Chapter 4

The SUV lurched sideways, nearly slamming into the guardrail.

The driver wrestled the wheel with both hands, his voice shaking. "Mason — who the hell just said that?"

The cigarette slipped from Mason's fingers and landed in his lap. He yelped and shot upright.

He spun around, eyes locked on me and Leo.

"Ashley, what the f**k are you pulling?!"

I pressed my hand over Leo's mouth, my whole body trembling.

"It wasn't me! I didn't say anything!"

Mason's face had gone white. For just a second, I saw something flash through his eyes — raw, genuine fear.

He stared at Leo like he was looking at something that shouldn't exist.

"Mason." The voice came again. "Don't you remember? The lake at West Estate. The water was so cold."

Leo's mouth hadn't moved.

But the words rang through the car, clear and unmistakable — coming from everywhere at once, from all four walls, from the air itself.

Then, without any warning, rain exploded against the windows.

A downpour out of nowhere. The wipers maxed out couldn't cut through it. The road ahead disappeared.

"Mason, something's wrong with this rain — there's fog everywhere, I can't see a damn thing!" The driver hit the brakes.

The car stopped on the winding mountain road that led to the West Estate.

Everything outside was black. The headlights hit a wall of thick white fog and bounced back, casting a pale, sickly glow.

The temperature kept dropping. A thin layer of frost crept across the inside of the windows.

Drip.

A drop of water hit the top of Mason's head.

He reached up and ran a hand through his hair. When he pulled it back, his palm was smeared with dark, murky water.

"What the — is this car leaking?!"

The words had barely left his mouth when I looked down. The floor mats were soaked. Muddy water had pooled at our feet without either of us noticing, and it was rising — slow and steady, carrying the rotten, weedy stench of a lake bottom.

"Get out! Everyone out!"

Mason threw himself at the door.

It didn't move.

He shoved harder. Then harder. The door held like it had been welded shut. He couldn't budge it.

The two men up front panicked, slamming their fists against the windows.

"Help! Something's wrong — the doors won't open!"

The water rose fast. In seconds it was over our ankles.

I pulled Leo up onto the seat with me, pressing back as far as I could go.

Leo's eyes opened.

The whites were gone. His eyes were completely black — solid, lightless, like two holes in his face.

He stared straight at Mason, and when he spoke, his voice was soaked in something ancient and hateful.

"Mason. When you held me under the water back then — I fought just like this."

Mason broke.

He ripped a knife from his waistband, jabbed it toward Leo, and screamed.

"Noah Miller! Don't you dare try to scare me! You were a bastard — you never belonged in this family! I killed you once, and I can do it again!"

Noah Miller.

Something detonated in my mind.

I remembered.

Years ago — more than a decade — there had been an illegitimate son in the family. My uncle had fathered him with another woman. The boy had been brought to live with us eventually, but not long after, word came that he'd drowned in the lake at West Estate.

An accident, they said.

He'd been fifteen years old.

Turns out, it wasn't an accident.

Mason had killed him!