Wicked Little Deeds, page 4
I hold my breath, waiting for her to turn and catch sight of me. But she doesn’t. Instead, she pockets her phone and ducks to avoid the low hang of spindly branches as she leaves the orchard and heads back in the direction of the house. I wait where I am, watching as the glow from the windows lights her path to the manor, urging her to hurry the hell up so I can finish covering up my mural in the pavilion.
Freya lets herself in by the front door, her long hair swishing at her back. My fingers clench against the trunk of the tree I’m still hiding behind.
It’s not your house!
But it is now, technically. I hiss as one of my fingernails bends back painfully against the trunk. My eyes tear up, and I have to look up and blink several times before they clear. When they do, I notice something in one of the upstairs windows of the manor. Inside my old room, I see three figures. One of them is Dominic Miller, which I realize with a stomach-roil probably means that’s his room now. His dad, Madoc, is standing next to him, and he seems to be laughing at something. I suck in a breath. He has no right to be standing there, laughing.
But the figure beside him is the real kicker: it’s Ford.
What the hell is my best friend doing in there with the people who’ve stolen my life?
I want to march right in and ask him. I’m going to – screw the Millers.
But I can’t do that. If I’m caught here, the Millers will raise hell – they’ll probably think I’ve come to smash their windows or something petty like that. They might even call the cops.
At the same moment that I resolve not to act like a righteous ass, Madoc leaves the room. Dominic leans out through the open window, and points something out to Ford.
No, not something. Someone.
Me.
Shit.
I pull up the hood of my coat – a pretty pointless gesture seeing as my hair is really dark, anyway – and turn away from the manor. Then I run.
Cold air burns my lungs with each hard breath. I don’t slow down. I’m at the bridge before I look back, but somehow Dominic is already at the front door of the manor, just stepping out and peering at the shadowy treeline where I was standing a moment ago. He hasn’t tracked me to the bridge yet, but it’s only a matter of glancing in my direction.
Just then Ford bounds through the door behind him, yelling something I can’t make out, and Dominic turns to answer him.
This is my shot.
There isn’t enough time to make it back to the wall surrounding the property. Not without being clearly visible, anyway. And Dominic’s probably a much faster runner than I am. It’d be just like him to carry a pocket Taser.
I don’t feel like getting zapped tonight.
I reach the end of the bridge and duck down underneath it, letting the roar of the water swallow the sound of my ragged breathing. The scars on my hands sting with cold.
Maybe ten seconds later, I hear voices overhead – Dominic and Ford, I guess, unless Madoc has decided to join the search party.
They must be yelling for me to be able to hear them at all, but I can’t make out the words. Their voices fade as they cross the bridge and head in the direction of the boundary wall – the same way I need to go to get out of here. Typical. But then they cross over the river again and go back towards the house.
I wait another few minutes in the dark beneath the bridge like a literal troll, icy vapour misting my skin, just to be sure Dominic doesn’t come back with reinforcements. But then it occurs to me that he might be checking the manor’s security footage, or worse – calling the cops to report an intruder.
I don’t think the cameras would get a clear image of me at night and from so far away, but it’s definitely not a good idea to still be here if the cops do show up. I slide out from my hiding place and sprint back to the boundary wall. In one swift move, I climb up and over, jump down the other side and head back to my new home.
It’s only as I’m walking back along the river past Copper Bell Dam that I remember: I still haven’t covered up the goddamn mural.
CHAPTER FIVE
Uncle Ty has already left for an early faculty meeting when I set out for school in the morning. I turn the key in the ignition, half expecting Bessie to roll her eyes at me, but for once, the car seems oblivious to the cold and starts up like a kitten.
Daphne and Carla aren’t waiting at the bank of lockers, though that’s hardly a surprise. Corinne – their usual ride to school – doesn’t believe in living her life by some asshole’s schedule, so Daphne and Carla tend to storm in right before the tardy bell.
This means I have to hang around at the lockers, waiting for them. That’s not usually a problem because I’m locker-neighbours with Ford. But today I’m rightfully pissed at him.
His back is to me as I approach, and his shoulders tense the second he hears my footsteps. He turns, beaming his ridiculous full-toothed smile.
‘What the hell was that yesterday?’ I demand. ‘Ditching me for the Miller twins?’
Ford winces. He’s a good-looking guy, though not my type. The way toothpaste tastes fine, but you wouldn’t want to eat it. With his curly brown hair, pale skin that freckles the moment it sees the sun, and the tiny mole above his lip, there’s something a little too angelic about Ford. His nose ring goes some way to downplaying the effect, but not far enough.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says, voice pitched low like he’s trying to soothe his way past an angry tiger. ‘I completely lost track of time – did you know Nic Miller has the most amazing collection of –’
‘Nic? You call him Nic now?’ I actually gag.
Ford changes tack and looks balefully at me. ‘I know, I’m the worst friend ever. But I did get you a little something to make up for it.’
I bite off whatever I was about to snap at him. ‘You got me a gift? But it’s not my birthday for a couple of weeks yet.’
I can tell he knows he’s got my interest by the smug way he points to my locker.
‘It’s in there?’ Suspicious now, I input the combination and open my locker a crack. Nothing leaps – or dribbles – out, and there’s no obvious bad smell. So far so good.
I don’t see anything unusual at first, but then my eyes land on a scrap of paper. When I pick it up, four photos of Ford stare back at me.
The photos are on one of those hokey picture-booth strips. In them, Ford gazes at the camera as he unbuttons his shirt – one button lower in each frame – until the fourth shot, where he’s trying unsuccessfully to lick his own nipple.
I look up at him, biting the inside of my cheek so I won’t laugh. Ford winks at me.
‘A little something for your wank bank, milady.’
The combination of the Mary Poppins-ish accent and his absurd cockiness is too much for me. I try to maintain my glare, but it’s useless. A snort slips out, and I’m done for.
‘Those’ll be worth a fortune when I’m a famous Hollywood actor,’ he adds as my laughter dies down.
‘I still don’t forgive you for yesterday,’ I grumble, but even I can admit it’s a lie. Ford and I have danced this dance more times than I can count over the course of our friendship. There was the time he told me he was too sick to go skating for my tenth birthday, and I later found out he just couldn’t tear himself away from his new gaming console. Or the time he borrowed my bike in middle school and it somehow ended up in the river. Or last month, when he asked me to pick him up after an audition in the city, then forgot to tell me it’d been cancelled.
‘You’re right as always, my queen,’ he says. ‘That was unforgivable.’
‘And I’ll need a full report on all the gross decor choices the Millers have made.’
‘Naturally.’
I sigh. ‘Then I accept your weird and creepy peace offering.’
Every time, he goofs his way around me. And like a sucker, I let him. But that’s just what you do with friends, right? Put up with their crap?
Ford put up with plenty from me after my parents died. He kept inviting me to do stuff – go to parties or to watch a movie, even when I kept saying no. He’d skip whatever it was to come hang with me instead, the two of us sitting side by side in my room, playing Rocket League in silence. And he always picked up the phone when I needed to talk, even if it was three a.m. on a school night.
He’ll never change, for better or worse. I just have to deal with that, and accept his weird apology gifts.
I go to put it in my bag, but Ford snatches it from me and sticks it to the inside of my locker with the gum from his mouth.
‘That’s disgusting.’
He nods. ‘Like your face.’
I punch him in the arm, nowhere near hard enough to hurt. Still, I expect Ford to make a big show of rubbing it like he normally would. Instead he reaches up and runs his thumb down my cheek. I lean away.
‘Uh …’
‘Mascara goop,’ he explains. ‘Anyway, what were you doing in the orchard last night?’
Damn. ‘You knew it was me?’
‘Of course I knew it was you. Who else would be sneaking around out there without a flashlight?’
‘Does Dominic know, too?’
‘No,’ Ford says with a look of extreme pride. ‘I ran interference for you, told him it must’ve been the manor’s resident spook he saw. You’re welcome, by the way.’
‘Thanks.’ I offer Ford a sincerely grateful smile. Having the Millers on my back for ‘trespassing’ is the very last thing I need.
‘You haven’t answered my question, little snake. Why were you there?’
‘Spying,’ I tell him. ‘I was insanely jealous about you hanging out with the Miller twins.’
There’s a grain of truth to this, but I still load it with enough sarcasm to send Ford’s eyes rolling. I don’t want to tell Ford why I was really there, though. He doesn’t know about the mural I painted in the pavilion – firstly, because I was embarrassed about it essentially being homework from my therapist, Dr Ehrenfeld. Secondly, because the whole thing was just too personal. I know I can talk to Ford if something’s bugging me, but at the same time … I don’t always want to. I don’t want to be the friend who always leans on other people. The one who always brings their problems to the table, and nothing else.
‘I just …’ I scrabble around for a plausible excuse for being there last night. But Ford can tell when I’m bullshitting.
‘Move it, serfs!’
I look up and see Carla baring her teeth at some unfortunate sophomores as she and Daphne march towards me. Carla has her hair twisted into a dozen little cones today, and her shadow stretches out ahead of her, hard and spiky as a weaselbat.
‘That’s my cue to …’ Ford turns to face his open locker, totally missing my Very Not Pleased face. I hate the way he avoids Carla and Daphne.
‘Did you study for the test?’ Carla asks, not bothering with hello.
‘Of course,’ I say, but we both know I haven’t studied nearly enough. Math just doesn’t make sense to me. Also it’s boring. Except to Carla, apparently, who likes it enough to join the mathletes.
‘We’re only a few months away from graduation,’ she reminds me.
‘I’m aware of that.’
‘And are you actually planning on graduating?’
‘Are you actually planning on kissing my ass?’ I counter. But she does kind of have a point. The school guidance counsellor, Mr Hamish, has been making distressing comments about the prospect of summer school or repeating the year. Apparently, there’s a one-year time limit on grieving for your dead parents, and losing your lifelong home and family business doesn’t even count as far as cutting me some academic slack. But I just can’t seem to focus on my studies beyond art class.
‘Ava.’ Ford tugs on my arm. ‘Have you heard this?’
It’s only when I turn fully that I notice several other students in the hallway are gathered around Mateo Medel, one of the Miller twins’ little shit-crew.
Mateo is captain of the football team. He’s Latino, with naturally deep-copper skin, a smile you can see around corners, and zero coordination when he’s off the football field. (His truck has more dings in it than Bessie, and she’s lived a long and eventful life.)
I used to think he was OK – for a jock, at least – but he morphed into a Miller-twins-wannabe the moment he started hanging out with them last year. Now he seems to be announcing something to his gathered fans, making big arm gestures to go with it.
Casper, final member of the Miller twins’ ensemble, stands quietly next to Mateo as always. They’re a couple, I think, but I don’t know if that’s fact or just hallway speculation. I’ve never really spoken to Casper, so I only know him as a set piece in their ghosthunter videos who supposedly ‘senses things’ in whatever location they’re filming. He’s thin and grungily pretty, with messy blond hair and hazel eyes – picture a bleached-blond Timothée Chalamet – and I’d always thought he was shy before he became one of the Haunted Heartland crew.
‘… she was, like, face down at first, just floating there in the shallow water, but then he flipped her over and he knew right away she was dead …’
‘What’s he talking about?’ I whisper to Ford. He answers without tearing his eyes away from Mateo.
‘His dad found a girl’s body at the bottom of the waterfall when he was walking his dog this morning.’
‘A body? Who?’
At the front of the crowd, Mateo continues spinning the story for his captive audience. ‘Her hair was all tangled around her face, so he had to kinda peel it away, and that’s when he really freaked out because the girl had no eyes! Like, they were completely gone. Just two empty eye sockets staring up at him.’
I shudder, imagining a cold breath brushing my nape. There’s no way that’s true about the girl’s eyes. Mateo must be making it up. Nevertheless, a whisper of Dead-Eyed Sadie runs through the crowd.
Dead-Eyed Sadie is the name people in Burden Falls have given to the ghost that supposedly haunts Thorn Manor – especially the waterfall. She’s a teenage girl who wanders the grounds, looking for her missing eyes. Rumour says she was murdered near the waterfall, her eyes gouged out in some grotesque ritual that left her spirit tied to the manor. I feel a kind of proprietary protectiveness towards her, same as I do towards the manor itself. But she isn’t real, no matter what people around here believe.
No matter what Mom believed.
‘Mateo sent me a pic his dad took at the scene,’ Ford says. ‘Some white girl with long blonde hair. I don’t recognize her. Wanna see?’
‘Ew! Hard no, Ford. Why is Mateo sending you pics, anyway?’ They aren’t friends, as far as I know. Ford shrugs, like it’s totally normal.
‘I bet it was the impact of being washed over the waterfall that made the corpse’s eyes pop out – if that’s even true,’ Carla cuts in next to me, logical as ever. ‘Mateo’s probably just making it up to win Sadie points.’
‘Still …’ Daphne murmurs, and our eyes lock. I shake my head.
‘Sadie’s just a story.’ I say.
‘Or it could have been caused by an animal,’ Carla continues as though we haven’t spoken. ‘Remember what happened to Mr Hayes’s lambs?’
I do remember, and it was gross. It was lambing season, and Mr Hayes – the nearest sheep farmer – had already had a dozen or so new lambs. But one morning, he went down to check on the flock and found that all the lambs had had their eyes pecked out. Crows had attacked every single one of them. The old farmer was so shocked to find them that way he had a heart attack and keeled over, and died right there in the middle of his field.
‘Everyone in town started whispering Sadie’s name then, too,’ Carla ends pointedly.
‘I know,’ I say, even though there’s a part of me that isn’t so sure this situation is the same. It’s the part that remembers Mom spinning a story about some Thorn ancestor who saw Sadie in the moments before they died, and Dad shaking his head at the newspaper he was not-reading. Then Mom would look from him to me and say, ‘We’ll see.’ Just that. And I don’t know if the we meant her and Dad, or her and me, or both.
‘Don’t you think it’s a huge coincidence that a body just washed up near Thorn Manor with no eyes? I mean, it’s right next to where Sadie’s supposed to … well, not live, but … hang out,’ Daphne says.
‘Come on.’ I can see Carla’s patience is at zero bars. ‘When you die, your eyes are always the first things to go – either eaten by pests, or they rot away. Or, in this case, get knocked out of your skull by a sixty-foot drop into a rocky pool of water.’
‘Gross,’ Daphne says, and she’s not wrong. My stomach’s churning quite unpleasantly by this point.
‘And,’ Carla adds, ‘if Dead-Eyed Sadie was really out there murdering people and stealing their eyes, why didn’t she come after you in all those years you lived at the manor? You were right there and, let’s face it, you’re not the fastest runner.’
‘Good point, Car. I’d’ve been easy pickings for a killer ghost,’ I deadpan. But I still jump when a sophomore brushes up against me as they edge past to get nearer to Mateo, who’s still taking questions at the centre of the crowd.
‘Who do you think the girl is, though? Or was?’ Daphne asks.
I’m about to tell her what Ford said about not recognizing her when Carla says, ‘Claire Palmer, of course.’
It takes me a moment to place the name. But then I remember her photograph on the local news – a smiling girl with long blonde hair and braces on her teeth.
‘The one who went missing last week in Kinnerton?’
Claire Palmer had been all over the news for a minute there, but then a local senator got caught having an affair and suddenly nobody was talking about her anymore.
‘She didn’t just go missing.’ Carla’s tone is perfectly matter-of-fact. ‘Claire Palmer went to walk her dog along the river and never came home. Must’ve fallen in and been swept downstream. I think there was even a witness who saw her trying to get her dog’s ball from the water.’
‘But that was over a week ago,’ I say. ‘Surely she’d have washed up before now?’
