A shout.
Ellie flinched, but Maeve lowered the paperweight.
“He’s not here,” she said. A little laugh escaped, a shudder of nerves.
“Brilliant,” said Oliver. “The phone?”
“Right.” Maeve reached for it with the same hand that held the paperweight, winced, and set the weight aside.
Ellie held her breath. Caskie couldn’t have forgotten about the landline, could he? As Maeve lifted the receiver, hope wedged its way into her like a sliver of glass. If the landline worked, it wouldn’t matter that the Wi-Fi and cellular signals had been blocked.
Maeve set the phone down and frowned, an expression reminiscent of Ellie’s mother-in-law’s French bulldog.
“No dial tone,” she said.
“Did anyone notice any other phones in the house?” Lorna asked.
“Probably wouldn’t matter,” said Oliver. “More likely than not he cut the main line.”
“How far does the jammer block the signal?” Lorna asked. “Didn’t the box say a hundred meters? We can walk that far, get a signal.”
“If there’s a signal to be had,” Oliver said. “The moment I drove off that ferry, I lost service. I think there’s one cell tower that serves this entire bloody island, and in this weather?”
As if on cue, a gust of wind blew against the house. The lights flickered again.
Maeve threw up her hands. “So we can’t phone the police or anything. And our cars are buggered so we can’t go anywhere.”
“Who says we can’t go anywhere?” A rain jacket hung on a coatrack by the door. Oliver grabbed it and slipped it on. “We’ve got legs, don’t we? Lorna was right about the walking. Even if we can’t catch a signal, maybe we can catch a boat.”
“You want to walk to the quay?” Lorna asked. “That’s miles away. We’ll never make it there before the last ferry.”
“We’ll make it there in time for some ferry. If not today then tomorrow.”
“You’d stand out there all night? In this?”
Rain lashed the windows.
“It’s better than staying here with a fucking psychopath! You think Caskie hasn’t planned this all out? He’s probably waiting, just waiting, to do us like he did Hollis.”
“You saw the note,” Ellie said. “We’re not supposed to leave. If we leave, he’ll kill us.”
“And maybe no matter what we do, he’ll kill us anyway because that’s been his plan all along.”
“But I still don’t understand,” Maeve said. “Mr. Caskie is half our age. What could he possibly have to do with Caldwell Street? With us? With any of it?”
“I don’t plan on sticking around to find out,” Oliver said. No one moved. “Come on. A stormy night? A creepy house with a psycho killer? I’ve seen this film, and I’m not keen to stick around for the ending.”
The rain marked the time as the fear they thought they’d left upstairs wove its way down to them. Oliver looked at each of them, and Ellie knew that no matter how much he wanted to leave, he wouldn’t go alone. He needed a group, a following. For all his talk, someone else needed to give him the final push, like they had with Callum all those years ago.
“Caskie has what he needs to blackmail us,” Ellie said. “If we leave, maybe he can’t kill us, but he’ll hurt us in other ways.”
“So that’s it then?” Oliver asked. “You want to give in? Ruin the rest of your life?”
“No. I don’t know.” She closed her eyes and shook her head.
“Because I didn’t do anything wrong that night. I have nothing to confess.”
Ellie cleared her throat. “You hit him first.”
Oliver’s eyes raged like the storm outside. He pointed at Ellie.
“Fuck you.”
He pointed at Lorna. “And you.”
He pointed at Maeve. “And you. What Caskie’s got on me, it’s not as bad as a murder charge. Maybe you can’t say the same, but I’m willing to take my chances.”
He threw up the hood of the raincoat, his steps like thunder across the floor. He turned the doorknob and yanked.
And yanked.
And yanked.
“Open up,” Oliver whispered fiercely. “Open. Up.”
He kicked the door. “Open up!”
It held firm.
“Caskie, you fucker!”
He beat on it—Ellie remembering the damage his fists could do—then stormed into the dining room, where they heard him smashing chairs and clawing at windows. He returned to reception, knuckles bloodied, and then he was gone, across to the study.
“We have to get away from him,” Lorna whispered. “You know happens when he—”
“Piece of shit!”
The sound of splintered wood exploded from the study.
Maeve ducked, though there was nothing to avoid.
“Where are we supposed to go?” Maeve asked. “We’re locked in a house with a bloody tornado.”
“Fuck you! Open up!”
“Lorna’s right,” Ellie said. “Even if we can’t get out, we need to find a safe place to hide until he calms down.”
“God fucker piece of—”
Another crash.
“I’m not going back upstairs,” Maeve said.
“The back of the house. This way.” Ellie pointed to the passage that led beneath the main staircase. “Maybe there’s a place back here we can use.”
Oliver’s anger was tearing apart the group that had protected Ellie. Now Caskie seemed the lesser of the two evils. Maybe she could find a way to say what he wanted her to say. Or at least give him enough of the others so she wouldn’t have to give herself. After all, she must’ve been special, or else the others would know as much as she did, wouldn’t they?
“I’ll kill you, you fucking bastard!”
While Lorna and Maeve hurried down the back passage, Ellie lingered by the staircase. Caskie was probably somewhere upstairs. She could find him before the others. Make a deal. Return to David and the children before anyone realized she was missing. Return while Caskie did to them whatever needed to be done. She placed one foot on the staircase.
Oliver
“I’ll kill you, you fucking bastard!”
Oliver threw one last barstool, then staggered back against the wall. His chest burned and a hoarse cough wracked his chest. He spat a glob of mucus into a potted plant and rested his hands on his knees, examining his bloodied knuckles as he tried to regain his breath. His anger—at Hollis, at Caskie, at Wolfheather House—continued to rage inside his head, but his body could no longer keep up. The anger turned inward, at his own stupidity for coming here in the first place. But before self-pity could overtake him, the girls screamed.
Oliver ran into the foyer, face red and flushed, wondering which one would be dead, but all three of them were alive, standing and staring at something on the floor. Ellie noticed him first and stepped aside.
It didn’t register at first, what it was. When he tried to speak, he was out of breath and had to take a big gulp of air before he could ask.
“Who the fuck is that?”
Ellie, paler than usual; Lorna, shaking hands betraying her steely glare; Maeve, chewing on the cuff of her jumper—none answered. And neither did the body on the floor.