint buckets and rollers that spilled from the foyer over into the common room. “I certainly hope so.”

  “Good,” she said. “Because this place is a mess.”

  “It’s cluttered.”

  “A cluttered mess you were supposed to have cleaned up by last Friday,” she said. “You’re three days behind.”

  “I’m aware.”

  “We don’t have an extra three days. You need to pick up the pace.“

  “I’ll get it done.”

  “You have to,” she said. “It’s December, Chris. We still don’t have a tree, and the decorations are buried downstairs in that mess you call a basement. You haven’t brought anything up.”

  “I’ll get to it,” he grumbled.

  “You keep saying that,” she said. “But Christmas is in two and a half weeks, and the Carlsons arrive in four days. We have to be ready.”

  “We’ll be ready,” he said, trying to smother the agitation in his voice with something friendlier, but he hadn’t succeeded.

  “I still don�
��t understand why you couldn’t hire a professional,” she said.

  “Because I know what I’m doing.”

  “Regardless, it would’ve gotten done faster,” she said.

  “Saving time isn’t worth the cost.”

  “It’s only money, Chris,” she said, straightening her stance. “You need to learn to invest in your business.” With her shoulders back and chest jutted forward, it was almost as if she was daring him to turn back and stare, but Chris didn’t give her so much as a glance. “Listen, I have to get back to the boutique. I promised I would help with inventory tonight.”

  Chris grumbled something and climbed two steps up the ladder to resume painting.

  “I’ll be back Wednesday,” she said. “Can you please have this done and cleaned up by then so we can start decorating for the holiday?”

  He grumbled again but didn’t give her a definitive answer, and she turned back to me, wearing a forced smile.

  “Sydney, it was lovely meeting you.”

  With one last look in Chris’s direction, she let herself out the door. When the door latched, he huffed a sigh.

  “Is she gone?”

  “She’s gone,” I said, and he took a deep breath.

  He turned back and shook his head, and I stood in place, trying to make sense of their dynamic. It didn’t seem likely that she was just an employee; there was more to their relationship than he’d let on. I guessed that maybe she was a girlfriend, or maybe even an ex. I couldn’t tell. I suspected if their relationship was strictly professional, he would’ve threatened her job after the way she’d spoken to him. But he didn’t. And then there was the way she looked at Chris with some weird mix of lust and love, all the while making demands . . . it was unsettling.

  Danielle was unsettling.

  ***

  “Can I help?”

  “Really?”

  “Beats sitting alone in my room,” I said.

  “Well, I’m done for the night,” Chris said, stepping down off the ladder. “But you’re welcome to stick around and keep me company while I clean up.”

  “I can help,” I said, offering again. “I can wash brushes or clean the rollers.”

  “You’d do that?”