Page 23 of Love at First Fright

A prickle ran down my neck.

I stopped writing.

The air suddenly felt different. Heavier. Like the moment before a storm, when the pressure shifts and the world holds its breath.

A floorboard creaked behind me.

I didn’t want to turn around. Every instinct screamed not to turn around. Don’t look. Keep writing. It’s just the house settling. Old buildings do that. They expand and contract. Physics. Normal, boring physics.

I turned around.

Nothing.

Just boxes. Furniture. Shadows pooling in corners.

Dust motes drifted through the air, caught in the weak light from the window. Yet… they moved strangely—not falling, not rising, but swirling in patterns that didn’t match the stillness of the room. Spirals. Deliberate.

“Hello?” The word slipped out before I could stop it. A whisper.

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

I shook my head, annoyed. This was exactly how the workmen’s imaginations had conjured up ghost stories. Old house, creepy atmosphere, isolation. The brain filled in the gaps. Created threats where none existed.

Except the hammer. That had actually flown across a room, according to Evelyn. That was strange.

The motes spiralled faster.

I backed towards the door. “Right. Cool. Very atmospheric. Well done, Grimthorne.”

My fingers found the handle. Twisted.

Locked.

Ice flooded my veins.

I twisted again. Harder. The handle didn’t budge.

You have got to be fucking kidding me.

“Brad?” My voice cracked. I cleared my throat, tried again. “Brad, this isn’t funny!”

Silence answered. No footsteps. No reply.

And Brad wasn’t a slight man. Those stairs had screamed under my weight—they’d have bloody well announced his arrival like a foghorn. I’d have heard him. Would’ve had plenty of warning.

I rattled the handle. Nothing. The door might as well have been welded shut.

“Brad!” I slammed my palm against the wood. “Open the door!”

The sound echoed, then died. Swallowed by the attic’s oppressive stillness.

My chest tightened. I sucked in a breath, forced myself to think. Panic wouldn’t help. There had to be another way out. Houses like this always had servant’s access, hidden passages, something.

A hatch. There’d be a hatch somewhere, leading to the roof for… maintenance! Yes, that would be it.

I scanned the ceiling, searching the shadows between rafters. Nothing. Just beams and cobwebs and that awful slanting roof pressing down like the lid of a coffin.

Fine. The window, then. Tiny, filthy, but technically large enough for a person to squeeze through. I could climb out onto the roof, edge along to a drainpipe or—