The Guest House Hauntings Boxset by Hazel Holmes (novel books to read txt) 📕

The dead were always still and quiet, and they never slobbered over your brand-new shoes. Brent kicked the skeleton’s hands off his feet and then stepped backward.

The skeleton looked up at Brent, snot and tears dribbling from his orifices, his cheeks bright red, his eyes narrow slits. “Please.”

“Three.”

The skeleton screamed. Brent squeezed the trigger. Another stain was added to the carpet.

Smoke drifted from the pistol’s barrel, and Brent lingered in the living room, staring at the growing puddle of blood engulfing the dead man’s head. After a minute, he picked up the two shell casings and shoved them in his pocket. They jingled on his walk to the door, where he stopped and turned back toward the dead. He smiled.

As he suspected, no one came out of their apartments, and no one stopped to question him as he stepped outside the building and returned to the street. If Sarah wasn’t here, then he was beginning to think that she wasn’t in the city at all.

Brent opened the door of his black 1968 Pontiac GTO Judge and climbed inside. The leather was cold, but it smelled wonderful. He’d rebuilt and refurbished the vintage car himself. It was a labor of love, and he had ended up dumping more than sixty grand into the damn thing. But holy fuck, did he love that car.

It was a beast of a machine and one of the most recognizable cars in the city. He loved watching the little street junkies and wannabe thugs scatter at the sound of his throaty four-hundred-twenty-horsepower V8 engine. The car was power. And Brent loved power.

Brent tapped his finger on the steering wheel and noticed a bloodstain on the fitted leather glove. He grimaced and removed a packet of wet wipes from the glove box. He vigorously scrubbed at the stain, the leather darkening under the moist cloth.

Finished, Brent threw the dirty cloth onto the pavement. His phone rang. He answered, still examining the glove. “Yeah.”

“We got a hit,” the voice said. “Northern Maine in a town called Redford. Local PD ran her license through the DMV.”

“Text me the address.” Brent hung up and then placed the phone in his cup holder, his eyes still locked on the vanished bloodstain.

So Sarah had decided to try her chances up north in the middle of nowhere. It was a bold move, especially with winter on its way and barely a penny to her name.

Brent smiled at the thought of her wandering through the woods like a hermit, hitchhiking all the way to the Canadian border. Was that her end game? He laughed. The dumb bitch had imagination, he’d give her that. But she had finally run out of rope.

Brent revved the GTO to life and took one last glance at the apartment building where he’d left two bodies. Then he started his journey north, where he would take one more.

68

Sarah had pulled the hospital blankets up to her chest. The gown they’d put her in was thin, and made her feel exposed. She picked at the corner of the thinnest sheet, the fabric scratchy beneath her fingernail as the deputy in the seat next to her tapped the pen against his notepad, examining his notes.

“You said you found a box of IDs in a shoebox hidden beneath a loose board in the shed.” Deputy Dell Parker read the statement, underlining the section with his pen, then looked up at Sarah. “And that was when you ran.”

“Yes.” Sarah kept her answers short.

“And then Dennis, the Bells’ groundskeeper, chased you down, drugged you, and then brought you back to the house for a—” He flipped to a previous page of his notes. “Ceremony.”

“That’s what he told me.” Sarah ended her assault on the corner of the bedsheet and started to pick the chipped turquoise nail polish on her finger. Her hands had been wrapped with gauze, injuries from her escape out of the house, the details of which she embellished to the deputy.

“So you woke up in the basement, broke out of the room, had the sense of mind to grab your backpack,” he looked to the bag on the table by the door, then returned to his notes, “and then ran out of the house, escaping through a second-story window.” Dell removed his gaze from the notepad and looked at Sarah. “Am I missing anything?”

Sarah shook her head, knowing full well that there was more to the story. She had avoided telling him about the body and the ghost because she knew divulging that information would only lengthen their chat and make it harder for her to leave.

The deputy tapped his pen onto the notepad, staring at Sarah for a long time, and then finally stood. “All right, Ms. Pembrooke. I’m going to head over to the Bell house now and have a conversation with the family and question the groundskeeper. In the meantime I have a deputy outside and down the hall to keep an eye on you. I’ll also put an inquiry into,” he returned to his notes, “Brent Alvarez.” He closed the notebook and placed it inside his jacket. “See if what he has to say matches up with your story about him.”

Sarah nodded, knowing that her ex would deny whatever allegations she said about him.

“You just get some rest.” The deputy smiled, and then left.

Sarah exhaled relief once he was gone, and waited until the sound of his footsteps faded and there was only the slow cadence of beeps from the machines monitoring her vitals.

Sarah flung the sheets off her, climbed off the bed, and rolled the machines toward the table and her backpack. Her hospital gown flowed behind her as she opened her backpack and removed her clothes, planning to dress quickly.

Naked, Sarah examined her pale flesh. Up till an hour ago, she had been freezing, but now, even with her bare feet against tile, there was nothing. No cold. No goosebumps.

Sarah paused when she slid on her