Page 28 of Darkwater Lane (Stillhouse Lake #7)

GWEN

It’s an odd feeling, returning to Stillhouse Lake.

I’ve been back several times since we moved, but this time, driving in with a trailer loaded down with all our belongings hastily packed in Knoxville is different.

Even though this move is only meant to be temporary, there’s a sense of something permanent to it.

The gravel of the driveway crunches under the tires as Sam pulls up to the house. He’s already out of the truck, phone in hand as he texts Javi to let him know we’ve arrived and that it’s safe for the kids to come meet us and help unload the trailer.

I sit in the car, staring at the house as memories assail me. When we first moved here years ago, it had been with a sense of promise. It was the first house that had felt like a home. The first time since The Event that I’d felt a sense of possibility for a future free of Melvin Royal.

How little I’d known that he would find us, even here.

I slip out of the car and stretch, breathing in deep. It’s cold, and while there’s no snow on the ground, the clouds overhead threaten the possibility. The air stings a bit in my lungs, but the smell is comfortingly familiar: pine, lake water, and leaves left to mulch in the surrounding woods.

I’d forgotten how quiet it is here without traffic or Life Flight helicopters. Just the ticking of Sam’s truck engine as it cools and the whine of the trailer’s hinges as Sam unlocks it and pulls the doors open.

In the distance, a rusty truck stutters as it shifts gears, making its way slowly along the road that circles the lake.

Instinct kicks in, and I watch it for a moment as it heads our way.

Before reaching the turnoff to our house, it pulls off into a small gravel lot by a rickety dock that holds several small, weather-worn boats.

An older man gets out, white hair tufting in the breeze.

He rummages around in the bed of the truck, coming up with a long fishing pole and a tackle box.

He fits a cap on his head and shuffles down the splintered planks to one of the rougher-looking boats at the end.

It takes him a few tries to get the engine going, but eventually I hear the muffled put-put-put as he pulls away from the dock, headed out toward deeper waters. A small wake cuts across the dark surface behind him, sending ripples through the reflection of the dull clouds overhead.

I shiver, thinking about what secrets those waters might hold.

When we first moved here, they’d pulled the bodies of two dead girls from the lake.

The murders had been eerily similar to Melvin’s.

He’d liked to flay his victims alive and then tie them to cinderblocks and drop them in a nearby lake, creating an underwater garden of rotting, mutilated bodies.

Once local law enforcement learned of my true identity, it didn’t take long for me to fall under suspicion for the girls’ murders.

In the end, it had been one of their own behind the killings.

Officer Graham had been a neighbor, a father.

.. and an acolyte of Melvin Royal’s. We’d been lucky to survive.

I’m pulled from my thoughts by the sound of another approaching car. This one I recognize: my SUV. Lanny pulls into the driveway and parks next to Sam’s truck. At the sight of my kids healthy and whole, I let out a long breath. Some of the constant strain of worry eases from my tense shoulders.

Connor is the first one out of the SUV. I pull him into an immediate hug, which he grudgingly reciprocates. I inhale the familiar scent of his head, a smell imprinted on my heart from the first moment I held him after birth. “You okay, honey?”

He shrugs his way out of my arms. “Fine.”

A frustratingly vague response. We’ve talked on the phone a few times since they left Knoxville, but it’s been hard to get a sense of how he’s really doing. I tuck a strand of his hair behind his ear. “You sure?”

“I never really liked Knoxville anyway,” he says, lifting a shoulder.

This is a surprise to me, even though it shouldn’t be. Before I can press the issue, he starts toward the trailer. “I’m going to help Sam unload.”

Behind him, Lanny slips from the driver’s side of the SUV. I note that she pockets the keys instead of handing them over. I’m sure she’s enjoyed having the car to herself the last few days, though I’m also pretty sure Javi and Kez kept a tight leash on where they allowed her to go.

“Hey, Mom,” she calls, as if it’s just an ordinary day. As if she hadn’t recently walked in on a gruesome murder scene in our own living room. As if our entire life hadn’t been upended in a matter of days.

I open my arms for a hug, and she obliges. I hold her tightly, wishing I could erase the burden of the last few days from her. “Thank you for taking care of your brother,” I tell her. “You did a good job getting away from the house. I’m proud of you.”

She rolls her eyes. “It’s not like you haven’t drilled that into us a hundred million times.”

“And you complained for 99% of them,” I remind her .

“Yeah, well, apparently, I was paying attention.”

“You were,” I agree. I’ve started to realize that I’m so often looking for the gaps and lapses in our security that I fail to acknowledge the successes. It’s important for me to reinforce when my kids do things right.

She glances past me at the truck. “Where’s Vee? Did she decide not to come after all?”

As soon as we made the decision to leave, we asked Vee if she wanted to join us at Stillhouse Lake.

Initially she said yes and even helped pack up the house.

But then this morning she backed out. “She didn’t want to lose her apprenticeship at the shop,” I tell her.

“I think she’s pretty happy where she is, but we told her she’s always welcome. I’m sure we’ll see her soon.”

Lanny frowns slightly. “And my field trip to DC? Is that still on?”

I wince. “I’m sorry, honey.”

“So Vee’s allowed to be an adult but I’m not?”

I start to protest but she waves a hand. “Never mind. It’s not like you were going to let me go anyway. We all knew you were going to change your mind.”

I open my mouth to argue, but she’s right.

In fact, until she brought it up, I’d completely forgotten about the trip.

It makes me feel like an absolutely shitty mom and is yet another reminder of how easy it has been to fall back into the same patterns as before: constantly vigilant, always awaiting the next threat, erring on the side of caution.

All the things I promised Lanny I’d try to dial back so we could try to live a little more normally.

Except this time is different. A man was murdered in our house. Until we understand who did it and why, I don’t want my kids out of my sight.

She has to recognize the uniqueness of our situation. “I’m sorry, honey,” I tell her. I mean it. I hate that I’m asking her to make sacrifices. Again .

She lifts a shoulder. “I’m used to it by now.”

The way she says it is like a physical blow. These kids have had to give up too much of their lives. They’re being punished for their father’s crimes, and it isn’t fair.

It’s even more reason for me to find a way to make it stop. I have to figure out how to give my kids their lives back. They’ll never get to be normal, but they should at least be able to grow up without the shadow of Melvin Royal hanging over them constantly.

We spend the rest of the day unpacking the trailer and sorting boxes. Slowly, we start to make the house feel more like home. Connor tacks up a few posters on his bedroom wall, and Lanny fills her half of the bathroom counter with an eclectic collection of makeup tubes and bottles.

While we’d been renting out the house, we’d stored some of our belongings in the panic room located off the kitchen, using it as a quasi-utility closet.

I push aside the bookshelf blocking the door and enter the code to unlock it.

The room itself isn’t huge, and the walls are still covered in the zombie apocalypse posters we put up when we first moved into the house and Connor had dubbed this our Zombie Bugout Shelter.

Boxes are piled in one corner, while a few pieces of furniture we didn’t want to leave out for renters, including several wooden Adirondack chairs Sam and Connor built together, are stacked in another.

I start hauling those out to the deck, already looking forward to spending time out there with a beer after dinner.

Sam grabs a couple of the boxes marked kitchen and starts sorting through them, pulling out some of our nicer cooking equipment that we hadn’t wanted to leave out for renters.

We don’t say much as we work. Lanny has connected her phone to speakers in her room and is blasting the soundtrack to Hamilton .

Every now and again, I hear Sam singing along and smile.

The last few days have been rough for him. For all of us. I appreciate that even with all the pressure mounting, there are still pockets of normalcy in our lives. For now, we’re all okay: we’re healthy and whole and together.

I don’t ever take those things for granted.

We’re still unpacking when I hear tires crunching over gravel.

My first thought is to wonder where the closest firearm is located, but then glance out the window to see a familiar truck pulling up behind my SUV.

I immediately start for the door and key in the alarm code before stepping outside, just as Kez hefts her bulky frame from the passenger seat.

She’s wearing black leggings and a crisp white button-down that stretches tight across her large, pregnant belly.

The sight of it—of her so healthy and glowing—brings tears to my eyes.

There’s something about knowing the little life growing inside her, kicking and twisting and ready to take on the world, that fills my soul.

It’s a reminder that life continues. So does hope.

“Kez,” I say, clutching my hands to my heart. “Look at you!” I start toward her.