Fallen

“Yeah. Well, I’m pissed. Who is she anyway?” Georgia stepped away, crossing her arms over her chest.

He glanced at her to see her eyes had hardened, her mouth turned into that familiar pout. “Just some woman who plans to turn the house into a business.”

“A business?” she spat. “We’ve waited thirteen years for this, Cam. We earned it. There’s no way some bitch is going to take what’s rightly ours.”

His muscles tensed. “She already has, Georgia. Unknowingly. Like I told you and Mason, we’re going to have to modify—”

“Oh, bullshit.”

He turned to her. “We’ll talk about this later, okay? With Mason. I have to go home and get ready for work.”

Her expression registered hurt. She reached out to him. “Okay. We’ll talk about it later. I just—”

“I know, Georgie. I know.” He sighed. “She has a daughter. She’s only seven.”

Georgia blinked. “A daughter?” She chewed at her lip a moment, finally shaking her head. “It doesn’t matter. Changes nothing.”

“Her mother told me she’s seen horns in the woods.” He’d mentioned it to the sheriff. He shouldn’t have. He regretted it now. It’d made a spark of interest light in the sheriff’s eyes and a heavy feeling of guilt settle in Camden’s stomach. He didn’t know what that might mean to the man, but he hadn’t liked the expression on his face.

Georgia laughed. “Horns? So? It’s a forest.” She rolled her eyes. “Oh God. That legend?”

“I think they believe it. Sometimes I wonder too . . . I used to . . . see things.”

Georgia let out a small huff of breath. “We need to forget the things we saw at Lilith House. The things we experienced there. Isn’t that the whole point?”

He regarded her for a moment, finally nodding. “Yeah. Yeah, it is.” He owed her that, that and so much more. He leaned forward, kissing her forehead, letting his lips linger there. He heard her let out a small sigh and then he stepped away. “See you later.”

“Bye, Cam.”

Camden stepped out of Georgia’s house, jogging down the steps, the vision of Scarlett Lattimore’s face as she’d laughed in the shade of the gazebo filling his mind.CHAPTER TENDowntown Farrow struck Scarlett as both sleepy and old-fashioned, as though both pace and time had slowed at some point in the recent past and the rest of the world, having not received the same memo, had continued to speed right on by. Although there were several large estates that looked to feature every modern amenity including swimming pools and basketball courts, sprinkled on a hill overlooking the town, the rest of Farrow was completely at odds. Scarlett drove down Main Street, noting the quaint ice cream parlor with outdoor seating, the theater with the hand-lettered marquee, and the white, domed bandstand at its center.

There was a sense of charm in Farrow, but to Scarlett, the small town situated in a valley between two mountains also gave off a strange feeling, possibly because such a vital example of a modern urban landscape existed less than two hours away.

However, despite the odd feeling, there were plenty of examples that modern life was very much being lived there. Cars and trucks were parked in the spaces along Main Street, people were out walking dogs and simply strolling the neighborhoods, and the bells rang from the church tower as Scarlett pulled up in front of the white steepled building with the emerald-green doors. The parking lot was mostly full, and a few stragglers hurried toward the short set of steps.

“Ready?” she asked Haddie as she got out of the car and went around to open the back where her daughter sat strapped into her booster seat.

Haddie nodded as she unbuckled, stepping down from the car, her gaze moving between the church and the cemetery behind it and to the left, her expression morphing quickly from concern to placid and back again. “Are you okay?” she asked, taking Haddie’s hand.

“Yes,” Haddie said. “Lots of things happened here. Good and bad.”

Scarlett glanced at the church. Haddie said these kinds of things sometimes and she never knew what to make of it. She’d asked her to explain what she meant dozens of times, but the questions always seemed to cause Haddie to withdraw. So rather than pointing them out and making Haddie feel self-conscious, she’d learned to take them in stride, labeling them “Haddie-isms” that maybe someday her little girl would have the vocabulary to describe to her. Or maybe not. Maybe she’d simply outgrow this phase, the same way other children eventually left their imaginary friends behind. “Yes,” Scarlett confirmed. “That’s a good way to describe a church.” They began walking toward the door, Scarlett spotting a sign that said, Office, with an arrow pointing toward the back of the building. She stepped onto the path that led there. “Joyful occasions take place in churches like weddings and baptisms, but people also gather in churches for sad events like funerals and memorial services.”