The Haunting of Emily Stone Read Online Free PDF Page B

smile, allowing her to lead him into the house. “I knew you cared!”

Chapter Nine
     
    Twenty-four years ago
     
    Rain was pouring down as Joyce Stone opened her front door.
    “You're a goddamn liar!” Robert shouted, barely protected from the deluge by the umbrella he was holding.
    “Oh, piss off,” she replied, with a cigarette in her hand. She tried to shut the door, but Robert stepped forward and put his foot in the way.
    “What was the point?” he asked. “Did you do it just to get a kick out of the attention, or was it for money, or did you just want to humiliate a few people, or -”
    “You don't know what you're talking about,” Joyce replied, pulling the door back open and then trying to kick his foot out of the way. “Go on, fuck off. You've already done enough damage, telling the papers we're a bunch of fakes.”
    “I've done enough damage?” he asked incredulously. “ I've done enough? You're not just fakes, you're charlatans, liars -”
    “I'm not listening,” she replied. “Get off my property or I'll call the police.”
    “Mum?” a voice called out from inside the house.
    “Go upstairs!” Joyce shouted.
    Spotting Emily sitting on the stairs, Robert saw the fear in the little girl's eyes. For a moment, he felt sorry for her, before remembering that she'd been just as much part of the lie as her mother.
    “I hope you're proud of yourselves,” he continued, turning back to Joyce. “Not only have you wasted six months of everybody's time with this massive hoax, but you've damn near destroyed my career, as well as any chance of having this kind of research taken seriously. I believed you! I'm always so cautious, but I had this feeling, deep down, that you were telling the truth. What kind of idiot does that make me?”
    “Oh, bollocks,” Joyce hissed, “now are you gonna piss off, or do I have to call the police?”
    “Was it worth it?” he asked. “Just answer that question for me, and then I'll leave and never come back. Was it all worth it?”
    “Was what worth it?” she asked with a sigh.
    “All the lies. How did you get Emily to fake that voice? It must have taken some work. You've spent six months living a complete lie, Joyce, and you've turned your daughter into a liar too. I'm not the only one who was fooled by you, either. Did you really think you could keep it going forever?”
    He waited for a reply, but Joyce simply took an unimpressed drag on her cigarette, while Emily continued to watch from her position on the stairs. The little girl was shaking with fear, and her eyes were wide and filled with tears.
    “For the rest of our lives,” Robert continued, “we'll all be linked to this. Whenever anyone hears my name, they'll remember me as the guy who was fooled into believing all this bullshit. And whenever they hear the names Joyce and Emily Stone, they'll just remember a pair of liars who thought they could cheat the world, and that reputation will follow you all the way to your graves. So was it really worth it, Joyce? Six months of fame, for a lifetime of infamy?”
    “I'm sorry,” Emily called out to him.
    “Go upstairs!” Joyce shouted at her.
    Emily winced a little, but she stayed in her spot on the stairs.
    “They were gonna give us two hundred grand,” Joyce told Robert finally, with a hint of spite in her voice. “Two hundred, it was gonna be like winning the bloody lottery. And now look at us, we've got nothing, and we're not gonna get another chance like that, 'cause people like us, we don't get ahead, we don't get big breaks! It was our one chance! For your information, the first couple of times it happened to Emily, it was all real. We just emphasized it a little for you, and you lapped it up. It's showbiz, innit?”
    “You put on some very theatrical and imaginative illusions,” he told her, “but they were lies.”
    “The first few times -”
    “No-one believes you,” he continued, taking his foot out of the way of the door. “No-one will