like it had been pulled from another era. The blue paint was chipping, and
several wooden shingles on the roof were missing.
“Are you sure this is the address?” I asked the driver.
He gestured to his phone on the dash, which had Wayz opened. “You tell
me.”
“Only one way to find out.” Jaxson climbed out of the car, and I
followed.
I had steeled myself for a twisted hovel in the midst of an ominous,
rotting wood inhabited by a sinister crone who made books out of the flayed
flesh of her victims. I had a very real image of it in my head.
“You know,” I mused aloud, “somehow, this wasn’t what I was
expecting.”
Jaxson opened the rickety gate in the white picket fence that surrounded
the property. “Don’t let the façade fool you. Keep your eyes open.”
His body was tense and alert, like a predator stalking an enemy’s
territory. There was something utterly captivating about the way he moved.
Power and grace. I’d never fully appreciated it before.
I tried to ignore my magnetic draw to him as we followed the concrete
path that cut through the overgrown yard. The front steps creaked as I took
them two at a time, glancing at the white rocking chair on the porch and the
pots of herbs hanging from the railings.
My heartbeat accelerated.
The place was so unassuming that it was almost ominous. An incredibly
powerful being lived here. She was capable of entering dreams and
summoning nightmares, but there was no sign of her power. Something
wasn’t quite right.
A deep sense of unease rooted in my gut as I thought of Hansel and
Gretel and the gingerbread house. Heart pounding, I picked up the brass
knocker bolted to the door frame and rapped twice. “Here goes nothing.”
The echoes died away. And then, just as I was about to knock again, my