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Her comment explained the multiple locks on the door. Sympathy for the mother and daughter swelled inside Ellie. “I’m sorry to hear that. Has she always suffered from phobias?”
Monica shook her head sadly. “Not when she was little. But that year at college did something to her. I don’t know everything that happened but… she was traumatized. The doctors say she had a psychotic break.”
“Were drugs involved?” Derrick asked.
“My daughter didn’t do drugs,” Monica said emphatically. “But you’re right. She did live in that apartment building. One night, she woke up and there were spiders in her bedroom. She was bitten by several black widows.”
“How scary. They’re poisonous but not always deadly,” Ellie said.
Monica nodded. “I know, but she was sick for weeks and after that, had nightmares of spiders and woke up screaming all the time.”
Derrick pulled a hand down his chin. “How did the spiders get in her room?”
Monica shrugged. “She thought one of the creeps that lived in the building put them there.”
Ellie’s mind raced with more questions. “Did the police investigate?”
“They talked to one kid but he swore he didn’t do it, insisted that someone stole the three black widows he kept. Police had no proof he put the spiders in Darla’s bedroom. His father paid for a lawyer and that was the end of it.” Her voice cracked. “But my daughter has never been the same.”
“Do you remember the boy’s name?” Ellie asked.
Monica pinched the bridge of her nose as if battling her emotions. “I’ll never forget it. Vincent Billings.”
A shrill scream erupted from the bedroom and Monica ran toward the closed door. Ellie followed. When Monica jerked open the door, Ellie saw a rail-thin skeleton of a girl in full-fledged panic.
“Get them off me!” She slapped her hands across her body as if she was on fire. “The spiders are all over me! Get them off!”
FORTY
Poisonous spiders crawled up and down Darla’s arms, their tiny legs traipsing over her skin as if they planned to feast on her. Their pinprick bites were like needles jabbing into her, a thousand at a time. Their eyes piercing her.
She slapped at them, beating them away, but dozens more flew at her and fell from the tangled web they’d spun above her bed.
“Darla, honey, there are no spiders in here,” her mother said in a soothing voice. “Wake up and you’ll see they’re all gone, honey.”
Her mother’s voice barely registered through the fear pulsing through her. Her mom was wrong.
The spiders were very real. They came at her when she closed her eyes and especially when she was alone. No one seemed to be able to see them except her.
Everyone thought she was crazy.
But she wasn’t. Her body stung as if it was on fire. Her throat was starting to get thick and close up. Her vocal cords twisted together like intertwining ropes cutting off the sound of her cries. Nausea built in her chest, trapped inside as the spiders crawled in her ears and made their way through her ear canal. Her muscles started to spasm and sweat streamed down her face.
She slapped at them again, raking her hands across her body, sending some of them scurrying.
Blood rushed to her head and the world tilted.
“Darla, honey, it’s okay now,” her mother pleaded. “The police are here. They want to talk to you about a girl you knew in college.”
“Her name was Amy,” another female’s voice broke through the fog. “We think you knew her from your apartment complex ten years ago.”
Darla didn’t remember an Amy or any other friends. Only the shock of that night when her life had come to an end.
FORTY-ONE
LAKE HAVEN APARTMENTS
Ellie couldn’t erase the image of Monica’s distraught daughter from her mind as she parked at the apartment complex where Darla and Amy had rented units. How awful to live in a never-ending nightmare where spiders were attacking you.
