RIOT HOUSE (Crooked Sinners #1) - Callie Hart Page 0,167

her chest—nothing more than bone and matted, dull hair.

This is where she’s been.

All of this time…

The cops searched these woods. They never found her. They’ve been looking for her back in Florida where her parents live, plastering her face all over the sides of milk cartons and noticeboards, but she was here all along, quietly rotting away to dust.

“Holy…fuck.”

I reach out, my fingers hovering over the blackened skull—

“Oh my god!”

I pull my hand back, nearly jump out of my skin. Mercy stands in the opening of the cavern, staring at the body of the girl who used to be her friend. Shock distorts the planes of her face. Even in the dim lighting thrown off by the electric lamps, I can see how pale she is. “Jesus, you nearly gave me a heart attack!” I hiss.

She comes toward me on wobbly legs, reaching out, like the ground’s shifting underneath her and she’s fighting for balance. “I swear—” she whispers. “I swear I thought she was fine. I thought she’d just bailed. I guess she isn’t blowing frat boys in Cabo, after all.”

“No.” The word comes out clipped and hard. Mercy has a lot to answer for here. I won’t say it, because what would placing blame accomplish now? But Mara and I barely knew each other. We went out once, didn’t even make out, and I decided she wasn’t for me. Bastard that I was, she wasn’t innocent enough for my tastes. She was just as tainted and troubled as I was at the time, and I couldn’t even bother having a one-night stand with her. She’d pursued me at first, but then given up the chase. There’d been no bad blood between us. And then Mercy stuck her oar in and wound up getting Mara killed. Fitz wouldn’t have touched her if my sister hadn’t said what she did.

Mercy stands over Mara’s corpse, the muscles in her throat working. I think she’s beginning to understand now. It’s finally hitting home. Tears course down her face as she surveys the bones from the skull, down over the ribcage, pelvis, femur, tibia and fibula. “I wouldn’t have been chatting with him in the street if I really believed he was capable of this,” she whispers. “I just…I thought it was a game. I thought it was funny, the way he wouldn’t leave you be. I never thought—”

I wrap my arm around her shoulder, pulling her into my side. She’s been the cause of so much of my guilt over the past year, because I did know. I knew Fitz was this crazy. I feared he’d done something like this, but I had no way of proving it until now. Mercy’s hurting, though, and she’s still my fucking blood. She will have to deal with this for a long time to come, but for now I’ll comfort her, because that’s what brothers are supposed to do.

“We need to call the police,” she mumbles into my shirt.

“I know. We will. But first we need to find Elodie. I don’t want her to end up on this slab next to Mara. Let’s search the rest of the cave and—”

A loud CRACK! echoes down the passageway behind us—it sounds like a rock, skittering along the ground and hitting the wall. Mercy and I trade a stunned look. “Hide,” she hisses. But it’s too late. There is nowhere to hide. The cavern is where the cave ends, and it’s empty apart from the plinth.

So, I do what I should have done a long time ago.

I turn and wait to face down a monster.

50

ELODIE

Carina lets out a strangled cry. That’s how I know something bad waits for us up ahead. The walls of the passageway close in, swearing they’ll crush me to death, as Doctor Fiztpatrick pushes me from behind, shoving me through an opening in the cave. And my heart stops dead in my chest.

Wren.

His eyes widen when he sees me, full of terror, and then they go utterly blank. At my back, Doctor Fitzpatrick lets out a hollow, surprised bark of laughter. “Well, well, well. Look who it is! We were just talking about you, weren’t we, girls? Mercy, too. Wow, we’ve got the whole gang.”

Wren stares at me, his jade eyes working their way up from my feet, travelling over my body; I can tell that he’s assessing me for injuries. I give him a quick shake of the head to let him know I’m okay. He steps forward, sliding his hands into his