Page 92 of The Wicked

EJ blocked the hallway, hands on his hips. When you’d spent your whole life backing down, standing up was hard to do, even when you had Luca, Brooke, and Blue at your back. For one wild moment, I considered inviting Jack Morrow and his crew inside, but we’d left them at the far end of the driveway where they belonged.

“I just need to get some things.”

Uncle EJ nodded at the key in my hand. “From the attic?”

“I—”

Parker appeared behind him. “Let her take what she wants, Dad. It’s only a bunch of old junk up there.”

“She can’t walk in here with a group of people and expect to start rifling through family possessions.”

“Actually, she can.”

“Says who?”

“Says Grandpa’s trust deed.”

“Thank you,” I whispered to Parker as EJ turned on his heel and stomped off toward the kitchen.

He shrugged. “You okay after last night?”

“Of course I’m not.”

“Watch out for the twins. You have the right to remain silent, and anything you say may be used against you on Instagram.”

“Where are they?”

“Some local news show wants to interview them this afternoon, so they went to get their hair and nails done. I’d say you have”—he checked his watch—“around five hours.”

“Thanks for the warning.”

“Do me a favour and try to keep the noise down. I already have a headache today.”

Parker disappeared toward his home office, leaving us a clear run to the attic. To the third floor. Could Blue really be right? Had Mom hidden something among the old books and toys all those years ago?

Opening the door to the attic was like stepping into a time warp. Dust motes danced in the shafts of light illuminating dusty treasures that had belonged to my grandpa and probably his parents before him. Old pictures stacked in gilded frames, steamer trunks filled with clothes long since outgrown, an age-spotted cheval mirror in one corner. Grandpa hadn’t liked to throw anything away, and EJ was too lazy to sort through the mess.

“I remember that rocking horse,” I whispered, stepping closer to stroke the rough mane. “It belonged to the twins. They wouldn’t let me sit on it.”

Even though they’d only used it to drape clothes over.

It was all there—old dollhouses, model cars, a veritable museum of old computers. Mismatched dinnerware, Christmas decorations, suitcases, some of it broken. And windows. So many windows, small and grimy, and they probably hadn’t been cleaned in my lifetime. I counted eight from where I stood, and there were more hidden behind the junk. It was a big attic.

“Where do we start?” Brooke asked.

“I guess with the closest window and move on from there.”

It was a daunting task.

Everything was filthy. We needed gloves and dust masks too. Coughing, we cleared a space in the middle of the room and used it to stack the detritus of the Baldwin family’s previous lives while we checked each item for a mystery object that didn’t belong. The problem was, we had no idea what we were looking for. It could have been anything. Anything that could lead one person to murder another. What were the motives for murder? Money? Revenge? Love? My mom wouldn’t have gotten involved in any of that, not unless she was trying to protect a person she cared about. Or what if…what if someone else had transgressed and my mom witnessed it? The monster could have eliminated her the way he was trying to eliminate me now. Or what if there’d been a mistake? Could the monster have killed the wrong person? And now he had to clean up the evidence?

So many questions, and absolutely no answers.

The four of us searched through every box and bag and stack and pile, starting near the windows and working our way back. Six hours later, we were all filthy, and we’d found nothing useful. Blue had packed six old pipes into a box for further examination just in case, but they appeared to contain nothing but desiccated tobacco. Either our prize had been moved years ago, or it had never existed in the first place.

And worse, now I heard Kayleigh and Lillian moving around below. Could I squeeze out of one of those windows? It was really tempting to try.

After a quick stop in the bathroom to wipe off as much dirt as we could, the four of us tiptoed down the stairs. Blue in particular looked dejected. Me? I was used to losing hope. The living room door was open, and I could hear the twins griping as we snuck past.

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