Page 114 of A Step You Shouldn't Take

Silently, he extended one arm in front of him, pointing.

“Over there,” I told Reed. “Towards Wyatt.”

Rania was already moving in that direction, followed by Will. Who was he? How did they meet? I had so many questions, but they’d have to wait until we found the other girls.

A shout came from Wyatt, and Will began running with Rania at his side. Reed followed, carrying me as if I weighed nothing, and I clung to his neck and buried my head against his shoulder as the branches whipped past.

Out of the murk, a building began to take shape. From the outside, the barn was a ramshackle ruin, sagging at one end where decades of the elements had taken their toll. But inside, new timbers propped up the roof, and a line of footprints on the dusty floor showed us where we needed to go. Wyatt was already pulling the trapdoor open, and Will flicked on a flashlight as they ran down a set of wooden stairs with Rania.

“Do you want to go down there too?” Reed asked.

Not in a million years, but at the same time, I had to. “Yes.”

Except when we got to the bottom, our way was blocked by a solid wooden door and the combination lock that had thwarted Fern. Wyatt gave it a kick, and it barely even rattled. Peter may have had a screw loose, but I had to hand it to him—he was reasonable at DIY, the shower excepted.

“We can’t shoot the lock,” Wyatt said. “Not with people on the other side.”

“What about knocking out the hinge pins?” Will suggested, shining the flashlight around the edges of the door. “Anyone have a multitool?”

“Hang on,” Rania said, hurrying past us, back up the stairs. “I’ve got an idea.”

A minute later, she came back with an axe. “I saw it as we came in.”

Wyatt grabbed it off her and attacked the door like a man possessed. Woodchips flew everywhere, and Rania covered my eyes with her hand.

“Can you stand for a second?” Reed asked me.

“Okay.”

I hung onto Rania as the three men charged at the door once, twice, three times. There was a splintering crash, and it flew open, smashing off the wall as light spilled out of the dungeon. Startled faces looked out at us, and Wyatt was the first inside.

“Emma? Where’s Emma?”

“She’s here,” Fern called out. “I’m a doctor. Let me out, and I can help her.”

The monster had locked Emma back into her cage, and while all the other girls had their faces pressed against the bars, Emma didn’t stir. Bruises blossomed on her pale flesh, and the mattress was stained red. Peter had done a real number on her in the short time before he came after me.

Wyatt’s hands trembled as he unlocked her door, and Reed was so tense I feared one touch would shatter him.

“Go to her,” I whispered. “I’ll be fine.”

He hesitated, but then Rania stepped in. “I’ll take care of her.”

“She stepped on poison oak. See if you can find some water to wash the oil off her legs.”

“There’s a shower room,” I told them. “To the right.”

And inside, it looked like a slaughterhouse. Blood splattered the walls, dripping down into the mess of toiletries that littered the floor. It seemed as though Emma had thrown everything she could get her hands on at Peter. And he’d thrown the gas canister at her, judging by the crimson stain on one edge.

“So that’s how you escaped?” Rania asked, nodding at the gaping hole in the shower wall.

“There’s a spirit in the other room. She told me about it. You know, until now, I’ve mostly avoided talking to them, but this last month…”

“I used to hate it too, but some of them aren’t so bad.” She smiled for a second. “I met Margaret in your living room. Hold on a second, I saw a stool outside.”

Rania came back a moment later and helped me to sit in the shower. The water ran pink from all the cuts on my feet as she picked out thorns with her fingernails.

“I don’t understand how you got here. You’re from England? Or somewhere else? I can’t place your accent.”

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