Dark Rapture Read Online Free

Vince. “Not quite what you expected?”
    “You could say that.” He blasted her with a cold look, surprising her after having only seen his gentle demeanor.
    He does get testy, doesn’t he? she thought, and she shrugged, offering him her unsure silence.
    Gary hopped out of the car. “Well, fellow explorers, are we ready?”
    Vince nodded and the two stomped down the tall purple-flowered weeds and tangled grass to clear a path for Scarlet to follow up to the crumbling brick steps. Dark clouds rolled over their heads and flashes of lightning pierced the sky in the distance. A cluster of palm trees in front of the house rippled as the downpour began, sending the threesome running for the door.
    Brandishing a key provided by his aunt, Vince wrestled with the rusted lock, while Gary and Scarlet huddled behind him to avoid the pendulous raindrops. Finally, after much twisting and turning and swearing at the rusted mechanism, the heavy oak door creaked open to reveal a long, dark hallway.
    Vince turned and sighed, as if to muster up courage to go in, and then stepped inside, followed by Scarlet and Gary.
    Scarlet squinted to make out the features of the lengthy hallway. Muted daylight shone across the marble floor and lit up a portion of the richly papered walls. Everything in sight was thick with dust and cobwebs.
    The wind rose, slamming the door shut behind them. They all spun to assure themselves that the others were still there. The hallway was now almost totally black save for the glimmer of light that shone through the boards on the windows to either side of the door.
    Gary snapped his gum and laughed, but nervously.
    “I can’t believe this,” Vince whispered.
    “Help me pry one of these off,” Gary said as he hooked his fingers beneath a long slat of wood, which let in the hazy light.
    Vince kicked the wood into the corner of the entryway and it bounced off the baseboard, leaving behind a deep gouge. “Man, this is a joke.”
    “Maybe it gets better,” said Gary.
    “Right,” Vince snapped, and started down the dusty hallway. “I bet it’s haunted, too.”
    Gary followed his long strides while Scarlet brought up the rear, their footsteps lifting the dust from the floor in tiny billowing clouds. She looked over the maroon velvet wallpaper crusted with dust and traced a clean spot with her finger across the raised gold wood chair rail that separated the wallpaper from the brown burnished stucco below.
    Above her head hung two crystal chandeliers, each at least six feet across by her estimate. The sparkle was gone from the many tiers of crystals, weighed heavily by a thick crust of dust. But the grandeur the house had once possessed was apparent.
    Ahead of her, the men stopped in the kitchen. Hearing their groans and sighs, she felt awful that their dreams had been so quickly dashed by the house’s sad state of disrepair. This place was definitely going to need some work before they could move in. Which in a way was good, because then Gary would have to stay with her longer.
    Gary flicked the sheets down from a window over the rusted porcelain sink and the three stood there looking at the grime, each sure of the other’s silent thoughts. What a dump.
    “It doesn’t look like anybody’s lived here for a hundred years. Except maybe ghosts.” Vince flung his arms out and the fringes on his pants shimmied madly as he paced the kitchen. “There is no way my great-grandfather could have lived in this mess. It’s going to take months to clean up.”
    “Remember, you did say he’d been gone for a while.” Gary fingered a delicate cobweb that spread across the sink. “That might explain the, ah, mess?”
    “Mess?” Vince shook his head and disappeared into the adjoining room, leaving Scarlet picking through the bare cupboards and Gary coughing in a cloud of dust.
    Curious to find the hidden opulence beneath the debris, Scarlet pulled the handle on the drawer below the counter but jumped back as if she’d