The Ghosts of Lakeforth Hotel

by Amy Cross

  Suddenly I spot a young boy's face reflected in the window, staring straight at me.

  I turn around, but there's no sign of him. Looking at the window again, I find that he seems to have vanished, although I know what I saw. Turning, I watch the yard for a moment, just in case he makes another appearance, and I swear my heart is pounding. I don't know whether ghosts get to choose where they haunt, but if they do, Jobard – or Maurice, as he might want to be known once again – could have chosen to come back here. Perhaps ghosts come not only to the places where they have unfinished business, but instead sometimes to the places where they feel most themselves. Or to the places where they left a part of their soul.

  At least, they go to those places once they're free. Once they're no longer anchored to wherever they died.

  In which case, I think I understand why several patients at a London hospital have reported seeing two ghostly little girls playing in the grounds.

  ***

  “Ms. Hayes?” a voice calls out. “Beth Hayes? Wait, can I have a word?”

  Great, another journalist.

  I pick up the pace, hoping against hope that I'll reach the office door before this asshole catches up to me. A moment later, however, I hear footsteps getting closer, and I realize that I'm not going to be so lucky. This happens about once a week at the moment, and I'm starting to think that these people are never going to get tired.

  “Ms. Hayes, I -”

  “I really don't want to talk,” I reply, glancing at him and seeing that – sure enough – it's someone I've never met before in my life. “Thanks, but no thanks. I don't talk to the media.”

  “I'm not from the media. I'm nothing to do with the press. Please, I just want one moment of your time. I have something for you.”

  Realizing that this guy isn't going to give up easily, I stop and turn to him. He's older than me, in his forties or maybe fifties, with graying hair, and he seems pretty breathless after hurrying to catch up.

  “Whoever you are,” I tell him, “I'd appreciate it if you'd just leave me alone. I've done nothing to court attention. I just want to get on with my life.”

  As I say those words, I realize that I've inadvertently reached up and started touching my scar again. I swear, every time I meet someone new, I catch myself scratching at the spot where a ridge of knotted flesh rises up from beneath my collar and runs to the edge of my cheek. Forcing myself to shove both my hands into my pocket, I still can't help thinking that this guy can probably tell that beneath my thick overcoat and the rest of my clothes, the left side of my body is a scarred mess. My face is just about the only part of me that looks even remotely normal, and even that is burned in several places. I've had a lot of operations over the past year.

  “It's about the Lakeforth,” the man says cautiously.

  “Of course it is,” I mutter. “I can't remember the last time anyone wanted to talk to me about anything else.”

  “The hotel is -”

  “The hotel doesn't exist anymore,” I add, cutting him off. “It's gone. There's nothing there except a patch of ashy ground. The entire place burned down a year ago.”

  “Oh, I know,” he replies. “I've been there. To the site of the fire, I mean. I was never fortunate enough to go when the place was still standing. There were always rumors about the place, but it was never high on the list for any paranormal investigator. Not until everything that happened to you, anyway. I've always thought that it must have been such a strange atmosphere at the hotel. From the photographs I've sourced, it's clear that the Lakeforth had a rather unusual style, somewhere between -”

  “Do you want something?” I ask, feeling a flutter of irritation in my chest. At the same time, a man and a woman walk past, and the woman glances at me.

  Did she see the scars?

  Or did she recognize me? After all, my story hit the papers a while back, even though I just wanted to hide away. Some asshole even got a photo of me and put it all over social media.

  “My name is Gavin Wallace,” the man says, reaching out to shake my hand. “I've read every report about what happened at the Lakeforth, Ms. Hayes. About its past, about the life of Jobard Nash and the lives of the key people who passed through the hotel's doors. About Steve Culshaw, and all the things he did. And about you, about how you still claim not to remember how you escaped the burning building. How you were found outside when the fire crews arrived. They say it's as if somebody carried you out, although obviously there was no sign of anyone else.”

  Swallowing hard, I realize that I can't tell him what I really think. I can't tell anyone. Deep down, I'm certain that once she saw the hotel was burning, Ruth Maywhistle realized she no longer needed vengeance. I'm certain that, right at the end, she became herself again.

  “I should cut to the chase,” Mr. Wallace continues, forcing a nervous smile as he fishes a crumpled leaflet from his pocket and hands it to me. “I know this might seem indelicate, but I'm here today to make you an offer. A financial offer, one that I hope might interest you a great deal.”

  Looking down at the leaflet, I'm shocked to see that it's for a company that organizes ghost tours. I take a look inside and see various weekend trips advertised, including nights in supposedly haunted houses up and down the country. Just as I'm about to ask what this has to do with me, however, I see that on the leaflet's back page there's an advert for a new tour that's set to launch early next year.

  “You're taking people to the site of the hotel?” I whisper.

  “We're a small company,” he replies. “We've been around for a while, but we're not some big global corporation. It's just myself and my wife who run it. We take small parties to various sights of supernatural significance, and we arrange viewings and ghost hunts, and little talks, that sort of thing. Oh, and tea and biscuits are included free of charge in every trip.”

  “What does this have to do with me?” I ask, feeling faintly disgusted as I hand the leaflet back to him.

  “You can keep that.”

  “I don't want to.”

  “But -”

  “I don't want it!” I say firmly.

  He hesitates, before taking the leaflet.

  “We're planning our first trip to the site of the former Lakeforth Hotel,” he explains, “and, well, we wanted to offer you the chance to come along as a special guest. We'd pay your travel fees and accommodation costs, plus a small fee of five hundred pounds. Five hundred per trip, that is. I know it's not exactly riches, but ideally we'd like to run up to four of these trips each year., maybe even more if there's enough demand. People do so like to visit haunted locations, you see.”

  “You can't take people there,” I reply.

  “We have permission from the new owner of the site. He doesn't mind us going up there while he arranges to bulldoze the ruins.”

  “That's not what I mean,” I continue. “You're crazy, you can't...”

  My voice trails off.

  “We donate 10% of all proceeds to a local animal sanctuary,” he replies. “We only charge £70 per trip anyway, so we're not exactly making a big profit. We're mainly interested in the experience. And obviously, if you were to come along and provide expert, on-site commentary, I'm sure our guests would gain a much better understanding of what really happened at the Lakeforth.”

  I pause for a moment, before shaking my head.

  “Ms. Hayes, your presence would really make the trips more instructive for our guests,” he continues. “I know you might not like the idea of going back, but we run a very serious, very -”

  “I'm not doing this,” I tell him, taking a step back. “I don't even want to talk about it. I told the police everything I know about what happened there. About what happened to my sister. I guess I probably can't stop you taking your little tour to the Lakeforth, but there's no way I'm going along with it. If you think I'd ever want to go back to that place, if you think I want to encourage anyone to go there, then obviously you don't really understand what happened.” I t
urn to walk away, before hesitating for a moment. “Besides, it doesn't matter. Do what you want. You won't find any ghosts there.”

  “We could perhaps stretch to six hundred pounds.”

  I open my mouth to tell him what I really think, which is that he's wasting his time. With the hotel destroyed and the human remains destroyed in the fire, I'm pretty sure the ghosts have been set free. Then again, I doubt he'd accept my word for that.

  “Goodbye, Mr. Wallace,” I say finally. “Please don't contact me again.”

  “I'm surprised you're so skeptical of our chances,” he tells me. “After what you went through, Ms. Hayes, I'd have thought you of all people would believe in ghosts!”

  “I didn't say I don't believe in ghosts,” I reply, turning and walking away as a cold wind blows along the street. “I said you won't find any in the ruins of Lakeforth Hotel.”

  Also by Amy Cross

  THE NURSE

  “Twenty years ago, something very bad happened in this house. But it's over now. I promise.”

  When Rachel moves to a new house with her mother, she immediately realizes that something isn't quite right. Although she's blind, Rachel can tell that the stories about the house's past don't add up. And slowly, she starts to worry that someone or something from that past might still be around.

  Soon, Rachel learns the story of the house's previous occupant, a troubled nurse who spent every waking moment caring for a sick old man. The nurse eventually lost her mind, resulting in a series of horrific murders, but have the events of that awful time truly been left behind? Or is something stirring in the night, something that only Rachel seems to notice?

  The Nurse is the story of a girl who finds herself trapped in a sinister house, and a woman who believes she's being haunted by the ghost of a long-dead child. Contains scenes of violence.

  Also by Amy Cross

  THE BODY AT AUERCLIFF

  “We'll bury her so deep, even her ghost will have a mouth full of dirt!”

  When Rebecca Wallace arrives at Auercliff to check on her aged aunt, she's in for a shock. Her aunt's mind is crumbling, and the old woman refuses to let Rebecca stay overnight. And just as she thinks she's starting to understand the truth, Rebecca makes a horrifying discovery in one of the house's many spare rooms.

  A dead body. A woman. Old and rotten. And her aunt insists she has no idea where it came from.

  The truth lies buried in the past. For generations, the occupants of Auercliff have been tormented by the repercussions of a horrific secret. And somehow everything seems to be centered upon the mausoleum in the house's ground, where every member of the family is entombed once they die.

  Whose body was left to rot in one of the house's rooms? Why have successive generations of the family been plagued by a persistent scratching sound? And what really happened to Rebecca many years ago, when she found herself locked inside the Auercliff mausoleum?

  The Body at Auercliff is a horror story about a family and a house, and about the refusal of the past to stay buried.

  Also by Amy Cross

  THE GHOST OF SHAPLEY HALL

  “Georgette Shapley died outside this house. Her ghost has spent the past century trying to get back inside so she can be reunited with her child.”

  James Spence doesn't believe in ghosts, so he has no worries about going with his girlfriend Rachel to visit an old, abandoned country home.

  Rachel, meanwhile, is convinced that a weekend at Shapley Hall will make James change his mind. After all, she knows from bitter experience that the the house is haunted by a woman who once died in the most horrific manner possible, and who now waits to be reunited with her long-lost child.

  As the weekend continues, however, James starts to realize that maybe ghosts are the least of his problems. Rachel's behavior is becoming increasingly erratic, and it soon becomes clear that she'll stop at nothing to fulfill a promise she once made to a dead woman. Did Rachel imagine a terrifying experience during her childhood, or are the hallways of Shapley Hall really haunted by a terrifying, vengeful creature?

  The Ghost of Shapley Hall is a horror story about two people who venture into a dark, abandoned house, and about the echo of a terrible crime that still haunts the Shapley family to this day.

  Also by Amy Cross

  THE PRINTER FROM HELL

  It's just a printer.

  That's what Steve Holland tells himself when he brings the machine into his family's home. Even when he struggles to get the printer working, he tells his wife that there's no reason to worry. After all, a printer can't actually hurt anyone.

  And then the bruises start to appear on their son's arm.

  Soon it becomes apparent that the printer has brought something dangerous into the apartment. Hideous photos start to emerge from the machine, photos that can't possibly exist. Yet somehow they do exist, and they show scenes from a nightmarish world. A world much like our own, but filled with more blood, pain and misery than any human could endure. And when his wife and son disappear from the apartment, Steve is forced to join a madman's quest to save his family.

  The Printer From Hell is a horror story about a man who makes one small mistake, and ends up fighting to save his family from a horrific monster. And all because he bought the wrong printer.

  OTHER BOOKS

  BY AMY CROSS INCLUDE

  Horror

  The Body at Auercliff

  B&B

  The Disappearance of Katie Wren

  The Horror of Devil's Root Lake

  The Haunting of Blackwych Grange

  The Devil, the Witch and the Whore (The Deal book 1)

  Perfect Little Monsters and Other Stories

  Twisted Little Things and Other Stories

  The Printer From Hell

  The Farm

  The Nurse

  American Coven

  Annie's Room

  Eli's Town

  Asylum

  Meds (Asylum 2)

  The Night Girl

  Devil's Briar

  The Cabin

  After the Cabin

  Last Wrong Turn

  At the Edge of the Forest

  The Devil's Hand

  The Ghost of Shapley Hall

  The Death of Addie Gray

  A House in London

  The Blood House

  The Priest Hole (Nykolas Freeman book 1)

  Battlefield (Nykolas Freeman book 2)

  The Border

  The Lighthouse

  3AM

  Tenderling

  The Girl Clay

  The Prison

  Ward Z

  The Devil's Photographer

  Fantasy / Horror

  Dark Season series 1, 2 & 3

  The Girl With Crooked Fangs (Vampire Country book 1)

  Grave Girl

  Graver Girl (Grave Girl 2)

  Ghosts

  The Library

  Thriller

  The Girl Who Never Came Back

  Other People's Bodies

  Dystopia / Science Fiction

  The Dog

  The Island (The Island book 1)

  Persona (The Island book 2)