Dead Scared Read Online Free PDF

destruction of others. Who believed they were clever enough to cause pain without even getting their hands dirty.

 
    EVI WOKE WITH a start, convinced someone was tapping on her bedroom window. She lay still for several seconds. Nothing. Just a dream, one of the bad ones, the ones that started with a strange, misshapen creature banging on the window. She had to get back to sleep before she started thinking, because otherwise she’d be awake all night. She turned over in bed, just as the tapping noise began again. She raised her head from the pillow to listen properly.
    Fully awake now, she knew it wasn’t coming from the window. The cedar tree didn’t even reach this side of the house. It was coming from right above her head. From the room upstairs. She reached out, found the light and sat up.
    Tap, tap, tap. There was a phone beside her bed. The police, or university security, could be here in minutes. If she told them she thought someone was upstairs they wouldn’t waste time. On the other hand, she’d feel a proper fool if she called out several hulking men in uniform to investigate a squirrel infestation.
    She sat still in the bed, unable to make up her mind.
    Did squirrels make that insistent, shrill tapping noise? The beak of a trapped bird might. The sound stopped. A second later it started again. Tap, tap, tap for a few more seconds and then silence. Only two choices really. Call help and risk looking ridiculous or investigate herself. Evi got up, tucked her stick under her arm and left the room.
    The house had been fitted with a stairlift but Evi hated using anything that made her feel both elderly and disabled, so she slept downstairs, using a guest bedroom and bathroom. She sat now on the chair and pressed the button that would take her to the top. When the mechanism halted, there was nothing but silence in the house. Evi realized she hadn’t brought a phone with her. If anything happened, she’d be trapped on the upper floor with no means of calling help.
    The room directly above where she slept was at the end of the corridor. She could hear nothing. The door was closed. She pushed it open and switched on the light.
    The room was empty. No en suite bathroom. Curtains drawn back. Nothing to hide behind. No sign of anything out of the ordinary, except stray ash and twigs around the fireplace. Knowing that a trapped bird or rodent could probably explain the sound she’d heard, Evi felt a small measure of relief. It would be a nuisance, getting the chimney swept, but hardly a big deal. She was halfway across the room when the tapping began again.
    This close, there was no mistaking exactly where it was coming from. Not the chimney after all, but one of the beautiful fitted oak wardrobes to either side of the fireplace. The one to her right. Evi stepped closer. The sound was tiny, tinny. There was nothing to be afraid of, surely, from something that sounded so small?
    Evi put her hand on the wardrobe door handle, knowing she was very afraid. Knowing also she didn’t have a choice. She pulled open the door.
    For a second she didn’t see it. She’d been looking directly ahead, half flinching, expecting something to fly out at her. Then she looked down and saw the bone man.

 
    BRYONY’S FIRST SESSION with the counsellor had been in the third week of term. Even that early in the academic year, she’d been struggling to cope, finding the rough and tumble of student life, the banter, the frequent practical jokes, difficult to deal with.
    I finished my second glass of wine and wasn’t sure I could stay awake much longer. Then I got to the notes of Bryony’s third session with her counsellor and suddenly sleep seemed a very long way away.
    During this session, Bryony had brought up her fear that someone was coming into her room at night and touching her while she was asleep. There were no transcripts of the sessions, so I couldn’t judge exactly how the counsellor had reacted to Bryony’s suspicions, but I