Chasing Ghosts by Madalyn Morgan (best fantasy books to read .txt) 📕

fingers still hooked in the woven steel and her face pressed against the rusting wire. Thomas crouched down beside her. ‘It is time we left,’ he shouted, his voice drowned out by the howling wind. He pointed to the gunpowder grey sky. ‘It will soon be dark.’ He took the scarf from his neck and wrapped it around the lower part of Claire’s face before pulling her to her feet.

Overcome by the horror of what she had seen, Claire stumbled. Thomas caught her and with his arms wrapped around her, he walked her back to the car. Before getting in, she looked back. Out of an angry and malevolent sky a curtain of sleet and hail thrashed down, pounding and battering what remained of the horrific Gestapo prison.

Thomas opened the passenger door and pushed Claire into the car. The wind buffeted the car and hail hammered noisily on the roof and windscreen, making it impossible to hear what each other was saying or to see anything other than balls of ice building up in the corners of the windows.

Claire stared open-mouthed as a white shroud of hail covered the windscreen, blocking out what was left of the daylight. The car’s interior became eerily dark and Claire began to panic. She turned to open the door, but Thomas grabbed her and pulled her to him.

‘The noise!’ Claire shouted, through chattering teeth. In a fit of anxiety, she forced her hands free of Thomas’s hold, pressed them against her ears and buried her face between the lapels of his coat.

When the storm ended, sleet and rain melted the hail leaving the windscreen relatively clear. Straining to see through the rivulets of icy rain running down the windows, Claire watched the sky brighten.

Taking his arm from around her, Thomas lifted Claire’s chin and looked into her eyes. For a moment she thought he was going to kiss her. Instead, he whispered, ‘Breathe…’ Claire looked at him and nodded. She suddenly realised she’d been holding her breath. After inhaling and exhaling several times, slowly, she felt calmer.

Thomas started the car. ‘What are you doing?’ Claire asked. Ignoring her, Thomas put his foot on the accelerator and the engine roared into life. ‘We can’t go,’ Claire said, ‘not while it’s still daylight. We haven’t found the escape route. Thomas, please,’ she begged, ‘we can’t go yet.’

‘We can go and we will!’ He put the car in reverse gear, spun the steering wheel and turned to look out of the back window. ‘You are soaked to the skin,’ he said angrily, ‘we both are!’ Claire wiped the cuff of her coat across her face, transferring mud to her cheek. ‘You’ll catch your death of pneumonia,’ he shouted, ‘and then you won’t be any good to your husband, or to anyone else!’

Claire slumped down in her seat, dejected. She looked out of the passenger window and watched the leafless trees around the desolate prison fade into the distance.

Hôtel Garonne, on the outskirts of Saint-Gaudens on the Garonne river, was once a private chateau, which had turned into a hotel between the wars. Thomas carried in the suitcases and asked for two single rooms.

From the outside the hotel had the red-brick charm of buildings in Toulouse. On the inside the décor was tired and the woman behind the reception desk looked as if she had something unpleasant stuck to her top lip. She clicked her fingers at a lad dressed in an ill-fitting bellboy’s uniform standing like a statue at the bottom of the sweep of stairs. He jumped and ran over to the desk. The woman behind it glared at him. ‘How long will you be staying, Monsieur?’ she asked, looking at Thomas from beneath hooded eyelids.

Thomas raised his eyebrows in question at Claire. Still annoyed with him for insisting they left the prison without looking for the escape route that Alain had told her about, Claire shrugged her shoulders. ‘One, possibly two nights, Madame. We are not sure how long we will be staying in Saint-Gaudens.’

‘In that case, I will need a deposit to hold your rooms after tonight. It will be fifteen francs Monsieur,’ she said, leaning over the reception desk and looking with distaste at the floor where Claire dripped water on the cheap carpet. ‘Each!’

‘It is raining, Madame!’ Claire said, her voice clipped with sarcasm.

‘Then it is a good job there is a fire in your room so you can dry your coat,’ the receptionist countered. Turning her attention back to Thomas, the woman reeled off a list of hotel rules: ‘Dinner is at seven. Do not be late. The kitchen stops serving at eight. The dining room closes at nine. The bar, which is for residents only, closes at eleven.’ The sour-faced receptionist handed Thomas the keys to both rooms and turned to the bellboy. ‘Rooms seven and eight.’

Claire and Thomas followed the boy up the thinly carpeted stairs to the first floor. Outside room seven the boy put down Claire’s case. ‘Do you want to look at the other room?’ Thomas asked, ‘it might be--’

‘This one will be fine.’ Claire shivered. ‘As long as there is a fire?’ She directed the question to the bellboy who nodded. Taking the key from Thomas, Claire unlocked the door.

‘If you feel like a drink, I shall be in the bar from…’ he looked at his watch, ‘six-thirty.’

‘I might join you; I’ll see how I feel. If I don’t, I’ll see you in the dining room at seven.’ The bellboy followed her into the room and set her suitcase down by the wardrobe. ‘If you need anything, Madame, anything at all,’ he said, with a glint in his eye, ‘ring down to reception. Madame la propriétaire will be happy to help you.’ He pointed to a telephone on the dressing table. ‘Pick up the receiver, there is no number to dial, and you will get through