Page 53 of The Imaginary Friend's Obsession

And he’s been growing very strong lately. I’ve been trying to find a way out, for both me and for Dorian, but our attempts to get him to cross the property line have proved futile, and I can’t leave him behind.

When Dorian removes his hands from my ears, the house is silent. Weirdly silent. My parents are no longer screaming in the dining room. The record player is no longer playinghissong, but skipping, over and over again, the song deep and distorted.

“Run- Run- Run- Run-”

“What—” I start to ask, but Dorian places a finger to my lips. His eyes are wide behind the mask, shifting toward the doorway to my room.

The stairs creak. Then there’s another sound—a dragging, scraping sound of something being pulled across the floorboards. As it gets closer, I hear, too, the sound of footsteps. The heavy thuds of my father’s shoes.

Step, scrape.

Step, scrape.

Step.

Right outside my bedroom door. I hold my breath, my hands fisted in Dorian’s shirt. He is silent, tense beside me.

“Daisy,” my father says. It’s his stern voice, the one that means I’m in trouble.

Step, scrape.

He’s inside my bedroom.

“Daisy, come out now,” my father says. “Stop acting like a child.”

I inch that way out of instinct; punishment is always worse if I disobey. But Dorian grabs me and holds me close, keeping me under the bed. His body trembles against my back. He presses a gloved finger to my lips.

Step.My father’s shoes come into view from my vantage point under the bed. Polished and glossy black.

Scraaape.

He drags an axe across the floor behind him. Its blade is rusty—and dripping with fresh blood.

The song upstairs cuts off abruptly, leaving behind a terrible silence.

Dorian’s hand stifles my gasp. But then he slowly releases me. I reach for him as he pulls away, but he shakes his head and disappears from view.

I stay there, trembling, heart pounding in my ears.

“Little rabbit…” my father whispers, but it doesn’t sound like his voice at all. It’s too deep, too old, too inhuman.

I jump at a suddenthumpfrom behind my closed closet door. But as the thing inside my father moves that way, I realize it must be Dorian causing a distraction for me. I crawl to the edge of the bed and wait one second, two, until I hear the creak of the closet door opening and the sound of my father shuffling around in search of me. Then I roll out from under the bed, lurch to my feet, and race out the door.

My bare feet pound against the floorboards as I head to the stairs.

I lurch to a stop at the top of the staircase, hand flying to my mouth. My mother is facedown at the bottom of the steps, hair spread around her, one hand outstretched. Her back is a mess of gore and gristle where the axe came down. She must have been crawling away—to me, or the front door, I’ll never know.

I swallow my scream as I hear footsteps thumping out of my bedroom behind me. I stumble down the stairs and force myself to step over my mother’s body. Tears blur my vision as I run for the front door. I grab the handle, pull it open—but as I step forward, a hand grabs me by the hair and yanks me back. My feet slip in my mother’s blood, and the thing inside of my father slams the door shut and locks it with his free hand.

“Going somewhere?” he whispers, and I look up into a pair of eyes that burn red as he reaches to pick up the axe again.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Iscrabble at the hand holding my hair, but my struggles are in vain. My powers don’t answer when I call, either; I’m too scared. They have always come to me in moments of anger or concentration, and I can find neither when I am drowning in the sound of my own heartbeat.

Suddenly, Dorian is there. He appears, visible and solid, pushing between us. He has always been the bigger one, the faster one, the braver of the two of us. I hit the floor and scramble backward, gasping for breath.

The thing possessing my father tilts his head, looking at Dorian.

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