Harlequin Romantic Suspense April 2021 Karen Whiddon (best fiction books to read TXT) 📖

and groaned with each step. It had been months since the home had been searched and the remnants of crime-scene tape, like tattered flags, hung limply from the porch. A lockbox with a ten-digit code had been attached to the front door. Inside was a key to the front door.

Julia had the code and unlocked the door. Luis pushed it open. Rusty hinges squeaked and dust motes, disturbed by the movement, rose and swirled in a frenzied dance. The air was stale and smelled faintly of mold.

They entered a front room, complete with a crumbling fireplace and a sofa that vomited stuffing. The floor was covered with a ripped and stained carpet. Wallpaper hung in strips and chunks of plaster had fallen from the ceiling. Straight back and to the right, a set of stairs led to the second floor.

Despite the decay and neglect, Luis could tell that something was wrong with the house. Without question, he knew that something bad had happened here. It was as if the walls and floors, and even the foundation, had absorbed the negative energy.

Luis held a wobbly balustrade and placed his foot on the first step. Pressing down, he bounced a little. The step held. The next step was solid, as was the one after that. With only half a dozen stairs left, Luis heard a crack. His shin filled with fire and his foot dropped away. “What the...?”

He looked down but knew what he would see. He’d broken through the rotten wood of the step. The sharp edges of wood had ripped the fabric of his jeans and sliced open his flesh. Hot blood trickled down his leg, filling his shoe. Pulling his leg free, he cursed.

“We need to get you back down to the truck,” said Julia. “There’s a first-aid kit in there.”

“I don’t need a first-aid kit,” he said. “I’m tough. I can handle the pain.”

“There’s rodent droppings all over the place and it reeks of mold in here. Nobody is tough enough to fend off all these germs if they get in an open wound. When was the last time you had a tetanus shot?”

He grimaced. “Two, maybe three years ago.”

“You should be good then.” Julia hooked her arm under his shoulder, drawing him close. God, she smelled so good—and holding her felt better. “You want to go up or down?”

Luis looked up to the landing and back down to the living room. They were closer to the top of the stairs than they were to the bottom. Hobbling to the next step up, he said, “You get the first-aid kit. I’ll start looking through Darcy’s old room.”

“At least let me help you,” she said.

He unwrapped his arm from Julia’s. “You go. I’ll get myself upstairs.”

“Are you sure?” she asked.

Luis took another step. Man, did that hurt. “I’m positive.”

“If you’re sure.”

He took another step. “Just be careful on the way down.”

“And you,” she said. “Be careful on the way up.”

He tried not to smile.

Julia walked down the stairs, missing the rotten one completely, and disappeared out the front door.

Struggling the rest of the way, he made it to the second floor. There were four doors. The first on the right led to the master suite. The second on the left was for the bathroom. The one next door had belonged to Darcy as a child. According to the notes in the case file, the final room had been a combination junk room and office.

Outside of Darcy’s bedroom, Luis stood without movement, or even drawing a breath. He knew there was something different about this house—something sinister about the room. The hairs on the nape of his neck stood on end. Gripping the doorknob, he turned the handle.

Nothing.

He tried again.

The door remained closed.

It wasn’t that moisture had left the door swollen shut. The room’s lock was actually engaged.

It made no sense. The house had been thoroughly searched several months ago. Nobody in law enforcement would have locked a door. It was easy for Luis to believe that that house had secrets it wasn’t willing to share.

After taking a step back, Luis launched himself forward. A bolt of pain shot through his ankle as the wooden frame cracked and the door opened. Stepping inside, he knew instantly that this was the room where all the madness had begun.

* * *

Julia stood at the front door. Desperate to rid her lungs of the dankness that permeated the house, she drew in a deep lungful of clean forest air. With the sun overhead, the air was growing warm. Despite the heat, she shivered. Giving a backward glance, she walked across the crumbling porch and made her way to the truck to grab her first-aid kit that was stored behind the single bench seat.

After fidgeting with the release, Julia tipped the seat forward and spied a tackle box with a red cross emblazoned on the lid.

Reaching for the handle, she tried to pull the box free. The latch caught on the back of the seat and the lid sprang open. Gauze, bandages, antibiotic ointment and tape spilled onto the floor. Julia cursed and leaned farther into the truck. Her fingertips brushed an ACE bandage.

She froze and held her breath.

What was that noise?

Was it the crunch of footsteps on gravel?

The skin on the back of her neck tickled. She felt as if she was being watched. Julia slowly backed out and stood. Her gut burned. She could almost feel her lost fingers—phantom limb, the doctors had called the sensation. She reached for her holster and unlatched the snap. Using her left hand, she withdrew the firearm.

Holding her breath, she spun around, arm extended and finger on the trigger.

There was nobody, just the creepy old house, rising like a tombstone out of the overgrown lawn.

Julia laughed, the sound little more than a cackle. “Sheesh, I’m as jumpy as Luis’s cat,” she chided herself.

After slipping the gun back into the holster, she relatched the snap. She bent back toward the truck, then stopped.

There it was again. A