Hidden by Hope Welborn

Author:Hope Welborn [Welborn, Hope]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-01-04T16:00:00+00:00

Nine

Alison stood frozen on the stairs. “Noah?” Her voice squeaked.

“Don’t come down here.” Noah’s voice echoed in the room.

She hesitated, one hand on the stair railing. “Are you okay?”

“Fine. Just…stay where you are.”

“Was that a gunshot?” The acrid smell of gunpowder flooded the room.

Despite his instructions, she took a few more steps to the basement.

He’d said he was okay. So, what was going on?

She reached the bottom, but her view of Noah was blocked by a stack of boxes.

“Noah?” When he didn’t answer, she rounded the corner.

And pulled up short.

Noah stood over Pete Guthrey, gun in hand. Pete was slumped over in an unnatural way.

She stepped closer and another smell hit her.

Metallic. Sickening.

Blood.

It ran from the center of Pete’s forehead, down his face and across his body, pooling in a crimson circle on the floor.

She gagged and held a hand over her mouth.

Noah looked up, his face hardened in a way she’d never seen before. His blue eyes were dark and cold. His chest heaved with labored breaths.

“Alison.” His voice was as cold and dark as the night. “I told you to stay—”

Fear shot like electricity through her body.

“What did you do?” Her voice came out in a whisper. She looked from him to Pete’s dead body and then back. “Did you—?” She couldn’t finish the thought.

No. This couldn’t be happening. Noah couldn’t have—

Could he?

“Al—” He took a step toward her.

She flinched, moving back into a stack of boxes. They toppled, the sound crashing into the silence.

Noah reached for her. She spun, barely registering the stairs as she fled.

Go! Get away! Her thoughts screamed as her feet moved.

Tears blinded her. She stumbled on the stairs but kept going, her mind whirling as her body compelled her up the stairs.

To the door.

Out into the night.

Away from the terror. The blood. Pete’s lifeless body.

And Noah Chandler.

Icy wind stung her face, turning her tears into stings against her wet cheeks. The storm whipped her hair around her face. She pushed it back and ran, half blind, across the snow.

She was almost at the tree-lined drive when she heard him calling her name.

Away. She had to get away from this man. This killer.

Panic swept its way up her spine and across her lungs, stealing her breath.

She shot a look over her shoulder. Noah trekked after her. His long legs carried him across the snow faster than she could push through the snow drifts.

“Alison!” He called again, his voice closer this time.

She reached the woods and fell against a large oak. Her lungs ached as she pulled in quick breaths of freezing air.

No phone. No car keys. Where could she go?

The nearest neighbor was a half mile down the mountain.

She would freeze before she reached them.

If Noah didn’t kill her first.

Footsteps slushed through the snow.

He was coming closer.

She searched for a place to hide.

Under the cover of the trees, the snow was less deep. A clump of bushes to her left. Maybe she could duck under there before Noah reached her.

Leaving the shelter of the tree, she checked the trail.

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