Page 24 of The Deer and the Dragon
Shit.
I’d fucked up.
Climbing was easy compared to pulling myself up. I had no muscle mass in my chest or arms. I groaned as I hookedmy elbow around a bar and swung my knee up onto the barest sliver of ledge. I would have taken my sweet time grumbling, complaining, and bitching, if a neighbor’s light hadn’t flown on. The adrenaline gave me the boost I needed. I scurried over the railing and flattened myself on the porch until the light went off, the neighbor’s curiosity presumably satiated when they saw nothing.
And now, the moment of truth. I wrapped my fingers around the handle to the sliding glass door. Much to my relief, the second-floor balcony was unlocked.
The moment I crossed the threshold into Richard’s house, I was hit with an inexplicable sensation. It was as thick as stepping into a cloud of pea soup. I blinked against it as if I’d submerged myself through a physical wall.
But my eyes adjusted to see…nothing.
I couldn’t explain the heaviness in my chest. My muscles tensed. My body went into primal survival as all my senses urged me to flee. But the house was quiet. The room was vacant. Nothing was wrong.
Stop it,I chastised myself.Of course, you’re afraid of the man’s house. He tried to kill you. But he’s dead. He can’t hurt you. Now grow a pair and calm the hell down.
But I couldn’t calm down. My hands shook as I tiptoed through the home.
There was an eerie sterility to his house, even in the shadows. Everything was reminiscent of a showroom, as if no one had ever lived here. If it hadn’t been for the evidence tags in yellow that intermittently dotted the residence, there would have been no reason for me to believe that a human had ever stepped foot in this house. The furniture was too perfect. The floors were too clean. The pictures on the wall were too perfectly spaced. Everything was in monochromatic shades of black, white, and gray. If I hadn’t known he was a psychopath before entering his home, this would have confirmed it. I paused at a single picture to stare at the stock photo of a happy family of models smiling back at me.
Oh, yeah. This guy was definitely nuts.
My guts twisted, muscles tensing as my heart raced uncomfortably. It continued to pick up speed as if the erratic organ knew something I didn’t. I should be relaxing now that I’d confirmed beyond a shadow of a doubt that the space was vacant. I was being stupid. I was being irrational. I should be brave.
But bravery was rarely in the cards for me. Stupidity, however…
I debated turning on the lights, but wisdom won out. I was sure someone would call the cops if a curious neighbor spied evidence of someone snooping through an active crime scene. Instead, I turned on the flashlight on my phone and began to pick my way through the house’s blue-black shadows, every forward step filling me with thicker dread. I followed the feeling like a thick mist as I wandered down the stairs and through the late surgeon’s home. I paused at a closed door. I couldn’t explain why, but a sinking gravity told me this was the entry to his basement.
The man is dead,I repeated to myself.Don’t be afraid of a dead man’s basement and squiggles on the wall, you coward.
The antagonistic pit in my stomach urged me once more to run. It told me to get out of the house. It begged me to grab for the front door, to tear into the yard, to sprint down the street until I could flag down a car.
If the fear was growing closer, then so were the answers.
I opened the door and peered into a solid black rectangle.
I swallowed and checked for a light switch. Yes, if I shut the door behind me, I could flick on the lights so the neighbors wouldn’t see. I lifted my phone to the wall, heart thundering so hard that it caused my hand to shake. I forgot to breathe as I took a single step into the basement.
He’s dead,I reminded myself.There’s no one here. He’s dead.
I eased the door closed as the light switch flickered with an audible buzz. The fluorescent light blinked once, then twice as it flooded the space below me. A large cementfloor with a single drain in the middle was the only thing I could see.
I took one step down.
Run! Run, run, run!whined the voice within me.
I shoved the voice down with two invisible hands, then took another step.
A sturdy workbench dotted with yellow evidence markers populated my view as I got lower and lower. The thrumming in my ears was so loud that I wasn’t sure if I could hear someone even if they were in the room screaming my name. My head spun, stars dancing in the center of my vision before I realized I’d been holding my breath. I took a steady breath in as I finished the descent and made my way to the center of the room.
What did I plan to do here? Meditate?
It had taken me weeks to comfortably settle in, relax, clear my mind, and see through the veil, as Xuân had called it, even in the comfort of my own home.
This room was wrong. The walls were flat and glistened with the strange high-gloss enamel of waterproofing. Deep below the antiseptic scents of bleach and paint ran an undercurrent of iron and rust. It was too bright for such a small space. And with each new observation, the balloon of dread swelled until it reached carrying capacity.
A sensation like ten thousand centipedes crawled from the floor up my spine and urged me up the stairs. I gave myself over wholly to the fear, bathing in the tingling dread as I conceded to its pleas. I’d had enough. I turned on my heel and sprinted to the top step, hand flying for the handle. I turned it and met instant resistance.
My eyes flared wider than they’d ever been before as I sucked in a breath. I looked down at the keyhole where a smooth surface should have been.
