Malum: Part 1 (The Elite King's Club 4)

“Let’s just go…” Bailey says, urging me toward the opposite direction.

Bang! It’s like a door slamming open and shut relentlessly.

“Seriously,” Bailey brushes me off. “It’s probably just a barn or something.”

Before I can contest what she’s saying, my feet are carrying me toward the sound.

Bang!

Bang!

I speed up, breaking out into a jog with Bailey being dragged behind me.

The sound gets closer, my heart beating faster as sweat oozes down my head. There’s a small clearing, so I shove the branches away, reaching for my phone and turning the light on.

I point it toward the noise and then freeze. The rusted wooden door, the steps leading up to it. The aluminum roof that provides it little shelter.

This was the small shack Daemon drew in his book.

“What?” I gasp, my head tilting to get a better look.

“Tillie, we should leave this place,” Bailey says, her eyes flying around the area. I understand her fear. I don’t blame her. What with being locked up in a cage for however long, awaiting her fate.

“It’s okay. I’ve seen this place before…” I take a step forward, the damp leaves rustling under the sole of my shoe. The wind whistles a sweet lullaby that sings through the strands of my hair, but like an interrupted record, it suddenly stops at the touch of Bailey’s hand on my arm.

I turn to face her. “What?”

She’s looking at me with fear, but her eyes frantically go over my shoulder and to the cabin. “We need to leave, Tillie.”

My eyes narrow, my suspicions about just how much this girl knows growing a little stronger the longer that I’m in her presence. I rip my arm out of her grasp and turn back to face the cabin. It’s not livable, it’s barely still standing against the wind. I start taking more tentative steps forward, looking around the yard. There’s a small tin roof that leads off to an old garage, but that wasn’t in the book. There’s a well in the front with an aged splintered bucket dangling from damp rope. My attention snaps to the front door when a dark shadow zips past in a flash.

“Tillie!” Bailey yells, but it’s too late.

I zip forward and run straight for the steps, taking them two at a time with my heart thundering in my chest. Ignoring the protesting stairs and old porch wood, I kick open the door that has been slamming open and shut and stand at the threshold, every single inch of myself is saying to run and that I do not belong in this place, but my rebellious side is disputing my logical side. I slide my finger into the small hole where the door handle used to be. Lightning starts flashing above me from the skies, thunder clapping angrily, as if it’s remonstrating my being here.

“Hello?” I say, pushing the door open even more.

I feel like a fucking idiot—you know, the kind that asks hello after walking into a place they shouldn’t be walking into. It’s usually a couple of minutes before they get murdered, too. I shine the spotlight of my phone into the sitting room and gasp, my knees shaking, threatening to give way. A torn up single lounge chair is seated in front of an old fireplace. There’s foam spilling out of the split seams, illustrating the lack of usage. It’s the exact same chair in Daemon’s book. My eyes catch the fireplace since there seems to be nothing else in here where furnishing is concerned. It’s dark, like a cemented block of blackboard plastered against the frame of a fireplace, but I find myself squinting in an attempt to get a better look. Something flickers inside of it, too small to have me think maybe I imagined it, but big enough to catch my attention. It floats up, and it’s then that I realize it’s a firefly. How peculiar, to have a firefly here, in this weather. It flutters again, enough for its light to hit the right angle. The curve of something penetrates the light of the bug, and when I take a small step closer, I almost think—

“Who is there?”

I take another step forward, but a hand slams over my mouth, yanking me back out of the cabin and up against the outside wall. Nate is glaring at me, his hard body up against mine. My eyes go around to look for Bailey, but I can’t see her anywhere.

“Why do I always find you getting into trouble?”

I try to yank my face out of his grip, but he doesn’t budge, only loosens enough for me to answer. “Maybe because you have a bad habit of leaving me alone.”

His eyes flick to the crack of the door. “I don’t fucking want you wandering the fuck around without me—especially when you had orders to go straight to Brantley’s!”