by James Hunt
Whispers in The Night
James Hunt
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
24. Three Days Later
The Haunting of the Holloway Family
25. Three Months Ago
26. Present Day
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Chapter 71
Chapter 72
Chapter 73
Chapter 74
Chapter 75
Chapter 76
Chapter 77
Chapter 78
Chapter 79
80. Six months later
1
Carla Maples drew in a sharp breath as she awoke abruptly in the middle of the night. Beads of sweat dotted her forehead and upper lip, and her damp nightgown clung to her flesh like a second skin. A scream was caught in her throat, but she swallowed it before it could escape.
She shut her eyes, trying to relax as she rid herself of the nightmare that had woken her. She couldn’t remember what had frightened her so much, but the nightmares had become a recurring theme since their arrival in this new house.
The bedroom was still and quiet. Moonlight shone through the window to her left, dispersing soft blue light among the shadows.
Carla sat up in bed, catching her breath, and glanced at her husband who was sound asleep. The man slept like a rock, and Carla had always been jealous. It never took much to wake her, which was why, for the past six weeks, he still seemed well-rested even though they had a newborn to take care of. It had been Carla who woke in the night when their little Angela cried.
But Carla also knew that if she wanted Daniel to help, then all she had to do was wake him up, and he would do it without question. He was a good man, kinder than most she had met throughout her life, and while they hadn’t been married for long, he had been a wonderful husband and a doting father. She could have done much worse in regards to a partner.
Carla looked at the blue clock on the nightstand and saw that it was three twenty-two in the morning. From the bed, Carla could see the crib near the window. Angela hadn’t slept this long through the night since they brought her home from the hospital.
Unable to fall back asleep, Carla slipped out from beneath the bedsheets and slid into her slippers, avoiding the cold wood floors.
Carla loved watching her daughter sleep. It was one of the most peaceful images she had ever seen, and it made all of the cryings, fussing, and endless diaper changes bearable. Angela had been Carla’s little miracle child.
Since Angela was born, Carla must have walked over to the crib just like this in the middle of the night countless times. Sometimes the baby would be asleep; most times, she would be awake, crying, wanting to be fed. But tonight was different.
Tonight, the crib was empty.
“Daniel?” Carla’s voice was only a whisper at first, but then fear and panic took control of her faculties, and she screamed. “Daniel!”
Daniel jolted awake, dazed from his heavy slumber, snapping his head to the left and right as he struggled to remain upright in the bed. “Huh? What—What’s wrong?”
Carla touched the crib’s bedding. It was still warm.
Daniel joined Carla by the crib and stared down in confusion. “Where is she?” He asked the question innocently, as if there was a simple explanation.
But Carla couldn’t rationalize what was happening. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t speak. She was paralyzed with fear.
“Carla, where is Angela—”
“Someone took her!” Carla finally shouted, her voice hysterical. “Someone took our baby!”
Daniel rushed to the bedside for his phone, immediately calling 911 as Carla slowly backed away from the crib in horror.
“Hello, yes, my daughter has been taken,” Daniel said, his tone growing more alarmed the longer he spoke. “I don’t—No, I don’t know who took her, that’s why I’m calling!”
Carla quickly left the bedroom and stumbled into the hallway, patting the walls for support as she walked past the staircase and toward the front door. A tightness clutched her chest and she struggled to breathe. She burst out onto the patio and stared into the densely wooded area surrounding the house where the moonlight failed to penetrate the forest canopy.
“Angela?” Carla’s voice caught in her throat as her breathing quickened.
With no response, Carla hurried down the porch steps, losing one of her slippers in the process, and she limped forward on her left foot, which padded the ground cautiously. Carla mumbled to herself, searching for her daughter, praying that her little girl was still alive.
“Where did you go?” Carla whispered to herself. “Talk to me, baby. Talk to me—”
An infant’s cry echoed to her left, and Carla quickly turned.
“Angela?” Carla asked, stepping toward the forest where the noise was coming from. “Angela!” She jogged, following her baby’s cries, which grew louder, closer, the farther she ran. “Mommy’s here! Mommy’s right here!”
The cries shifted directions suddenly, and Carla stopped, turning on a dime as she sprinted in the new direction of her daughter’s voice.
But this time when Carla followed, the noises grew fainter, disappearing into the woods. Panic-stricken, Carla turned around, heading back in the original direction from where she had come, but then there was nothing.
Carla stopped to catch her breath as she spun in a circle. She heard nothing but the noise of insects and the sound of her own pulse pounding in her head. She didn’t understand how this could be happening. She didn’t understand how she could have slept through her daughter’s abduction.
“Please!” Carla hunched forward, fighting back the tears. “I won’t tell the police. Just give my daughter back to me. I’ll give you whatever you want! Anything, please!”
No answer.
Carla grew more hysterical at the prospect of losing her child. She dropped to her knees, an ache in her chest so great she thought she was having a heart attack.
“Please,” Carla whimpered, barely loud enough f
or her to hear herself, and gently crouched forward, hands digging into the dirt. “Please, bring her back.”
A happy coo nearby prompted Carla to snap her attention up from the ground. And even though it was dark, eyes straining, she saw a woman in a white gown holding her child. She was a plain-looking woman with pale skin and jet-black hair. She held Angela in her arms, still wrapped in the monogrammed pink swaddle she slept in, the child quiet for this stranger in the woods.
Carla slowly rose to her feet, afraid of inciting the woman. “Give her back to me.” She extended her arms. “Please, she’s my child.”
The woman remained stoic, and Angela squirmed in her arms, growing fussier until she started to cry.
Carla’s tone grew more demanding. “Give her to me now!”
The woman didn’t move, didn’t speak, remaining completely still.
“Give her to me!” Carla roared, and then she heard Daniel nearby.
“Carla? Where are you?” Daniel shouted.
Carla looked away for only a moment, but it was all that was needed for the woman to vanish. Carla stumbled forward into the darkness, screaming her daughter’s name as her husband came up behind her and caught her before she collapsed to the ground.
All Carla thought about as she sobbed were the nightmares that had plagued her since their arrival. Nightmares of a strange woman coming to steal her little Angela. But instead of waking up and the nightmare ending with relief, there was only emptiness, despair, and the burning question she had been unable to answer since the nightmares had started.
Who was the woman who had taken her daughter?
2
Lindsy Foster had been awake for the past hour, but she had remained in bed, staring through the crack in the blinds of the window of the RV, watching a deer that had been grazing. It was a doe, and she was beautiful.
The lifestyle of RV living came with its sacrifices from time to time, but the fact that they were able to enjoy views like this was what made the small, uncomfortable mattress that she and her husband slept on every night worth it.
And even when they complained, it was never as bad as they made it seem. But after seven years on the road, Lindsy noticed how her bones ached a little bit more when she woke up in the morning. At thirty-five, she wasn’t old, but her body didn’t bounce back as quickly as it used to.
Mike stirred behind her, shifting positions so he could spoon her as he kissed her neck.
“Good morning,” Lindsy said.
“Morning.” Mike pressed his nose into her hair and took a deep breath, keeping his eyes closed. “What time is it?”
Lindsy watched the doe scurry away, sensing something it didn’t like, then brushed away a strand of thick, unruly, chestnut-colored hair from her face, revealing pale, freckled cheeks and round inquisitive blue eyes. “Time to get up.”
Mike groaned, and Lindsy reached around and slapped him on the rear, eliciting a fake shriek of pain. “You’re so mean in the morning.”
Lindsy kissed him, and then skillfully slipped her hand down into his boxers. “Are you sure about that?”
Mike laughed. “You’re like a sour patch doll.” He kissed her back and ran his hands along the smooth skin of her hipbone. She had always been a little self-conscious about her hips when she was a teenager, but the older she became, the more she embraced her natural curves. And judging by Mike’s excitement, he was ready to embrace them as well.
When they finished making love, Lindsy pressed her body against Mike, resting her head in the crook of his shoulder as her heart rate came down. Her cheeks were flushed with small patches of scarlet-colored flesh, and she traced her fingertips through Mike’s chest hair, making little pattern designs with her fingernails.
Mike was shorter than Lindsy by a couple of inches, which was always the first thing people noticed about their coupling. But Lindsy had never cared about his stature. She only cared about the way a man spoke to her, the way he cared for her, and the way he made love to her.
Ten years of marriage later, and Mike still checked all three of those boxes with ease.
Mike slapped his paunchy stomach. “This thing is starting to get out of control.”
Lindsy propped herself up on her elbow. “What is it you tell me? Just more of you to love, right?”
“Yeah, but you’re still stunningly beautiful,” Mike answered. “And I seem to be getting exponentially older, fatter, and shorter by the day.”
Lindsy brushed her fingers through Mike’s thick black hair, which he kept buzzed short, a habit handed down to him by his father who had been in the military. She sighed. “Well, I suppose I should just leave you now and get it over with.”
“I suppose you should,” Mike said.
Lindsy twisted her mouth to the side, wrinkling her nose.
Mike sat up and kissed her. “I love you.”
“I love you too,” Lindsy said, and then she slapped Mike on the stomach and quickly rolled out of bed before he could retaliate.
Lindsy grabbed the clothes she had worn the day before, sniffing them to make sure they could still be worn today. They passed the test.
“You want eggs for breakfast?” Lindsy asked.
“Sure,” Mike answered, still lying down.
“Good, me too,” Lindsy said, putting on her sandals. “Let me know when they’re done.”
Mike pushed himself up on his elbows, watching as Lindsy smiled at him as she stepped out of the door to enjoy the crisp Colorado air.
The campground they had picked was in the foothills, but the mountains could be seen to the distance in the west, which provided for a beautiful backdrop.
Most of the RV slots were empty, so they pretty much had the place to themselves, which wasn’t unusual for this time of year. Summer was over, and with it, so were the family vacationers who still went out every year, touring the country with their families.
RV trips had made a surprising comeback over the past few years, so it was nice to have the campground to themselves. But while most of those summer vacationers spent a few weeks in their rented RVs, few were as battle-tested as Lindsy and Mike’s year-round RV.
It was a 1996 Class C Thor Motorcoach. It was pre-owned when they bought it, and they had more than doubled the mileage on their ride over the past seven years, burning through two transmissions in the process.
The interior was dated, everything tan or beige colored, but they had all the creature comforts they could ask for. Running water, a generator to run heat and air when it became too hot or too cold to sleep with the windows down. Working kitchen, bath and toilet, and the freedom of the open road. And after what they had gone through seven years ago, both of them needed a change.
After the first year of traveling, they had considered buying a larger motorcoach, but they wanted to conserve as much of their funds as they could, both unsure if their new venture would provide any income. And while the first two years were very rough, they hadn’t had to dip into their savings for the past five years. By then, they had grown too fond of their little home on wheels to sell it.
Lindsy hugged herself as she looked up a blue, cloudless sky. She loved it when work took them to the mountains. The landscape held a majestic air to it that she didn’t experience anywhere else. She had spent considerable time trying to figure out why this place was so different for her, why the mountains were so unique, and she concluded that it was most likely because humans couldn’t recreate this place.
Most cities were the same, though some had better food than others, but nature was unique. No two rocks were the same out here, and she figured it was the diversity of the land that she loved most.
The RV door swung open, and Mike poked his head out, still only dressed in his boxer shorts. “Hey. Eggs are almost ready. You want to butter the toast?”
Lindsy turned and nodded, joining her husband back in the RV, greeted by the wonderful aroma of coffee. She loved that smell.
“Have you checked emails yet?” Lindsy asked.
“You are just cracking the whip today,” Mike answered, scraping the eggs onto two plates.
Lindsy buttered the toast, then grabbed the strawberry jam from the fridge. “I’m just ready for the next case.”
Mike picked up the pair of plates and turned, pausing to face his wife before he set them on the table. “I thought we were going to spend some time away from work for a little while?”
“We did,” Lindsy answered, finishing the toast and placing it on the plates next to the eggs. “This morning. And last night. And the night before. And the—”
“As wonderful as our sex life is, I don’t think it qualifies as a vacation,” Mike said, setting the plates on the table where the two mugs of coffee were still steaming.
Lindsy and Mike sat, the pair squished together in the small dinette set of the RV.
“I know,” Lindsy said. “But it’s not like we don’t have a great view here.”
“You know,” Mike said, chewing his eggs. “I bet we could get a little cabin up near Boulder and just relax for a few weeks before we start searching for our next gig. Give us a chance to recharge.” He sipped the coffee.
