Chapter 1 - Don’t Let It Hear You
The smile reached its widest point.
Then the bride vanished.
Not backward.
Not sideways.
One instant her porcelain face was pressed inches from the passenger window, her wet fingers spread across the glass.
The next—
nothing.
Daniel Mercer slammed his foot onto the brake.
The car fishtailed slightly across the rain-darkened road before stopping.
For several seconds he did not move.
His hands remained locked around the steering wheel.
The engine idled.
Rain whispered against the windshield.
Beyond the passenger window stood only the old wooden fence and a wall of leafless trees dissolving into mist.
Daniel looked at the wet glass.
Five fingerprints remained.
Real fingerprints.
Water slowly ran through them.
“What the hell…”
His phone was still recording from the dashboard mount.
Daniel grabbed it.
He replayed the final seconds.
There she was.
Running beside him.
The ivory dress.
The finger against her lips.
The impossible moment when she appeared to pass straight through the wooden fence.
Then the empty road.
Then—
Daniel paused.
Something was wrong.
He replayed Scene 6.
The bride appeared against the window.
Her hand struck the glass.
Her face approached.
Her mouth slowly formed that terrible smile.
But the video contained something Daniel had not noticed while watching her.
A reflection.
Behind his shoulder.
Inside the car.
Daniel stopped breathing.
A dark shape seemed to be sitting in the back seat.
He spun around.
Empty.
Black leather.
His overnight bag.
A damp jacket.
Nothing else.
Daniel replayed the clip.
The shape remained.
Too vague to identify.
Possibly the headrest.
Possibly his jacket.
Possibly—
He zoomed.
The image pixelated.
No answer.
Daniel almost laughed at himself.
He was tired.
He had been driving for seven hours.
Rain, fog, darkness and a woman in a wedding dress had done the rest.
A woman.
Not a ghost.
There had to be an explanation for the fence.
An opening he had missed.
An angle.
A trick of perspective.
Daniel looked toward the woods.
Then he noticed the footprints.
Bare footprints crossed the wet shoulder beside his car.
They began near the passenger door.
Continued backward toward the fence.
And stopped.
Not at the fence.
Six feet before it.
Daniel stared.
If she had run from the road into the woods, the prints should continue.
They did not.
His phone rang.
No caller ID.
He nearly ignored it.
Then answered.
“Hello?”
At first, only static.
Then a woman whispered:
“Is she still running?”
Daniel’s skin tightened.
“Who is this?”
“Answer me.”
“Who the hell are you?”
The woman breathed shakily.
“Did she touch your car?”
Daniel looked at the fingerprints.
“Yes.”
Silence.
Not surprise.
Fear.
The caller whispered:
“Then don’t speak again.”
Daniel frowned.
“What?”
“Turn off the engine. Turn off your lights. And whatever you hear outside—do not answer it.”
Daniel almost ended the call.
Then something tapped the rear windshield.
Three soft knocks.
Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
Daniel’s eyes moved toward the mirror.
Nothing behind him.
“What is this?”
The caller hissed:
“I told you not to speak.”
Another three taps.
Closer somehow.
Daniel stared into the rearview mirror.
The road behind him was empty.
Then a voice came from outside the driver’s door.
A man’s voice.
Weak.
Terrified.
“Please help me.”
Daniel instinctively turned.
No one.
The caller whispered:
“That isn’t a man.”
Daniel’s mouth went dry.
“What’s happening?”
“Drive.”
“You just told me to turn everything off.”
“Because I thought you were still before the marker.”
“What marker?”
The caller suddenly began crying.
“Daniel, drive.”
His blood went cold.
He had never given her his name.
“Who are you?”
“Please.”
“Tell me who you are.”
A long silence.
Then:
“My name is Rebecca Hale.”
Daniel stopped breathing.
He knew that name.
Everyone in Bellweather County knew it.
Rebecca Hale had disappeared on her wedding night in October 1998.
Her abandoned car had been found on this road.
Her wedding dress had never been recovered.
Neither had her body.
Daniel looked toward the woods.
The bride he had just seen could not have been older than twenty-five.
Rebecca Hale would be fifty-three.
“You’re not Rebecca.”
The woman began whispering desperately.
“No, Daniel.”
A pause.
“I’m the woman who survived her.”
The call disconnected.
At that exact moment, the car’s interior light came on by itself.
Daniel looked down.
The passenger door was open.
Only an inch.
Cold mist curled through the gap.
On the seat lay something that had not been there before.
A small ivory button.
Old.
Wet.
A strand of brunette hair was wound around its thread.
Daniel stared at it.
Then his phone received a text from the same unknown number.
One photograph.
Daniel opened it.
It showed Rebecca Hale on her wedding day in 1998.
Beautiful brunette.
Ivory long-sleeved gown.
Porcelain skin.
The same face Daniel had just watched running beside his car.
But Daniel barely noticed Rebecca.
May you like
Because standing behind her in the wedding photograph was a smiling twenty-eight-year-old man.
Daniel’s father.
