THE HOUSE BENEATH THE RED PINES

Chapter One — The Girl by the Lake

When Mara Venn received the call, she was sitting alone in a nearly empty diner three counties away from the town where she had grown up.

The waitress had just refilled her coffee when her phone vibrated across the table.

“Is this Mara Venn?”

“Yes.”

“This is Detective Aaron Cole, from Bellweather County.”

Mara stopped stirring her coffee.

She knew that voice.

Not personally. Not really.

But she had heard it years ago, when Detective Cole had been the young deputy who came to her family’s house after her older sister disappeared for three hours during a summer storm.

“What happened?” Mara asked.

There was a pause.

“A teenage girl is missing.”

Mara looked through the window.

Rain streaked the glass, turning the parking lot into a gray blur.

“And you want me to write about it?”

“We’ve heard you’re working for the state paper now.”

“I am.”

“The girl’s name is Elise Hart. Sixteen years old. Last seen Sunday evening near the old lake road.”

Mara said nothing.

Then Cole added quietly:

“She isn’t the first.”

The spoon slipped from Mara’s fingers.

For twenty years, she had avoided Bellweather.

Now she was going back.

Bellweather had changed very little.

The same narrow streets.

The same church tower.

The same red-brick courthouse.

And beyond the town, the same enormous pine forest stretched toward the lake.

Mara parked outside the police station just before sunset.

Detective Cole was waiting by the entrance.

He was older than she remembered, though she wasn’t sure she had ever really known him.

“You look tired,” he said.

“So do you.”

He smiled faintly.

“Still honest.”

“Still avoiding small talk.”

Cole handed her a folder.

“That’s everything we can release.”

Mara opened it.

Elise Hart.

Sixteen.

Honor student.

No known enemies.

No history of running away.

Last seen wearing a green jacket and carrying a canvas backpack.

“What about the other girls?” Mara asked.

Cole’s expression changed.

“Two years ago, Rebecca Lane disappeared. Fourteen.”

“And?”

“Never found.”

“And the second?”

“Lily Mercer. Fifteen. Found dead in the lake three months later.”

Mara stared at the photographs.

Three girls.

Three years.

The same town.

The same forest.

Then Cole said something that made her stomach tighten.

“Elise was last seen near the Venn property.”

Mara looked up.

“My mother’s house?”

Cole nodded.

“She doesn’t live there anymore?”

“She does.”

Mara closed the folder.

“Of course she does.”

Her mother opened the door before Mara knocked.

Evelyn Venn had always seemed untouched by time.

Silver hair.

Perfect posture.

A pale blue dress.

And the same expression Mara remembered from childhood: warm enough to look loving, cold enough to make you doubt it.

“You came back,” Evelyn said.

“I was asked to.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

Mara stepped inside.

The house smelled of roses and furniture polish.

Nothing had changed.

The hallway portraits still watched from the walls.

Her father’s portrait.

Her sister’s portrait.

Her own childhood photograph.

Mara stopped.

Someone had turned her photograph face down.

“Why is that there?” she asked.

Evelyn looked at it.

“I don’t like the expression.”

“It was taken when I was eight.”

“You looked angry.”

“I was.”

Her mother smiled.

“You always were.”

That night, Mara couldn’t sleep.

At 2:17 a.m., she heard footsteps outside her bedroom.

Slow.

Careful.

Stopping directly behind the door.

Mara sat up.

“Mom?”

Silence.

Then something slid underneath the door.

A photograph.

Mara picked it up.

It showed Elise Hart standing beside the lake.

But there was something strange about the picture.

Someone had drawn a black circle around the girl’s face.

And underneath it, in red ink, were four words:

SHE KNOWS ABOUT YOU.

Mara stared at the message.

Then she turned the photograph over.

On the back was another sentence.

ASK YOUR MOTHER WHAT HAPPENED TO JULIAN.

Mara’s breathing stopped.

Julian.

Her little brother.

The child nobody in the family ever talked about.

The child whose name had disappeared from every photograph in the house.

The child Mara had been told had died before she was born.

But that was impossible.

Because Mara remembered him.

She remembered his laugh.

She remembered the red toy boat he carried everywhere.

And she remembered the last time she had seen him.

He was standing at the edge of the lake.

Holding her hand.

Crying.

Then someone came up behind them.

And everything went black.