There’s a rumble in the sky – a helicopter overhead, getting closer, beams of light searching the area, rotary blades stirring treetops. Snow falls to the ground in heavy clumps.
But something else stirs in the cold air – closer, much closer – and my heart leaps as the beam from the helicopter highlights a figure sitting on Kyla’s bench. Whoever it is wears the mask of the young boy with the bright pink face and the too wide smile – the dead eyes.
I’m shaking with cold and terror, when whoever is sitting there raises their arm and reaches out to me through the darkness. Their arm drops down; their head slumps to one side.
Within seconds, adrenalin pumps through me. I’m running. Stumbling. Tripping. Falling. I scramble back to my feet, the bright lights of the helicopter guiding my way. My pulse thumps in my ears, as I head for the farmhouse. Finally, I glance behind me. But there’s nobody there. Nobody is chasing me.
I’m almost at the farmhouse, and haven’t dared look back again for fear of slowing my pace. The helicopter, after appearing to land on higher ground, has gone, taken off towards the coast. I desperately hope it’s the police.
When I finally reach the front door of the farmhouse, I bang my fists against it. ‘Help!’ I cry. ‘Help me! Julia! Finn! Let me in. Please!’
I steel myself, and glance back once more, but there’s still nobody behind me, only a vast expanse of muffling snow, the perfect sheen ruined by my anxious footprints.
It seems like an age before the door swings open. It’s Julia in her pyjamas, hugging the cat. She tilts her head. ‘Amelia. What is it? I was about to watch TV.’
‘Let me in,’ I cry, and she steps back startled. I storm into the house out of breath, and she closes the door. ‘Lock it,’ I yell. ‘Lock it for Christ’s sake!’
She puts down the cat, and turns the key slowly. ‘What the devil’s the matter with you?’
‘Where’s Finn?’ I call after her as she heads away, my voice husky. ‘Where the hell is Finn?’
‘He’s not here, Amelia,’ she says over her shoulder. ‘He went out about an hour ago,’ she goes on, disappearing into the lounge, where I hear the TV blaring out. ‘What’s this about?’
I stand in the dimly lit hallway, trying to catch my breath and make sense of everything, when I notice blood on my jacket, my gloves. It wasn’t a dream. I stabbed someone. A man.
The masked killer is a man, and I stabbed him.
Yes.
Yes.
And there are only three men here at Drummondale House.
But it can’t be Thomas, or Dad – it can’t be my lovely dad, and anyway he’s hurt his leg.
There’s only one person it can be, and I desperately pray I’m wrong.
‘You’re covered in blood,’ Julia says, as I step into the light of the lounge. ‘Oh God, are you hurt?’
I shake my head. ‘No, but someone attacked me. There’s someone out there, Julia.’ I’m talking too fast. ‘And someone’s killed Maddie.’ Oh God, none of this feels real.
‘Maddie?’ She sits on the edge of the sofa, and points the remote at the TV. Turns it off. Looks back at me.
‘Thomas’s carer.’
‘The pretty American? Oh God, that’s awful.’
‘You don’t sound remotely shocked.’ I’m still out of breath, and press my bloodied glove against my chest.
She narrows her eyes. ‘Of course I’m shocked, Amelia. I’m practising my calming techniques, is all. It won’t do any of us any good if we all act like crazy people.’
‘Like me, you mean?’
‘I never said that.’
I bite down on my bottom lip hard, determined not to lose it with her. Knowing it won’t help. ‘Someone was sitting on the bench,’ I say, trying for calm. ‘Wearing a mask.’
‘Kyla’s bench?’
‘Yes.’
She splashes red wine into a glass in front of her. ‘Who was it?’
Finn. Finn. I think it was Finn. ‘Christ, Julia, I don’t know – but whoever it was is the killer.’
‘Do you know who Kyla was, Amelia?’ she says, taking a gulp of her wine, and I realise she’s trembling, nowhere near as calm as she pretends.
‘Christ sake, Julia, is that important right now?’ I say, heading for the window. I pull back the curtains to reveal snow stretching towards a copse.
‘She was Finn’s half-sister.’ A pause. ‘My half-sister.’
‘What?’ I turn. ‘I don’t understand.’
The lights dip, and chills run down my back.
‘She died twenty-six years ago.’
‘Kyla?’
She nods. ‘She was only fifteen, and her death had a dreadful effect on Ruth, left her mentally scarred – unstable. Poor Finn had a hard time of it as a kid.’ She takes a sip of her wine. ‘Ruth became possessive of him – scared she might lose him too.’ She pauses. ‘Of course this was before I was born, but I saw the outcome, what it did to poor Finn.’
My eyes flash from Julia to the window and back to Julia. ‘But you said she was your half-sister too.’
A bang on the French windows startles us, and Julia’s glass slips through her fingers and shatters on the floor.
It’s Finn, his bloody palms pressed against the glass, his eyes wide.
‘Don’t let him in,’ I yell.
‘Don’t be silly, Amelia. It’s only Finn. We can’t leave him out there.’ She heads over to the French doors.
But I see the mask sticking out of his pocket. ‘Wait. No!’ I cry.
‘But he’ll freeze to death out there,’ she says, ignoring my plea – unlocking the door.
Finn stares in, not moving, his pupils dilated in bloodshot eyes, his skin red raw from the cold.
As he finally steps forward, teeth chattering, one hand on his stomach, his other loose by his side, my heart thuds, and I step backwards.
‘Julia,’ he says, his voice barely audible as he reaches out his hand towards her, in the same way the figure on the bench had – there’s no doubting he was sitting there earlier, wearing the mask.
‘Oh God, Finn.’ Julia steps forward, and I want to yell at her to be careful,
