“I don’t know what to say.”
“Say that you will help me. Have Miss Barnes agree to a dinner meeting with me so that I might tell her more about the position.”
“She might feel more comfortable if I was to be there, too,” April said.
Gallagher sighed heavily. “If that is what it takes to get this done and put everyone at ease, then you are more than welcome to come along.”
“I will see what I can do,” April said, already imagining life at a proper desk outside of a cubicle.”
“Wonderful,” Gallagher said, standing and extending his hand across the table.
Reaching out, April shook his hand, surprised at how soft his skin was. She’d listened to Kayleigh describe him as some reptilian creep for so long that she expected to feel scales or a slimy exterior.
“Please report back to me as soon as possible and have a wonderful day,” Gallagher said, signaling that the meeting was over.
Back at her desk, April spun in her chair, giddy at the prospect of a promotion. She toyed with the idea of calling Kayleigh to let her know what had just happened, but she decided to wait and tell her in person.
RATHER THAN HEADING straight back to the house, Kayleigh pulled into a strip mall close to home and parked in front of the Starbucks. She ordered an iced latte and a slice of iced lemon pound cake and sat at a table in the corner. With the workday already underway for most, the morning rush had passed, leaving the shop relatively quiet, just the way she liked it.
Popping in her earphones to drown out the sound of the smooth jazz playing overhead, Kayleigh opened her Instagram account and began responding to the messages and comments that she had received over the weekend. The post that April has put up about the fake history of their home was getting a lot of attention, with people begging to see evidence of the ghostly happenings. She let them know that cameras were ready to be installed and that she would post some stuff as soon as possible.
Thumbs flying across the screen, Kayleigh updated all her pages in less than an hour. Not quite ready to go home, she ordered another drink and opened Google. Since first seeing the video feed of the imprisoned girl, the name of the demon had stuck in her head. Kayleigh knew a lot about the occult, but in all the stuff she had read, Falyn was a name that she had never come across before. Typing the name into the search bar, she hit enter and was totally unsurprised to see no connection between the name Falyn and the supernatural. It was a rather uncommon name of Irish descent, with most interpretations saying that it meant leader.
Kayleigh hadn’t expected to find anything, but she was still a little disappointed at coming up empty. She thought about taking a peek at the feed but feared that entering the URL on the phone would lead to it becoming infected, just as all their laptops had been. There was nothing to do but go home and start trying to come up with ideas for their haunted videos. The notion of going back to an empty house didn’t seem appealing, but she also knew that her body would not react well to sitting and drinking coffee all day long.
Scooping up her trash, Kayleigh dumped it in the garbage and headed back out to her car. She settled in behind the wheel and opened the browser on her phone, searching for showtimes for Martians Alive. A lot of her followers had demanded to know when she was going to see it and post a review. She had hoped that they might forget about it, but no such luck. The first showing was a matinee that she could squeeze in before picking up her roomies. Given that she had free money on her theater rewards card, the decision to see it was an easy one.
It was a short drive home, but Kayleigh felt her eyes begin to droop, a minor miracle given the amount of coffee she had already ingested over the past couple of hours. Suddenly, a nap seemed like the best idea in the world, but all thought of sleep quickly evaporated when she pulled into the parking spot in front of their townhouse.
The manila envelope on the front door was easy to see, but the thing keeping it in place was not. Kayleigh could tell that it was metallic, judging by the glare it emitted as the sun shone against it. She moved side to side in her seat, trying to get a better angle, but it remained impossible to identify.
Unbuckling her seatbelt and killing the engine, Kayleigh looked down the street to where the garbage was situated. She was relieved to see that the coast was clear, but she still felt the knot in her stomach tighten. “Just a game, Kayleigh, just a game,” she muttered to herself as she stepped out of the car, muscles tensed, waiting for someone to jump on her.
As she mounted the front steps, and her shadow spilled across the front door, the object came into view. The envelope was pinned to the door using a knife with an ornate metal handle. On closer inspection, she discovered the faces of tortured souls etched into the handle. Much to Kayleigh’s relief, the serrated blade was clean. After the incident with the balloon, she half expected there to be some fake dried blood on there.
Working the handle back and forth, she pulled out the knife, holding the envelope so that it wouldn’t fall. As she did so, the front door slid open, Kayleigh jumped back, almost slipping off the top step. She thought back to them leaving the house that morning and tried to remember locking the door, but she couldn’t do it. Not willing to take a chance, she pulled the door closed and locked it, giving it a nudge to make sure that it was closed correctly. Happy that it was indeed locked, she went back to the car, dumping the knife and the envelope on the passenger seat, and locked the doors while she texted April to meet for lunch.
THEY SAT AT THE TABLE in the Corner Spot Café, food untouched, and stared at the knife lying in the middle of the table. The server threw them some wary glances as she refilled drinks, her gaze consistently returning to the blade.
“It’s just a prop, ma’am,” April finally said. “We are auditioning for a part at the local theater and want to make it as real as possible.
“What play?” the server asked, clutching a pitcher of iced water against her chest.
“Excuse me?”
“What play are you auditioning for?”
“Macbeth,” April blurted out.
“Hmm. I don’t go in for all that Shakespeare malarkey. You should do Phantom of the Opera. That’s more my speed, or maybe Hamilton.”
“I’ll bring it up with the director,” April said, her cheeks flushed from the litany of lies.
“You do that. In the meantime, can you take that thing off the table? You’re making the other customers nervous.”
Kayleigh snatched the knife off the table and put it in her purse, silently hoping it wouldn’t tear apart the lining. With the knife gone, they found their appetites again, wolfing down their food in short order.
“What does the clue say,” Sean said, little flecks of half-chewed burger flying from his mouth.
“I haven’t opened it yet. Could you please swallow before you talk? I’d rather not spend the entire hour dodging food shrapnel.”
With an exaggerated swallow and a satisfied sigh, Sean tapped on the envelope and said, “Open it up. Let’s have a look.”
As Kayleigh picked up the envelope, April cleared a space in the middle of the table, using her napkins to wipe away the particles of food that hadn’t made it into Sean’s stomach. Kayleigh opened the envelope, placed it on the table, and then sat the enclosed paper on top, writing side up so that they could all get a look