Page 40 of Did It Have To Be Gnomes?!
That made me smile, and since I hadn’t let go of his wrist yet, I slid my hand down to his and gave it a squeeze. “They don’t. You’ll be forgiven the second you apologize.”
“Then I should go now.”
I shook my head. “They don’t like getting upset in front of people, so just wait a minute, okay?”
“Yeah… yeah, okay.”
I shot him a grin and squeezed his hand again before reluctantly letting go. “Do you want to check the next room?”
“Uh, yeah. You can go down one, and I’ll go across the hall.”
Had this man lost his mind? Like hell was he going off by himself. “I meant we should check the next one together. It’s not safe for you to go off by yourself.”
For a moment, I thought he was going to be stubborn, but then he sighed and nodded. “You’re right. Yeah, okay, let’s go to the next one.”
With great reluctance, I walked down to the next door, checked that Miles was right beside me, and opened it. After seeing how active the last room was, I was surprised to find this one rather quiet.
Were there really not a lot of gnomes in this room, or were they hiding from us?
For some reason, I sort of felt like the quiet was… fake or something. Ominous. But since I didn’t have a real reason tostop us from entering, I walked in with Miles only a step behind me.
“Is it just me, or is it even creepier in here than it was in the hallway?” Miles asked quietly.
I shot him a grin. “I was just thinking the same thing.”
He snorted. “It’s weird. How are they so active in the next room over, but there’s nothing here?”
“No idea.” I headed toward the trap in the corner. “You wanna grab that trap”—I pointed to one of the other corners—“and I’ll grab this one?”
“Sure.”
He headed to the other corner, so I knelt in front of my trap. I set a new, empty one on the ground so I could switch them out, then picked up the old trap. My brow furrowed because it felt hella light, and it shouldn’t. With how many of the damn little critters there were in this house, it should be full and heavy.
So I peeked inside and blinked, then looked again to be sure.
“Uh, Miles?”
“Yeah?”
“There’s not even one gnome in this trap.”
He sighed. “Yeah, there isn’t any in this one either.”
I turned to look at him. “What the hell? How is that possible?”
He shook his head, looking as confused as I felt. “I… I have no idea. Nothing about this damn mansion makes any sense. These should be filled. There’s no way they just skipped over this room. I mean, there are signs of them everywhere.” He gestured at the gnome droppings and scraps of fabric everywhere—a sign that they’d been foraging for things to make clothes out of.
I put the trap back, grabbed the unused one, and stood with a sigh. “Agreed. This makes no sense whatsoever. I think we—”
Crreeeeakkkk.
Slam!
Miles and I both jerked toward the door that seemingly slammed shut by itself, then we turned to each other with wide eyes.
“What the fuck?” he whispered before his eyes widened impossibly further as he lifted his finger, pointing at something behind me.
I twisted around, my heart pounding against my ribcage, and a small yell fell from my lips.
