sister was lying in bed with the light on. “Listen, I’m sorry I’ve been such an unbearable shrew today,” Jenna said, not lifting her head from the pillow. “You must want to clobber me.”
“Oh, don’t be silly,” Ina said. “Go to sleep.”
Jenna gazed up at the ceiling. Ina noticed, in this light, her sister was looking old and a bit careworn, and it made her sad. Neither one of them was young anymore.
“I think Mark has been with someone,” Jenna said.
Ina let out a skittish laugh. “What are you talking about?”
“He’s having an affair, or at least, he’s had one. I can tell. By any chance, did he say something to George? He’s close with George.”
Ina shook her head.
“You’d tell me if you knew, wouldn’t you? If George said something to you about it?”
“Of course, I’d tell you,” Ina said. She sat down on the edge of the bed, on Mark’s side. “Jenna, Mark loves you. He’s not seeing anyone else. That’s just nonsense. You’re worrying about nothing.”
“Maybe,” Jenna allowed, sighing. “Jesus, I’m so messed up. Nothing’s been right since Collin died. I feel like a zombie half the time. It’s as if I were walking around with a piece of my insides cut out. It hurts, Ina. It’s not just emotional either. It’s a—a true physical pain.”
“Oh Jen, I’m so sorry,” Ina whispered. “There now…there now…” She couldn’t think of anything else to say. She hugged her sister.
Jenna rested her head on her shoulder and wept. Ina felt her sister’s tears through the silk burgundy robe.
After a while, they’d said goodnight, and Ina had slinked off to her room. Crawling into the creaky twin-size bed, she felt awful. Instead of supporting her sister during this terrible time, she’d slept with Mark. How could she do that to Jenna? And how could she do that to George?
She would be a better sister, a better wife, better mother, better person…
Ina had been telling herself that when she’d dozed off.
Now, she was awake again, listening to the toilet tank refilling. The master bedroom door let out a yawn as Mark closed it. He would be asleep soon, and she’d be the only one awake in the house—this creepy little house in the middle of nowhere.
Ina heard a rustling noise outside, and told herself to ignore it. They were practically surrounded by a forest, and it was full of creatures making noises. Or was it that thing Mark had chased halfway up the trail? Maybe it had come back. Maybe it had been watching the house, waiting for him to go to bed.
Ina, quit doing this to yourself.
There it was again, the rustling sound.
Ina tossed back the covers and climbed out of bed. Padding over to the dormer window, she peered outside. She didn’t see anything. But she heard those strange rustling sounds again. Was it coming from inside the house? Downstairs?
Standing very still, Ina listened. Floorboards creaked, more rustling. It wasn’t Mark; she would have heard the master bedroom door squeak open again. Way down the hall and farther from the stairs than her, Mark couldn’t hear what she was hearing, not even if he was still awake. She was the only one who heard it, the only one who knew something was terribly wrong.
You’re blowing this out of proportion. You got spooked earlier by that bear or whatever it was, and now you’re imagining the worst.
That much was true. She was thinking about the type of killer who might lurk within these woods, someone resourceful and clever, and yet savagely brutal. Someone deranged.
Stop it! She’d grown up listening to too many urban legends: the killer with the hook for a hand; the babysitter menaced by a maniac in an upstairs bedroom; and now, her own wild imaginings about this woodland killer.
She heard the noise again, and realized how silly she was. It was just the sound of logs in the fireplace popping and settling. That was all.
Ina crawled back into bed, and pulled the covers up to her neck. As much as she tried to convince herself everything was fine, she lay there tense and rigid, listening for the next sound.
She didn’t have to wait long. It came from downstairs again, in the living room, and she could tell exactly what it was: the legs of a chair scraping across the floor. Someone must have bumped into it.
The noise was loud enough that Mark must have heard it, too, because the master bedroom door creaked open again. Then there were footsteps in the upstairs hallway.
Ina climbed out of bed and started toward the door. Her heart was racing. At least she wasn’t the only one hearing the noises. And Mark was investigating it. She could hear him on the stairs. “Oh, thank God it’s you,” he murmured. “Jesus, what are you doing here? You scared the hell out of me….”
A hand on the doorknob, Ina pressed her ear to the door. She could hear undecipherable whispering. But one thing she could make out was Mark saying. “Okay, okay, I’m sitting down….” Obviously, he knew the person who was downstairs. There was more murmuring, and then Mark raised his voice. “Hey, no! Wait a minute, no—”
A loud gunshot went off.
Ina reeled back from the door.
She heard her sister’s footsteps along the hallway. Someone else was charging up the stairs. “Oh, God, no, no!” Jenna screamed.
Ina’s stomach lurched at the sound of a second blast. She heard someone collapse right outside her bedroom door.
God, please. This isn’t happening, this isn’t happening.
Ducking into her closet, she closed the door and curled up on the floor. She was shaking uncontrollably. She heard footsteps. She couldn’t tell if they were coming toward her bedroom or moving away from it. She felt dizzy, and couldn’t breathe. The dark closet seemed to be shrinking in around her. Ina’s whole body started to shut down.
She wasn’t sure what had happened, if she’d fainted or gone into a kind of shock, but Ina suddenly realized some time had elapsed. The house was still, and a very faint light sliced through the crack under the closet door. Dawn was breaking.
Was it all a nightmare? As she tried to move, every joint inside her ached. She felt as if she’d been beaten up. Her body was reacting to the trauma. This was no nightmare. It was real.
Ina managed to get to her feet and open the closet door. But she was shaking. The bedroom was still dark with only a murky, early dawn light seeping through the dormer windows. Nothing had been disturbed in the room. The door was still closed.
Ina swallowed hard, and then reached for the doorknob. As she opened the door, she saw the blood and bits of brain on the hallway wall. Only a few feet in front of her, Jenna lay dead on the floor facing that blood-splattered wall.
Ina let out a gasp. Tears stung her eyes, but she didn’t stare at her dead sister for too long. She staggered back toward the stairs. She shook so violently she could barely make it down the steps. She clutched the banister to keep from falling—or
