What the hell is this place? My eyes scanned the pitched roofline, noting how the dull gray sunlight peeking through the storm clouds seemed repelled by the property. Maybe it was a portal to hell and Jack really was the devil.
Dripping wet, I took the walkway to the front door. With each step, my feet got colder, the ground sucking the warmth from my body through my boots. My coat was no match for this Arctic hellhole.
I hugged my coat and approached the front door. Honestly, the home was even more impressive up close. The woodwork looked brand new, including the white wooden railing around the front porch.
I stepped up to the stained-glass front door and rang the bell, but like before, no one answered. Meanwhile, the air just kept getting colder. Hands down, this house was one scary-ass slice of horror.
I made my way around the rosebushes to a tall iron gate that reminded me of something from medieval days, complete with wooden slats for privacy. I pushed down on the long handle until I heard a click. The gate swung open under its own weight.
Okay. Strange. I expected a home like this to be locked up tight. On the other hand, who would be crazy enough to come here? Just me apparently. And Jack of course.
I stepped inside the backyard, following the walkway along the side of the house. There was a dead tree to my right and overgrown weeds everywhere. I continued on, my skin prickly with fear. What would I find back here? Piles of dead bodies? Some sort of monster? Anything was possible.
I turned the corner, getting a full view of the back of the house and yard. What the hell? Fallen tree limbs cluttered the ground, most of the windows were broken, and rotting wet leaves covered everything. Old rusted-out lawn furniture sat on the patio next to several dead birds and flooded planters. It was like two different worlds. The front of the home was pristine. The back looked like a war zone.
In an instant, the rain turned from a healthy shower to a gusty wet windstorm. My coat flapped in the wind, and my duffel bag was getting soaked and heavy.
I hurried to the back door, which had French-style windows. Many of the squares were popped out. I dug out my phone and shined the flashlight inside. Rat droppings covered the hardwood floor, which was warped and stained from rain. But other than the rodents, there were no signs of life.
Okay, so the place looked like a haunted crack house, and no sane person would want to live here, but what had Jack seen? It couldn’t have been the dirt or rat shit that got to him.
Wanting to take a closer look, I reached for the handle. “Ouch!” I snapped my hand away. The door felt hot.
Faulty wiring? Something more? Either way, I wasn’t getting inside, and I’d reached my tolerance for shivering. It was time to snap off a bunch of photos. I would take a better look later, somewhere dry and warm, and try to figure out what had unsettled a man who defied the laws of nature.
I hurried back toward the gate, anxious to get the hell away from this place. The moment my foot touched the street, the air warmed fifty degrees.
Dear God. Whatever that house was, or whatever had been done to it, the owner did not want visitors. What had the crazy blonde woman called it? Warded. She’d said my house had been warded, too, to keep her off the property. Was this the same thing? Some sort of…magic?
Magic. I hated that word. It sounded silly, like something a child would say when talking about their favorite fairy tale. This was not whimsical or fun.
I headed down the hill to order a ride. The farther away from this cursed place, the better.
Once at the corner, I pulled up one of the pictures on my phone, using my coat to shield the screen.
Other than a run-down house, I saw nothing alarming in the photos. Broken windows around the door handle in the back. A dead lawn. Piles of dead weeds. It looked like there might’ve been a pool back there once, but it had turned into a sludge pond.
The only thing surprising was that the neighbors hadn’t complained about the state of the house. On the other hand, I doubted anyone was brave enough to snoop over the fence. The only reason I’d gone for a look was because I had to. I had to find out what Jack was hiding.
With that in mind, I went through my photos one more time.
Wait. What’s that? I zoomed in on a picture of the back door. One of the intact windowpanes had words etched into the glass. It took several tries, messing with the photo settings to get the contrast right, but there it was: Property of Ten Club.