AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You all right, Don?” Dale says.
“Yeah. Just trying to calm down, you know?”
Dale nods. “Trust me, I know.”
“Brock,” I say, “have you had a chance to look through the crawl space yet?”
“No, I haven’t. Damn. We should have done that before your dad and mom got home.”
I nod. “Yeah, we should have. But now we don’t have a choice. We need to go through that stuff, and we need to do it now.”
“Now?” Dale says. “While we know there are bodies rotting somewhere on this property?”
“Yeah, now. Let’s find out what there is on paper before we start literally digging up our past.”
In reality, I just want to get out of here. So does Brock. I can see it on his face. He’s yellowish green.
Dale, though, is made of sterner stuff. “We’re here now, guys. I think we should look around a little more.” He walks to the truck, pulls a shovel out of the back.
“You want to go digging?” I say.
“Yeah. I want to go digging. I want to dig right around the place where you found that fingernail.”
“Good. At least it’s not inside the damned barn.”
“Good enough,” Brock says. He grabs a shovel. “I’ll help.”
I head back to the truck behind my cousin, grab a shovel and work gloves, and walk slowly to the spot.
“That fingernail hasn’t been here for very long,” I say. “It doesn’t look old.”
“It’s plastic, man.”
“I know that, but still… It would have been washed away by rain or wind or something.”
“Maybe not. Not when it’s so close to the shelter of the barn. It protected it.”
I’m not sure I believe my brother, but I’m okay with doing a little bit of digging. As long as we’re out here in the fresh air. Although, now that I know what it is? I smell that fucking rotting flesh. It’s like it has lodged inside my nostrils.
I push my shovel into the dirt. The four of us dig for a while until we’re down about four feet.
“Nothing that I can see,” I say.
“Let’s go just a little bit farther,” Dale says.
His forehead is tense and wrinkled. I’ve seen this look of determination on him before.
All those years ago, when he stood defiantly, demanding that our captors take him instead of me.
He was determined then, and he’s as determined now.
So I keep digging. I keep digging because he’s my brother, and I owe him everything. I owe him my life.
I dig and I dig and I dig, until my phone vibrates in my back pocket. I grab it. It looks like it’s trying to send a text through, but because the service in this area is so sketchy, I’m not getting anything.
I don’t like the idea that I’m missing something. What if something has happened to Dad? Callie? Anyone?
“You okay?” Brock asks.
