Page 35 of Fear Me Not

ASPEN

Why is Blake looking at me like that?

“Is everything okay?” I ask hesitantly.

His face is pale, his green eyes a shade darker. He looks haunted.

“Aspen?”

There’s a question in his tone that I don’t understand.

I point toward the kitchen, which was where I was going until I passed the drawing room and spotted Blake quite literally looking like he’d seen a ghost. “I’m just grabbing something to eat. Do you want anything?”

I feel like I’m putting out an olive branch. I’ve barely spoken to Blake, other than to fight, ever since the crash, and I’ve missed him. But putting out an olive branch doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven him.

“Where were you?” he asks, his voice shaky. “Like, just now?”

I frown. “Nowhere. Just in my room. Why?”

He shakes his head and sits forward and blows out a breath. “Nothing. Forget I said anything.”

“Did something happen?”

He hesitates then says, “I thought I saw something, but it must have been my imagination.”

“Or the hotel,” I tell him.

He glances up at me, and I can tell he’s biting the inside of his mouth. “Like I told you before, it has memories. When the days grow short and the snow stops us from leaving, those memories get stronger.”

I think back to the woman in the road and the bloody bath. To the strange drawings I’d created last week which remain hidden in my drawer. My sensible brain says this is all crazy, but I know it’s not. This is the reason Blake warned me about it not being a good idea to spend time alone. There’s something wrong with this hotel.

“Can they hurt us?” I ask him. “These memories?”

I half expect him to tell me not to be so ridiculous, and that it’s all in my head, but he doesn’t.

“Not directly.”

“But they can make us hurt ourselves, or each other?”

His answer alarms me.

“That’s why it’s not good for us to be alone.”

I suppress a smile. “Convenient.”

“Yeah.” He smiles back, but it doesn’t reach his green eyes.

That’s why they wanted me here over winter, to keep the hotel’s ghosts at bay, but what if I’ve brought ghosts of my own?

I think of something. “Why didn’t you believe me when I said I saw someone out on the road? Why did you excuse it away?”

“I thought it was too soon. The pass had only just shut. Normally, it takes a little more time for them to become stronger.”

I lift my eyebrows. “And the bloodied bath?”

He sighs and covers his face with his hands. “Yeah, maybe that, too. I didn’t want you to be scared, not so early into the winter.”

“But it is real?” I confirm, my stomach knotting with nerves.