When Stars Come Out (When Stars Come Out 1)

“What?” he asks when he returns to the driver’s seat.

“Where did you get that key?”

“My uncle owns this property,” he says, as if that explains everything.

“So, you stole it?”

“I borrowed it,” he corrects. “Don’t make everything I do sound like a crime.”

He inches the car forward until it’s inside the gate and then shuts the engine off. I follow him as he exits the car, the wind roars around me, picking my hair up, tangling it around my neck. It also carries the distinct smell of rot. It’s faint, still some distance away, but chills spider down my arms and back, making my skin feel like canvas stretched too tight. Thane doesn’t seem to notice as he walks, the crunch of loose gravel grates under his feet.

We make our way to the thick of the yard, moving over the outlines of tracks, overgrown with patches of grass. Streetlights spill blue-tinted light over parts of the property. Worn and broken locomotives sit abandoned to our left, and I swear the way the light hits them, they have faces, angry and disfigured. Metal silos and warehouses rise like guards, obscuring anything beyond the yard. It’s clear by the size of this place that it used to be the hub of town, now, just a phantom, and Rayon has grown around it

I pause, standing at the center of a set of tracks. Behind me, a train with an ugly face stares back at me, while the rails at my feet create a path straight to a grid of warehouses with vacant, black windows.

“Why would Lily come here?” I ask.

Thane doesn’t answer immediately. He stands ahead of me, staring into the dark, shoulders rigid, like he’s had wire shoved up his back and arms.

“We came here before…” he pauses, and I can finish that sentence: before his mother died, before he severed his relationship with everyone he knew. “It was just a place to escape.”

Thane starts off toward the locomotives and, at first, I want to follow, but the wind picks up, blowing my hair in my face again and, as I turn toward it, a light flickers in the distance. The only reason it draws my attention is because it’s coming from inside one of the warehouses. Has it been on since we got here? An uneasy feeling crawls up my back, like claws tiptoeing along my skin. Maybe Lily’s last moments were spent inside that building, but if that’s the case, what sort of clues remain? Among them, the killer?

Worse is the feeling that I need to move forward. Like I’m being reeled in—a creature at sea, caught on a line. I twist to look for Thane and tell him where I’m going, but he’s already out of sight. I take the bait, more curious than anything and start toward the building. Each step makes my heart beat harder in my chest. A sheen of perspiration bubbles on my forehead and I squeeze my fingers into a tight fist. I’ve gone into a lot of fights knowing I’m not defenseless, and yet that only makes me more afraid.

I stop before one of the warehouse buildings. Lights flicker from within, illuminating the dusty windows. Why would anyone need light in an abandoned building? Unless they were doing something illegal? Like sell drugs or…resurrecting people from the dead.

I wander to the side of the building and find a window I can easily climb through. At first, I think it’s open, but glass crunches beneath my feet, and I realize it’s been knocked out of the frame. I don’t like the idea of venturing in alone, but if there’s evidence inside that might tell me what happened to Lily, I want to find it, so I climb through, slicing my palm.

“Jesus!”

The word slips out, a harsh curse in this dark atmosphere. When I inhale, it’s sawdust I taste on my tongue. I close my fingers around the cut, feeling sticky blood pool in the crevices of my palm.

I stand for a moment to get my bearings as the lights flicker and fade. The warehouse is nothing spectacular, just a concrete floor scattered with broken pieces of wood and metal. Overhead, heavy beams create a pattern that holds up the metal roof, and windows are set high up to allow in as much light in as possible during the day. Still, there’s something about this place that’s familiar. I can’t place it, but I feel it, like energy vibrating around me, raising the hair on my arms, pricking along my neck.

The lights go out and something crashes to the ground, startling me, I whirl, facing the sound just as the lights come back on and find a large black bird flying toward me. I lift my hands to cover my face, but at the last minute, it turns upward and flies toward the rafters. It tilts its head, watching me. I can’t say whether or not it’s the same one I saw at Nacoma Knight my first day, but it’s definitely a raven.

The bird’s beady black eyes glint in the dark and an involuntary shiver runs down my spine.

“Stupid bird,” I mumble under my breath, before continuing to explore the warehouse under the watchful gaze of my unwanted companion.

I’ve inspected every corner when I hear it—movement from somewhere distant. It’s then I notice a door in the corner of the room. As I step toward it, a harsh caw erupts from the darkness and that stupid bird swoops down in front of me. Startled, I drop my phone. I can’t shake the feeling that this thing wants to peck my eyes out. Instead, it perches on the windowsill closest to me.

As I bend to pick up my phone, I grab a piece of scrap wood to throw at the creature.

“Go away!”

The bird dodges, and screams back at me, rising toward the rafters.

When I look at my phone, the screen is broken.

Great. Just something for Mom to get mad about.

After the commotion, I wait in the silence at the door, thinking that whatever’s in the basement might move again but I hear nothing.

If it’s another bird, I swear I’ll hit it with a board.

Gingerly, I turn the knob. It’s cold and gritty and when I open the door, the air around me changes—thickens, and it’s tinged with the faintest chemical smell. I stand at the edge of the darkness, using my phone as a flashlight. For a l