Gridlocked Guesthouse (Locked House Hauntings Book 1) by Mixi J Applebottom Page B

sleep. I figured Cletus and Carson would like to take a wee." She paused thoughtfully. "I couldn't get back in." She took a deep breath, and everyone settled down. Rachel even brought in a big vegetable platter that she had prepped. Everyone nibbled while they ate, listening to each tale. It might seem odd to you, that after John attacked Tiffany, and everyone went crazy, that everyone suddenly settled down for story time. But I think this was part of it, everything settled, everyone had their heads. Even Lucy, who had been a basket case all evening, suddenly seemed awake. She was present.
    Everyone was.
    And I should tell you about Lucy. You might be thinking, gee her boyfriend overdosed, and it sucks, but surely she could, I dunno, be a human? Maybe she could just breathe a moment. Or get her shit together. And also, why the hell was everyone else taking Rafael's death so damn easy? What was it that made his death a breeze for them and a nightmare for her?
    And the truth is, I'm not sure. It could have been the house, or the situation, or that everyone had a lot of shit on their plate. Like John being pissed and hurt about Tiffany's refusal to marry him, and his dead baby. Maybe he didn't have room on his plate for another feeling like, a guy he knew was dead upstairs, hanging out of a wardrobe.
    Anyways, it doesn't matter. Lucy's plate was Rafael. Lucy, I'd say, was more sensitive to death than the other people. Her mother was dead. Her father was dead. And when she was fifteen, her sixteen-year-old boyfriend was suicidal. There was one day they were wrestling around and he got angry and suddenly barked that he should end it all. He should end it and walk away from it all. And she said no, and he pulled out a gun. She tried to wrestle it from him, and well, even she didn't know if he pulled the trigger on purpose, but his brains splattered her face when the bullet fired. This is the life of Lucy. She and death were intimate . Most of her years, she'd tried to make up for the pain by fucking and kissing and loving the hell out of anyone who would stand still for five seconds. She was the kind of girl who wore her heart on her sleeve, right there, every little tear and kiss and love just beating beneath the surface. She never held back. She didn't become jaded. But she was a broken girl just the same. Really fucking broken. And this was her last straw. She'd be so fucked up from this point forward that nothing would ever be the same for her again.
    But like I said, everyone was suddenly present and accounted for. They were trying to determine what was going on. Eating delicious carrots and ranch, and generally, if you had walked in on them in this very moment, you would have thought they were still mid-party. They seemed almost happy.
    "I couldn't get back in," Jenny continued.

 
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
     
    "I tried the front door. I tried the windows. I beat at them with my fists, and nobody heard me. Nobody heard me!" She paused, but despite her frantic tone, as soon as she stopped for a breath, she was back to calm. "So I was thinking about what to do, try to break a window to get in or what. Eventually, I thought maybe I should just try to sleep in one of the cars. It was pretty damn cold out there."
    She crunched a carrot thoughtfully. She seemed to be building the rest of the story in her mind, looking for a way to form the sentences into a coherent thought. "So, what I'm saying is..." She paused again, crunching. I think she was obnoxiously slow. Get to the point, girl! We're waiting! "That was when I saw Oliver."
    Everyone blankly stared at her.
    "Oliver, you know? The four-year-old boy that was... peeled, I guess is how Ricky put it." She paused again, looking down at her toes before she crunched another carrot. "So I saw him. He was... mid-peel. Skin flopping to the front and to the back of him, and it was terrifying, and I screamed and started running. And