The exterior siding was made of boards, running vertically along the walls and held down by narrower strips of wood—a construction style that she knew was called board and batten.
There were two windows and a door in front, all of them with boards nailed across to keep them closed. Probably the building had once been painted dark brown, which she could see in a couple of protected places, like under the window frames, but most of the paint had faded and flaked off, giving the exterior a desolate look.
“This is it?” Max asked, his voice startling her.
“Yes,” she answered, hearing the tightness in her own voice.
Was that why he gave her a studied look? Did he realize that coming here was the worst thing she could imagine? Or was he just sorry he had to put her through something unpleasant?
She struggled to pretend that coming here was no big deal, but of course it was. Things had happened at this isolated cabin in the woods, things she had pushed out of her mind like a soldier slamming the door of a bomb shelter. Only now she felt like she was trapped inside.
Drawing in a deep breath, she let it out slowly.
“What?” Max asked.
“This place is disgusting,” she managed to say.
“Yeah.” He looked around at the trash scattered on the ground. There were beer bottles and soda cans, wrappers from candy and junk food, and…
Olivia followed his gaze, spotted a presumably used condom lying in the weeds at the edge of the carport and felt nausea rising in her throat
“I guess people are still coming up here to party,” Max said. He glanced around at the woods. “This is about how the area looked when you used to come here?”
Struggling for a response, she whispered, “Well, maybe the underbrush is a little thicker.”
He gestured toward the building. “Did you go inside?”
He had pitched his voice low, and she wondered if the place was getting to him, too. Did some evil magic cling to the atmosphere?
She wanted to wrap her arms around her shoulders, but she forced herself to keep her hands at her sides. She glanced at Max. His face was grim. Maybe he was reacting to the way the place looked now. She was reacting to memories she wasn’t going to share. Or was he picturing wild parties up here? Drunk kids doing God knows what because there were no adults around to stop them.
“We went in,” she said in a thin voice, thinking about turning and fleeing down the path. But if she did that, he’d question her, and she didn’t want to talk about what had happened here.
“You’ve seen it. Can we leave?” she whispered.
“Soon. You haven’t been back in ten years?”
“No. And I wouldn’t be here now if you hadn’t dragged me,” she said.
“Sorry.”
“Are you?” she couldn’t stop herself from saying.
“I’m trying to figure out who murdered Angela. And if something bad happened to her up here, then I want to understand as best I can.”
When she didn’t answer, he turned back to the building, looking at the closed-up windows and doors. “How did you get in? The guys took the boards off the door or a window to get inside?”
She sighed. “No. Around back, there was a place where the siding was loose. There’s no insulation, and we could just climb through.”
“Show me.”
She gave him a pleading look. “I want to leave.”
“I know. But I want to understand what happened here.”
“You can’t understand!” she almost shouted, before resignation settled in. “I suppose the sooner I show you, the sooner we can split.”
She stomped away toward the back of the house. Max caught up and was right behind her as she stepped to the rear of the cabin, glad to have an excuse to turn away from Max so that he couldn’t see her face. She wasn’t sure if she looked scared. Or would it be angry? But she didn’t want him to ask her what she was feeling. She wanted him to think that she was just reacting to someone else’s trauma, because her own trauma was something she had never really faced.
Once again as she knelt by the back corner of the cabin, she was hoping that everything had changed. What if someone had come along and repaired the break in the siding, and they wouldn’t be able to get in? But when she pulled on the section of the exterior wood, it lifted up from the side of the little building, and she could see darkness beyond.
Crouching, Max joined her at the opening. “What’s inside?”
She sighed, resigned to his plans. “It used to be a big open room, then somebody had the bright idea of tunneling into the ground at the back.”
“You mean making extra room inside?”
“Yes.”