Chapter 1 - The Three Knocks
The first night I slept at my grandfather’s farm, I woke up because someone knocked on the front door.
Three times.
Knock.
Knock.
Knock.
I stared into the darkness.
For several seconds, I could not move.
The farmhouse was exactly as I remembered it, but memory had changed the proportions of everything. The hallway seemed longer. The ceilings seemed higher. The old grandfather clock in the living room sounded brutally loud in the silence.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
I reached for the lamp beside the bed.
Nothing.
The power had gone out.
Of course it had.
I had arrived that afternoon with two suitcases, a mattress topper, a grocery box, and the stubborn conviction that I was not afraid of an empty house.
Now I wasn't so sure.
The knocking came again.
Three times.
Knock.
Knock.
Knock.
My grandfather's carved sentence flashed through my mind.
DON’T ANSWER AFTER THE THIRD KNOCK.
I had found those words beneath his desk six months ago, scratched into the wood so deeply that the blade had nearly split the grain.
At the time, I had thought they were a warning about something specific.
Now I wondered if he had meant exactly this.
Someone was standing outside my door at two thirteen in the morning.
I climbed out of bed.
My bare feet touched the cold hardwood.
The knocking stopped.
I waited.
Nothing.
I walked into the hallway.
Moonlight poured through the windows, turning the old family photographs on the walls into pale rectangles. My grandfather and grandmother on their wedding day. My mother at sixteen. My uncle Robert holding a calf. Me at seven years old, missing two front teeth and grinning beside a tractor.
I reached the foyer.
The front door was twelve feet away.
I could see the shadow of something beneath it.
A pair of boots.
My heart slammed once against my ribs.
“Who is it?”
No answer.
I should have called the sheriff.
Instead, I moved closer.
A voice came through the wood.
“Are you Hannah Walker?”
It was a woman's voice.
Old.
Rough.
Terrified.
“Yes.”
A pause.
“Then don't turn on the porch light.”
I stopped breathing.
“Why?”
“Because if they see you talking to me, you're next.”
I stared at the door.
“Who are you?”
“Someone your grandfather trusted.”
The woman stepped closer.
“I need you to listen carefully.”
I didn't open the door.
“You knocked three times.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Henry told me you would eventually come.”
My throat tightened.
“Is my grandfather alive?”
Silence.
Then the woman whispered,
“Not where you think.”
I stepped back.
“What does that mean?”
“You need to leave this farm.”
“Why?”
“Because Robert Walker knows you're here.”
The floorboards behind me creaked.
I spun around.
Nobody.
My breath caught.
The sound had come from the kitchen.
I looked toward the dark doorway.
“Wait,” I whispered.
When I turned back to the front door, the woman was gone.
I opened it.
The porch was empty.
The gravel lane stretched toward the barn beneath the moonlight.
No car.
No footsteps.
No headlights.
Nothing.
Then I noticed something sitting on the doormat.
An old brass key.
Tied to it was a strip of red cloth.
I picked it up.
On the cloth were three words written in black ink.
BARN. THIRD STALL.
I stared toward the barn.
Grandpa's barn had twelve stalls.
The third stall had been nailed shut for as long as I could remember.
I suddenly understood why.
I just didn't know what was waiting behind it.
I grabbed a flashlight.
Then I remembered the woman's warning.
Robert knows you're here.
My uncle lived forty minutes away.
How could he possibly know?
Unless someone had told him.
Unless someone had been watching the house.
I stepped onto the porch.
The night wind moved through the fields.
Far beyond the barn, something metallic reflected the moonlight.
A vehicle.
Parked beyond the tree line.
Watching.
I lowered my flashlight.
The vehicle's headlights suddenly turned on.
Then it backed away into the darkness.
I stood there frozen.
Whoever had been watching me had just made sure I knew they were there.
And somehow, that frightened me more than if they had stayed hidden.
I closed the front door.
Locked it.
Then I looked down at the brass key in my palm.
Three knocks.
Third stall.
A man who disappeared.
And a family member who apparently knew I had arrived before I had even unpacked my first suitcase.
I picked up my jacket.
“If you're leaving clues for me, Grandpa,” I whispered, “I'm going to find every single one.”
Then I walked toward the barn.
Behind me, from somewhere inside the dark farmhouse, I heard three quiet knocks.
Knock.
Knock.
Knock.
I froze.
This time, they hadn't come from the front door.
May you like
They had come from inside the house.
And whatever was making that sound was standing on the other side of the wall between my bedroom and the hallway.
