Page 77 of Happily Never After

“Where do we start? Bedrooms?” Claire leaned forward and glanced into the dining room as though she was rooted to the spot. Was there anything worse than the prospect of digging through a bunch of frat boy’s bedrooms? Hopefully the quart of hand sanitizer she had packed would be enough.

Mindy panned her camera around the room. “Sawyer says don’t forget the floorboards.”

“Great. I’m sure we won’t find any weird sex things at all.”

A brief survey of the first floor revealed little. Paintings hung in the hallway. A couple of bags of rice were left in the pantry. There were shadows on the wall where what looked like plaques had once hung. No doubt they had had ESA brothers’ names on them and were removed in case anyone came snooping.

“Welp, that explains all the paintings,” Mindy said. She held up her phone. “They’re Gauguin prints. He was a misogynist who ‘married’ multiple underage girls.”

Claire pursed her lips. “Yeah, that seems right.” She slapped the nearest painting off the wall. Glass crunched underfoot as she moved past.

“What the hell was that?” Luke’s head popped out of a room.

“Just shattering the patriarchy. What’s this?”

Her shoes clacked over the living room floorboards as she approached a set of French doors. She gripped the handles and turned. Locked. Luke arrived next to her and wrenched at the doors. They didn’t budge.

He grunted. “Let’s do the bedrooms first and circle back.”

The wooden stairs creaked as they made their way to the second floor. Numbness tingled up and down Claire’s arms. Everything about this house was unnerving. She had been in a fair number of frat houses during her tenure at Venor, and none of them had looked like this. The almost military-like cleanliness was creepy. Headlights flashed past the windows, and her breath caught in her chest. The last thing she needed was to be caughtbreaking and entering by the group of people trying to murder her. Or worse, the cops. She paused on the last step, but the lights moved on.

More ghosts of plaques long since removed lined the walls. Could they have forgotten one somewhere? Maybe somewhere in this house was the name of an ESA brother. It would be a start.

“I’ll take this one. You take that one.” Bossy Luke was back. He was probably still mad about the attempted kidnapping incident from earlier.

Claire and Mindy made a face at each other and disappeared into the bedroom Luke had indicated. A nondescript room appeared in the beams from their phone flashlights. A bare mattress sat on a wooden frame. Thick maroon curtains hung from the windows. Mindy immediately began opening dresser drawers. Claire headed for the desk. There was nothing—no discarded paper, no writing utensils. It was like no one had ever lived there.

After ten minutes of jamming her metal nail file into floorboards, Claire jumped when Luke stepped into the room.

“Nothing?”

He shook his head.

“Nothing here either.” Mindy said. She stood and dusted her gloved hands off. “I did find a dried out Cheeto under the desk, but I don’t think that helps.”

Claire reached out a hand, and Luke pulled her to her feet. They searched the remaining bedrooms together, but there was nothing. Not even a discarded sock. All evidence of the ESA brothers had been erased. How many of them had lived here, plotting evil things? Where were they now?

“I guess the mysterious locked room is our last shot. Come on.” Claire led the way down the stairs to the locked French doors. Was this all going to be a bust? There were otherabandoned ESA chapters in town, but they didn’t have time to search them all.

Luke stood next to her and pulled his lock picking kit out. Thirty seconds later, the doors popped open. He shined his flashlight into the room.

“Oh, hell.” His voice echoed off the walls. Floor-to-ceiling velvet drapes lined the room. A two-foot-tall golden statue with a massive erection stood on a pedestal in the very center.

“We meet again, Priapus,” Claire growled. Barney had very thoughtfully carved Priapus’s symbol into her neck when he had abducted her. It had largely faded, but the memory would always sting.

“Ha!” Claire roundhouse kicked the statue. It fell onto the carpet with a thump. A golden penis rolled out from underneath it.

“Shit.” She clutched at her ankle. It burned like the statue had been made out of lava. Not her finest moment.

“Sawyer says ‘good form.’ Are you okay?” Mindy stared at her over the edge of her phone.

“I’m fine.” Tension was welling in her belly again. She took a pained breath and swiveled. A bulletin board was tacked to one wall. Holes riddled the surface, but no scrap of evidence had been left behind.

What did they use this creepy-ass room for? And why had they stripped the house of everything but left this stupid statue behind? She was drawn to it like a magnet. She dropped to her knees and picked it up. It was heavier than it looked. There was a hole where the penis had popped off. A glint of white caught her eye. Was there something inside?

Her heart raced. She shook the statue. A shuffling sound came from inside.

“Guys. I think I found something.”

---