by James Hunt
“I couldn’t keep her still,” Lindsy said.
Mike frowned. “How is that possible?”
“I don’t know,” Lindsy said, her voice cracking. “She’s strong. I’ve never felt anything so strong. I think that’s how she’s been able to keep me out. She’s blocking me. Only lets me see what she wants me to see. Or at least that’s what she’s trying to do.”
“Well, it looks like she’s gone for now,” Mike said. “Do you think you can walk back to the RV?” he asked.
Lindsy nodded, and Mike helped her up. She leaned into him, thankful for the support, and then realized she had dropped the evidence bag with the key. She quickly snatched it off the ground, nearly losing her balance in the process.
“So, that’s it?” Mike asked, pointing to the bag.
“Yeah,” Lindsy answered. “Now, let’s go see what the midwife doesn’t want us to find in that trunk.”
14
Back at the Maples house, Mike had wanted to stop at the RV so they could take a closer look at Lindsy’s wounds, but she refused to be treated. She had the key in her hand, ready to open the truck as soon as she saw it in the attic.
Mike was first up the steps and pounded on the front door, but no one answered.
“Are you sure Daniel came home?” Lindsy asked, standing behind him on the porch, glancing around to the darkened woods.
“That’s what he told me,” Mike said, knocking again.
“Try the door,” Lindsy said.
Mike stopped to turn around and give her a look.
“It’s not intruding if we know the people, and the door is open,” Lindsy answered. “Just try it.”
Mike touched the door handle and then turned the knob. There was no resistance, and Mike pushed the door inward, glancing back over his shoulder to Lindsy.
“Might as well let ourselves in,” Lindsy said.
The pair entered, Mike shutting the door behind them while Lindsy walked to the base of the stairs. “It should still be up in the attic.”
“Daniel?” Mike called out, his voice echoing in the empty house. “Where the hell did he go?”
“Maybe he’s still speaking with that lawyer somewhere,” Lindsy answered, one foot already on the staircase. “But we don’t tell him any of this until we know what he’s up to. C’mon, we need to figure out what’s in that trunk!”
Before Mike could stop her, Lindsy was bounding up the steps. The long day had sapped much of her energy, but she made it up to the third floor without stopping. Mike finally joined her upstairs as she pulled down the strap to the attic, the stairs folding down to the floor as she did.
Mike stared up into the dark hole above them, shaking his head. “I don’t know, Lindsy. Something doesn’t feel right about all of this.”
“Of course it doesn’t,” Lindsy said. “We’re dealing with one of the most powerful ghosts either of us have ever encountered.”
She didn’t wait for any more of his thoughts before she ascended the steps and poked her head up into the attic.
It was much darker than before, but the walk through the woods had allowed her vision to adjust to the night, and she was still able to see most of everything stacked around her. Plus, she already knew where to look, so she wouldn’t need to keep stumbling around in the darkness.
“You coming?” Lindsy called down behind her when she didn’t see Mike coming up the steps.
“Yeah, just hang on,” Mike said, and then she heard the ladder groan from his weight as he started to climb up.
Lindsy retraced her steps from earlier in the day, shifting around all of the junk that had been stored up here for decades.
“Where are you?” Mike asked once he was standing up in the attic.
“Here,” Lindsy answered, waving her arm in the air. “I’ve almost found it. It was right here—”
Lindsy stepped around the large dresser that she had seen and pointed down to where she had seen the trunk earlier in the day. But instead, she only saw the outline of the box traced into the attic floor. “No.” She stepped around the space where the trunk had been, thinking maybe she had missed it or didn’t look the right way around. “No, no, no, no, no.” She raked her fingers through her hair. “This can’t be happening.”
Mike eventually joined her and stared at the bare floor. “Where is it?”
“It was right here!” Lindsy pointed to space. “She must have moved it.”
“She?” Mike asked. “You’re talking about the midwife?”
“It’s the only explanation,” Lindsy answered. “She knew I had the key and that I was coming here to open the trunk, and she decided to get rid of it!”
“How?” Mike asked. “You know how difficult it is for a ghost to do something like that?”
“Did you see what she did to me in the woods?” Lindsy asked. “I couldn’t stop her, Mike.”
Mike held up his hands, attempting to be amicable. “It’s all right. Hey, we’ll figure it out.”
Lindsy calmed down, and then nodded. She knew
“If she buried the trunk, we’ll have a hell of a time searching for it,” Lindsy said. “You saw the maps for this place. The property stretches for miles out here. There is an infinite number of places where she could have hidden it.”
Mike walked to Lindsy and gently touched her elbow. “Hey. We’ll find it.”
It was the assurance and confidence in his voice that calmed Lindsy, and she nodded. “Yeah. I know.”
Still slightly defeated, Lindsy walked back over to the stairs and stepped down. Waiting for Mike to descend, Lindsy heard the front door open and shut. She looked over the railing down into the foyer and saw Daniel walking into the first-floor hallway.
“Daniel!” Lindsy yelled.
There was no response. Mike joined her by the railing.
“He’s here?” Mike asked.
“Yeah, I just saw him walk through the door,” Lindsy said.
“C’mon, let’s go talk to him, find out what the lawyer said,” Mike stepped around Lindsy and descended the stairs. “Hey, Daniel! How’d it go with the lawyer?”
Daniel still didn’t reply on their way down, and by the time they reached the first floor, Lindsy felt something shift. “Mike, wait.”
Lindsy pulled on Mike’s shoulder, slowing him down before they went down the last flight of steps, and he looked back at her, confused.
“What?” Mike asked.
Lindsy pointed to the clumps of dirt that had been dragged in by Daniel’s feet, the dirty boot prints trailing deeper into the house.
When Mike saw the footprints, he stiffened with fear. “We need to get back to the RV. Now.”
Lindsy nodded, but before they could restart their path back down the stairs, they were stopped by the sound of metal scraping against wood.
The noise grew louder, accompanied by methodical footsteps until Lindsy watched Daniel appear in the foyer and then stop at the bottom of the staircase. He dragged a shovel behind him, and even in the darkness, she was able to see the dirt and earth that covered his clothes, legs, and arms. He stared up at Mike and Lindsy with a zombie-like expression, and Lindsy suddenly understood how the midwife had moved the trunk.
“Lindsy, Mike,” Daniel said.
Mike gently pushed Lindsy behind him, standing firm and resolute on the stairs. “Daniel, what happened to the conversation with the lawyer?”
The smile that Daniel spread across his face was incredibly forced, giving it an unnatural look. “Why don’t you come down here and we’ll talk about it.” Daniel gripped the shovel in his hand firmly.
Daniel was a big, muscular man. He had at least six inches of height and forty pounds of muscle on Mike, who barely cleared the scales at a buck-fifty at five foot seven inches. He wasn’t a pushover by any means, but he also wasn’t a fighter.
“We need to get out through one of the windows,” Lindsy whispered into Mike’s ear, and he nodded in response as they took a step back in unison.
The moment they started their retreat, Daniel’s forced smile vanished. “You’re making a mistake.”
“Go to bed, Daniel,” Mike said. “Sleep whatever it is that you’re feeling off, and we’ll talk in the morning, all right?”
Daniel took one step up the staircase, the shovel still dragging behind him. “I’ve never felt better.”
Lindsy glanced behind them, looking for the nearest bedroom that had a window, but all the doors were closed.
“No more games, you two,” Daniel said, taking more aggressive steps up the stairs, the shovel banging behind him against the step as he ascended. “Come down here now!”
Mike looked back at Lindsy and pushed her toward the nearest door. “Go now!” He shoved her inside a room and shut the door as Daniel charged up the stairs. The last image she saw of her husband was of him spinning around to face Daniel, who had finally raised the shovel above his head.
“No!” Lindsy lunged for the door as it closed, then ripped the door open in time to see Daniel charge Mike, tackling him to the floor.
Lindsy saw the shovel drop from Daniel’s hand as he wrestled with Mike on the floor. She rushed over to pick it up, raising it high above her head, and brought it down hard on Daniel’s back.
But it only flattened the big man onto Mike, and when Daniel looked up at Lindsy, there was nothing but pure rage in his eyes.
“GAAHHHH!” Daniel leaped to his feet, ripping the shovel out of Lindsy’s meager grip with an ease that showed off his prowess. He raised the shovel to strike Lindsy, but Mike was up to his feet and grabbed the end of the shovel, pulling it down with all of his weight, which caused Daniel to lose his grip.
“Lindsy, run!” Mike shouted as he swung the shovel like a baseball bat into Daniel’s side, and this time, Lindsy didn’t hesitate to run down the stairs.
The plastic bag with the key still gripped in her hand; her legs turned to jelly by the time she reached the first floor. She reached for the front door to escape, but just before she touched the handle, she was yanked backward and thrown to the floor.
Daniel towered above her, a gash across his forehead, cascading blood down his face and making him look incredibly menacing. “You should have just stayed away.” He was breathing heavily, a crazed look in his eyes as he moved closer. “You shouldn’t have ever come here.”
Lindsy crawled backward until she hit the steps, shaking her head. “Daniel, you have to listen to me. You’re not yourself. You’re not—”
Daniel lunged forward, gripping Lindsy by the throat and slamming her against the wall. He bared his teeth, the veins along his neck throbbing from his intensity. “No more tricks, witch.”
Lindsy looked up the staircase, afraid of what Daniel had done to Mike upstairs. She faced her attacker, trying to get a better read on his state of mind. She could tell the midwife had her claws in him.
“You have to fight her, Daniel,” Lindsy said, struggling to breathe as she squirmed beneath Daniel’s hold. “You have to remember your daughter.”
“Evelyn is taking good care of Angela,” Daniel said. “She’s in a better place now.”
“No, she’s not,” Lindsy said. “She misses her mother. She misses her father.”
Lindsy noticed the twitch at the corner of Daniel’s mouth. He was still in there, somewhere; she just needed to draw him out.
It was hard to do it with the living, but Lindsy could sometimes pull memories from people so long as she was touching them and concentrating hard enough. And doing that now might be her only chance at survival.
Lindsy shut her eyes, fighting through the choking pain and loss of concentration, trying to focus on Daniel’s raging mind. She didn’t think one person could have so much hate, but the midwife was bringing it all to the surface, heightening his rage tenfold with her influence.
But Lindsy drilled down, pushing past the rage and to the guarded memories, and tried to find a strong focal point that would help Daniel remember what he had forgotten, and she believed she found a memory that would work.
“Angela slept on the drive all the way home,” Lindsy said.
Immediately, Daniel’s grip on Lindsy slackened, and she saw a bit of the old Daniel return.
“She was wrapped in that pink blanket,” Lindsy said. “The same blanket Carla was wrapped in when she was a baby, passed down to her by her mother. You were so excited to have them home. You were happy that day.”
A tear formed in Daniel’s eye, but he still kept hold of Lindsy’s neck, one small twist away from killing her. “She was beautiful.”
“Yes,” Lindsy said. “She was. You took her to the crib, and you and Carla just watched her sleep.”
The tear rolled down Daniel’s cheek. “It was the most peaceful thing I’d ever seen.”
Lindsy nodded, noticing Mike in her peripheral vision. “You wanted to be a better father than your own. And you still can be, Daniel. You can still be that good father.”
Lindsy wasn’t sure how much longer she would be able to keep him still, and that’s when she felt the midwife push her out and retake control of Daniel’s mind. He clamped down on her throat one more time, squeezing harder.
“You’re dead—”
Mike brought the end of the shovel down hard on top of Daniel’s head. The man’s body went limp, and he crumpled to the floor. Mike dropped the shovel and then held Lindsy in his arms.
“Are you all right?” Mike asked.
Lindsy nodded, squeezing him tighter. “You?”
“My head is killing me, but yeah.” Mike pulled back. “I think so.”
Lindsy looked down at Daniel. “She must have been controlling him this entire time.”
“I didn’t think something like that was possible,” Mike said. “I’ve seen ghosts influence before, but this borders on possession.”
“I know,” Lindsy said. “And if we want to find out where he buried the trunk, then we’ll need to break the midwife’s hold on him.”
15
While Daniel was still unconscious, Lindsy and Mike tied him up, making sure he was completely immobile, and they taped his mouth shut so he wouldn’t start screaming when he awoke. While he remained unconscious, Lindsy and Mike came up with a plan they hoped would help free Daniel of the midwife’s influence over him.
“We need to remind him of who he is and who he loves,” Lindsy said. “Find as many pictures of his family as you can.”
Mike sprinted off, searching the house while Lindsy gathered her strength for what came next. She had never felt anything as powerful as the midwife. And the fact that the midwife had been able to keep such control over Daniel was a testament to the woman’s strength.
Lindsy hoped she could break through the midwife’s walls.
“Okay,” Mike said, returning with a box of pictures he had gathered from the different rooms in the house. “This is all I could find. Do you think it’ll be enough?”
Daniel groaned, pulling both of their attention toward him.
“We’ll find out soon enough.” Lindsy walked over to Daniel, staring down at him as his eyes flitted open.
The moment Daniel realized that he was tied and bound, he fought and struggled against his restraints, screaming into the duct tape that covered his mouth.
Lindsy shook her head. “You’re not getting out of this, Daniel, so I would save your energy.” But he continued to tense and writhe like a snake on the floor. She eventually took a knee next to him. “Whatever the midwife told you is a lie, Daniel. And I can prove it to you.” She reached for the tape on the corner of his mouth and ripped it off.
“GAH!” Daniel groaned, the skin around his mouth red. “I’m going to kill you and him.” He gestured to Mike. “You’ll be in the ground soon enough.”
“I know she’s testing you, Daniel,” Lindsy said. “But you have to be stronger than she is. You have to remember the people in your life.”
“Evelyn Carter is my life now,” Daniel said.
Lindsy extended her hand ba
ck to Mike, and he handed her one of the pictures. It was Carla and Daniel on their wedding day. She showed it to him. “Remember this?”
Daniel looked away, unable to focus on the image for very long. “Get that out of my face.”
Lindsy kept pushing the picture in front of him, not allowing him to look away. “This is Carla. Your wife. The woman who you swore an oath to love and cherish forever.”
“She’s weak!” Daniel roared, spittle flying from his mouth. “She’s always been weak!” He heaved his chest up and down from his heavy breathing, a look of bloodlust in his eyes.
“Give me another one,” Lindsy said, holding out her hand for the next photograph, and then flashed the image in front of Daniel. “When did the midwife start talking to you? Was it then?”
The photograph was from when they first moved into the house, Carla still large with child.
A slight tremor erupted at the corner of Daniel’s left eye. Lindsy kept hoping the images of the past, of who he used to be, would trigger enough powerful memories for Daniel to shake off the hold the midwife had on him. But Lindsy wasn’t sure Daniel had that kind of strength anymore. The midwife had her claws in too deep, and she had been working him for too long. She probably singled him out the moment they stepped onto the property.
“What did she promise you?” Lindsy asked. “What was it that she said that convinced you to listen to her?”
Lindsy studied Daniel, trying to find out what was bothering him so much that he would be willing to let go of everything he loved about his own life to allow the midwife to take control of him.
“Were you and Carla having problems?” Lindsy asked.
The question threw Daniel off guard, and he quickly shook his head, and Lindsy was sure this was Daniel’s own doing. “No.”
Lindsy studied him closer and decided that if the problems the midwife exploited weren’t in the present, then maybe they were in the past. “What was your childhood like, Daniel?”
Daniel glanced up at her, and Lindsy knew she had struck a nerve. “You don’t know anything about my life.”
