Yes, Mr Knight. Book 4: Part One
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Natalie Roche
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Chapter 1: The Empty Pit
JAMIE
The air smelled of salt and the sweet, coconut scent of sunscreen. The waves crashed against the shore behind me.
I was kneeling on a big, colorful beach towel. My skin felt warm from the sun, and my arms were sticky with wet sand. I was completely focused on what I was doing. Penelope was sitting right in front of me in the sand.
She looked so cute in her bright red bathing suit and a floppy straw hat that kept sliding over her eyes. She was working hard, using her little plastic spade to level the ground.
âMom, the keep has to be taller than the wall,â she said, her voice serious. She pointed at a pile of sand. âWe need the tallest tower ever. That way we can see everyone coming from a mile away!â
I smiled at her, my heart feeling full and light. I scooped up a handful of cool, wet sand and started layering it onto the central tower. âSmart planning, sweetie,â I murmured. I leaned over and kissed the top of her hat.
Then, a voice cut through the sound of the waves. It was deep, familiar, and made me feel safe instantly.
âWho wants to go for a swim?â Mason asked.
I looked up. He was standing there with the sun behind him. His dark hair was messy from the breeze, and his eyes crinkled at the corners as he gave me that heart-melting smile. He was wearing light linen shorts, and his broad shoulders were already wet from the sea. He looked happy. He looked perfect.
Penelope jumped up, kicking sand everywhere. âI do! I do!â she shrieked. She ran toward him as fast as her little legs could carry her. Mason laughed, scooped her up into his arms, and they ran into the water together.
I stood up to follow them, but suddenly, the warmth vanished. My stomach dropped. Something was wrong. My hands started to shake, and the sunlight turned a strange, sickly yellow. Mason isnât supposed to be here, I thought. Mason is dead.
A sharp, searing bolt of pain shot through my skull. The beach shattered like a piece of glass hitting the floor.
***
My eyes snapped open.
The first thing I saw was Eoin. My heart didnât just beat; it slammed against my ribs. I tried to jump back, but I couldnât move. I looked down, and panic choked me. My hands were tied tight to the arms of a rough, wooden chair, and my ankles were bound together with thick rope.
âHold still,â Eoin ordered. His voice was flat and cold. He was standing right in front of me, dabbing a clear liquid from a small brown bottle onto a piece of white gauze.
Eoin moved toward me. His touch felt clinical, like a doctor who didnât care if his patient lived or died. He tried to press the gauze against the deep gash on my forehead. I flinched away, jerking my head to the side. He let out a slow, annoyed sigh, like I was a child being difficult.
He didnât care that I resisted. He reached out, grabbed my chin to hold me still, and pressed the gauze hard against my wound. The antiseptic stung like fire. My head felt thick and fuzzy, like my brain was filled with cotton wool.
I realized then that I had been drugged. I couldnât remember anything after Eoin and Jason forced me into the car at the edge of the woods.
âWhere are we?â I demanded. My throat was dry, and the words came out weak and scratchy. I glared at him through the haze. âDid you drug me?â
Eoin kept the gauze pressed firmly against my forehead for a few more seconds, letting the sting sink in. Finally, he pulled it away and tossed the bloody used gauze onto a dusty table nearby.
âWeâre nowhere youâve been before,â he answered. He stepped back to look at his work. âItâs a place where we can have a private conversation. Just the two of us. No interruptions.â
He picked up the little brown bottle again, turning it slowly in his gloved fingers. âAnd yes, I drugged you,â he confirmed. A faint, cold light of amusement flickered in his eyes. âYou didnât give me much of a choice. I expected you to put up a fight, and you did. I find a mild sedative helps calm the nerves. It will wear off soon, donât worry.â
I forced my mind past the fuzziness, the terrifying image of Ericâs body still dominating my thoughts. If Eric was dead, anyone else could be too.
No one is coming!
SIX MONTHS PREVIOUS
With painstaking slowness, I turned the bedroom door handle. The faint click sounded like a gunshot in the quiet room. I pulled the door open just a sliver, moving as silently as I could. But just as I began to slip through, a vibration hummed against my hip.
My phone!
My heart jumped into my throat. I froze, a wave of anxiety washing over me. I snapped my gaze back toward the bed, my eyes searching the dark shape under the covers.
Relief hit me so hard my knees almost buckled. Mason didnât move. I watched the slow, steady rise and fall of his chest. Thank God. After nearly forty-eight hours, he had finally crashed from exhaustion barely an hour ago.
I had spent the last few hours perched on the edge of my seat, watching over him. Since his father died, Mason had thrown himself into his work with a desperate focus, trying to outrun the pain. The room usually smelled of home, but now it was thick with the heavy, bitter scent of scotch.
It was unsettling to see him like thisâso vulnerable and self-destructive.
I left the house quietly, drove to the meeting place, and killed the engine. Through the windshield, I stared at the dark woods fading into the night sky. We all agreed that the dark was the only time to do this.
My stomach turned as I thought about when we were here two nights agoâthe frantic digging and how heavy it all felt. None of us wanted to be here, but backing out wasnât an option. It was a little too late for that. We were already in too deep.
In the distance, two figures waited. I found Carmenâs eyes; her face was just a pale blur in the dark. Ethan stood beside her, his broad shoulders slumped. The moonlight glinted off the metal shovels in their hands.
It felt surrealâlike a lifetime had passed, but it had been a matter of days since our lives were normal. Mason and I got engaged, our future was right in front of us.
There was still hope.
Now, everything was different. Harryâs death had ripped a hole in our lives that felt impossible to fill. And then there was Eoin. He wasnât the cousin we thought we knew; he was Masonâs brother. That secret brought years of hidden hate and plotting along with it.
While Mason lay at home, passed out from grief and scotch, I stood in the silent woods about to bury the same body for a second time. Our plan was crazy, but we had to make sure our secret stayed buried for good.
Across the clearing, Carmen looked at me with worried eyes. She mouthed the words, âAre you okay?â without a sound leaving her lips.
Iâm nowhere near okay, I thought. I hated the truth, but I just gave her a small, tight nod. It was a complete lie, but I didnât have a choice. I had to keep it together. If I broke down now, we were all finished.
I took one more shaky breath, then opened the car door and stepped out. The gravel crunched loudly under my feet, a harsh noise in the quiet night. I walked toward them, my fingers gripping the cold metal of the shovel.
Ethan didnât look up as I got close. He just stared at the dark patch of dirt near his boots. But Carmen didnât let me hide. She waited until I was standing right in front of her, her eyes searching mine.
âI was worried you werenât going to get out of the car,â Carmen said softly, her voice low.
âWe made a pact, remember?â I whispered back. âWeâre in this together.â
I reached out and squeezed her arm. Her jacket was damp with the night mist, and she was trembling. After everything weâd enduredâthe blood, the panic, the liesâthere was no way I was letting them do this alone. Moving the body again had been my idea. It was my burden to carry too.
We needed each other for more than just the heavy lifting. Moving two hundred pounds of dead weight was one thing, but facing the darkness again was another. Other than Jack, we were the only three people in the world who knew the truth.
This wasnât a secret that would just vanish at sunrise. We were going to carry this togetherânot just tonight, but for the rest of our lives.
My shovel broke the surface first, sinking easily into the soft, rain-soaked mud. Carmenâs followed swiftly, her movements efficient and focused. Ethan, however, seemed to approach the task with reluctance, his shovel hovering for a moment before he finally plunged it into the earth.
We dug in silence, the wet earth clinging to our boots. Every shovelful felt heavier than the last. The rain fell steadily now, turning the ground into a slick, muddy mess that made it hard to keep our feet from slipping. But reopening the grave was easier than the first time; the soil was still loose from when weâd packed it down two nights ago.
Just get it over with, I told myself, the words repeating like a prayer. Every muscle in my arms burned, and the urgency in my gut felt like a physical knot, pulling tighter with every shovelful of dirt.
I need to get back before Mason wakes up and realizes that Iâm gone. The chilling question of what I would even tell him hung in the air, unanswered. An excuse I hadnât even begun to formulate.
His dad has just died in a fire. I should be by his side.
An hour had passed. I swiped sodden hair away from my eyes with the back of my hand, accidentally smearing a thick streak of cold mud across my forehead. I didnât care. I stopped for a second, my chest heaving, my breaths coming out in white plumes that vanished in the rain.
I looked down into the dark, water-filled pit. The rain was starting to pool at the bottom. Thatâs when the knot of unease in my stomach turned into a sharp spike of dread. I donât remember it being this deep.
âI donât remember the hole being this deep,â I said, my voice shaking.
Ethan stopped too, leaning his weight against his shovel. His face was gray. âYouâre right. Weâve been at it for an hour. We should have hit the tarp by now.â
A sinister silence settled over us, and the only sound was the heavy rain hitting the mud. Ethan looked up at Carmen, his eyes wide and panicked. âYou said it was this spot,â he said, his voice rising with a sharp edge.
âIt is this spot!â Carmen snapped, her voice defensive and high-pitched.
âClearly itâs not! Where the hell is he?â Ethanâs voice cracked. He looked down at the pit. âWhere is the body, Carmen? We should have found him!â
The rain felt like icy fingers sliding down my spine, tracing the path of my dread. Brent was gone. The body wasnât where we had left it, and now Carmen and Ethan were unraveling, their voices rising in the middle of the woods.
âIt has to be here!â Ethan cried out. He started stabbing the shovel into the mud, his hands shaking so hard the metal clinked against the rocks. He wasnât even digging anymore; he was just hitting the ground in a frenzy.
âIâm telling you, I marked the tree!â Carmen shouted back, her eyes wide with panic.
âShut up! Both of you!â I hissed. I spoke with a sharp edge that silenced them. They both froze, staring at me in the dark. I pointed down at the muddy, water-filled pit. âI know itâs this spot. I remember the layout of the clearing, and look at the groundâthe dirt is loose. Itâs been moved.â
âWhat does that mean, Jamie?â Carmenâs voice was a terrified whimper.
âIt means someone beat us to it,â I said, stepping closer to the edge, the mud pulling at my boots. âSomeone moved the body.â
The evidence was right there in the mud. Someone had dug Brent up before we arrived. It wasnât the policeâthere were no sirens, no yellow tape, no news crews. This was something else. Someone who watched us. Someone who knew exactly where to dig.
JACK!
