Page 4 of Chasing the Fall

Dots appear beside the username, then disappear. I wait a few minutes, but the user doesn’t return. “Shit.”

Pulling the headphones off, I toss them to my desk. Whoever it was got scared off. Someone who works at the club, maybe? Someone who knew the girl and suspects a link to the club?

Regardless, it reinforces my theory.

Thinking for a moment, I let my fingers hover over the keyboard. Taking a deep breath, I begin to type. This is going to stir some shit up.

But that’s what I want to do…dredge the bottom of a murky lake and bring light to the darkness. The message I add to the chat is simple.

I heard it’s Henry Thurston.

Replies initiate almost immediately, but they’re nothing more than gratuitous curiosity. I wait a second, then turn my screen off. I’ll come back later, see what that dragged up.

It’s late, and Ishould be in bed, but I’m too keyed up to sleep. In between bouts of computer work, I decorate my small apartment for Christmas, instead.

I step back and tilt my head, eying my scrawny Charlie Brown tree with a critical eye. It’s a potted pine, spindling and almost too ridiculous for the shiny glass balls I hang on each branch.

Only almost, though.

“Almost…” It needs something on that bottom right branch to balance the weight of the left side… Musing, I sift through the box of my mother’s ornaments, searching for the perfect one.

Ah. That one. The little glass hummingbird winks at me from the tissue paper it was wrapped in after its last use, and I unwrap it with careful fingers and position it. The tiny red bird was my mom’s favorite ornament, one she kept out all year round. She hung it in the kitchen window during the other seasons, saying she loved the way the sunlight flickered through the colorful blown glass.

I can’t not use it, having found it again. This is the first year since my mother’s death that I’ve felt emotionally stable enough to decorate with her things. This will be the perfect reminder of her when I’m feeling low.

I’ve just hung the ornament and stepped back to check its appearance when I hear a sound at my door. Not a knock, but a thump, followed by a slide of something against the metal.

“Brodie?”

I walk over and put my hand to the knob, waiting for Brodie’s response. Because it has to be him. Even though he and Cotton were supposed to leave earlier this evening for Ireland…there’s no one else who’d be here at eleven p.m. …not knocking.

There’s no response, and I try again. “Brodie, is that you?” He and Cotton were supposedly on their way to catch a flight for Ireland, but maybe they had to come back for some reason. For the first time, I curse the lack of a peephole. Brodie had installed a thick metal door and said it was enough…he didn’t feel like drilling a peephole through it.

The doorknob rattles beneath my hand, just enough to test the lock. I jerk my own hand back.

“Who’s there?”

“Knock, knock.” A laugh comes, low and insidious for all that it sounds perfectly normal. Just a laugh. One you might hear in response to a joke told in a bar.

“I’m calling the police.”

“Your voice is shaking, little girl.” A fist falls upon the door, heavy with intent. “You’re smart to be scared.”

“Go away!” I move away from the door and dial Jack, then inch back, leaving the line open as I get closer. “The police are on their way. And I have a gun. And cameras.”

There’s no response.

From the phone, I hear a flurry of tinny response—Jack, mobilizing. “Don’t open the door,” he barks loud enough for me to hear.

“You think I’m a fucking idiot?” I snap.

I whirl around from my position near the door as another sound comes, this time at the window. “Get the fuck away from my house! Jack, he’s at the window!”

“Stay away from the windows.”

Fear wars with the need to see who’s terrorizing me. Breath coming rapidly, I reach out with a shaking hand and snap open the shade. The lights are on, making it impossible to see out, and I flick the nearest lamp off.

Instantly, I see him. Henry Thurston, inches from the window as he stares inside. The screen is gone, popped out and lying on the ground, more than likely, although I don’t see it.

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