The wind had begun to change. The leaves in Ashwick no longer whispered softly but scraped against windows like restless fingers, and Sheriff Samuel Reeves felt the season turning in his bones. It had been two weeks since Harold Tate's autopsy, two weeks since the county coroner quietly placed the report on his desk with the same impossible note scrawled at the bottom: heart missing, no incisions.
He hadn't told Miller everything — not yet. The younger deputy had a habit of speaking too much when he was nervous, and Reeves didn't want rumors to spread through a town already thick with unease. But something in him refused to let go. Every road, every line of questioning, had begun curling back toward one name: Elias Warren.
Her name had first appeared in a faded deed tucked inside the county's archives — owner of the Warren property, abandoned since the early sixties. Reeves had seen the house once, half swallowed by ivy on the edge of Briar Creek Road, its shutters hanging like broken ribs. He'd written it off as just another decaying relic of the town's past. But then came the line in the report from 1962 — the coroner's note on Elias Warren's death.
Heart missing. No external wounds.
That was when the air in Reeves' office had gone still.
Now, late at night, the sheriff sat under the dim light of his desk lamp, the two reports side by side: Elias Warren, 1962. Thomas Greeley, 1984. Harold Tate, 1984. Three decades apart, three deaths that made no earthly sense.
He took a slow drag from his cigarette, the smoke curling up through the halo of light. His mind moved like a pendulum — logic on one side, instinct on the other — and lately, instinct had been winning.
"Sheriff?" a voice interrupted.
Reeves looked up to see Deputy Miller standing in the doorway, a manila folder tucked under his arm. His expression was cautious, the way it always was when he brought bad news.
"Got something for you," Miller said. "Pulled from the property records office in Ashmont. Took some digging."
Reeves motioned him in. Miller laid the folder open on the desk. Inside was a yellowed photograph of a woman — sharp-eyed, proud, standing in front of the Warren farmhouse. "That's her," Miller said. "Elias Warren. Died sixty-two. But here's the thing — she wasn't alone out there. Lived with a grandson. He'd have been about eight at the time."
Reeves leaned forward. "A grandson?"
"Name's Henry Warren," Miller said. "Found an address tied to some kind of state paperwork. He's still alive — or was, at least, last year. Old now, lives in a care home down in Monterey, California."
Reeves tapped the edge of the file, reading the lines of faded type. "You spoke to the facility?"
"Yeah," Miller said. "They said he's… well, not all there. Confused sometimes. But they confirmed he's still living. Been asking about Ashwick lately, though. Staff said he mentioned something about 'the house waking up again.'"
The sheriff's jaw tightened. "The house waking up," he repeated softly.
Miller shrugged uneasily. "Could just be dementia talking. You know how memory loops work in old age."
Reeves didn't answer. He reached for the photograph again, tracing the woman's face with his thumb. There was something commanding about her — a look that refused to fade even through the decades of dust.
When Miller left, Reeves sat in silence for a long while. The town outside was quiet, the station clock ticking faintly above the sound of the rain. The kind of night where thoughts grew heavier.
He turned his gaze back to the reports spread before him. Logic said coincidence. But coincidence didn't steal hearts without a trace. Coincidence didn't echo across thirty years.
By morning, he'd made his decision.
The next day, the sheriff's cruiser rolled down the two-lane highway out of Ashwick, rain misting against the windshield. The map on the passenger seat marked a long road south — through Oregon, into California, ending at a modest coastal town near Monterey Bay.
Miller had protested, of course. "You sure about this, Sheriff? It's not much to go on."
"I know," Reeves had said simply. "But maybe the past remembers something we don't."
The drive was long and silent, and by dusk, the Pacific air had turned warm and briny. The care home was small, tucked between cypress trees that bent toward the sea. The nurse at the reception desk gave Reeves a careful look before leading him down a quiet hallway.
"Mr. Warren doesn't talk much," she warned. "But sometimes, when he does… it's about things no one here understands."
Reeves nodded. He was used to that kind of talk.
When he entered the room, he found Henry Warren sitting by the window, sunlight spilling through the blinds across his face. His skin was paper-thin, but his eyes — blue-gray and distant — had a kind of restless intelligence still burning behind them.
"Mr. Warren," Reeves said gently, taking a seat across from him. "My name's Sheriff Samuel Reeves. I'm from Ashwick."
The old man's gaze flickered. "Ashwick," he murmured, almost to himself. "It's been a long time since anyone said that name to me."
Reeves leaned forward. "I'm here because of your grandmother. Elias Warren."
Henry's lips trembled slightly. "She told me it would come back," he whispered.
Reeves frowned. "What would come back?"
The old man's eyes shifted toward the window, toward the line of trees swaying beyond the glass. "The silence," he said at last. "The same kind that came before she died."
Reeves felt a chill trace the back of his neck. "Mr. Warren, your grandmother's death — it was unusual. I think you know that."
Henry nodded faintly. "No wounds," he said. "No blood. Just… gone."
Reeves hesitated. "Gone?"
"The heart," Henry said. "That's how it begins."
For a long moment, the room was silent except for the rhythmic tick of a clock.
Reeves cleared his throat. "Mr. Warren, how could you possibly know that? The coroner's report was sealed."
The old man smiled faintly — a tired, knowing curve of his lips. "Because I was there," he whispered. "And it's happening again, isn't it?"
Reeves didn't answer.
Henry turned back to the window, his voice barely audible. "Tell me, Sheriff… do you hear it yet? The house calling?"
Reeves stood slowly, unsettled but trying not to show it. "Thank you for your time, Mr. Warren," he said carefully.
As he walked down the hall toward the exit, the nurse caught his eye. "Did he say anything useful?" she asked softly.
Reeves adjusted his hat. "Depends on what you call useful," he said.
Outside, the sky had turned the color of copper, the sun dipping low over the ocean. Reeves paused by his car, the sound of waves mingling with Henry's last words echoing in his head.
Do you hear it yet?
For the first time, Sheriff Samuel Reeves wasn't sure if he wanted to.
END OF VOLUME 1