The Talking House's Deadly Secret

At eleven at night, I couldn't sleep, so I climbed over the balcony and slipped into the run-down old apartment in the dark.

I switched on my flashlight and pulled the metal detector out of my bag.

I crouched in front of that wall and pressed the sensor against it.

Beep, beep, beep. The detector went off.

My hand jerked. I moved it to a few different spots and tried again.

The upper part of the wall gave nothing. In the middle a faint response started, and the lower I went, the sharper the sound got.

I slumped down onto the floor, my back soaked with sweat, the corners of my mouth pushing up no matter how hard I tried to keep them down.

There really was something inside the wall.

My head spun, and I sat there alone in the pitch-black living room grinning like an idiot.

With that money, Percy and I could kick back and never work again.

A breakup? What did that even matter? When the time came, I'd lay the money out in front of him. Enough to buy ten big luxury units.

But the smile didn't last long.

I'd bid the place up to a million and signed the contract. I had three days to pay in full.

I had five hundred thousand in my account. I was still five hundred thousand short.

The gold was in the wall, the cash was in the ceiling, and without the keys I couldn't smash a single thing.

Where was I going to scrape together five hundred thousand?

I stared blankly at the contacts on my phone.

I scrolled to Barret Fox, an old classmate from high school. He was in short-term loans now.

When he picked up, Barret went quiet for several seconds. "Girl, are you sure somebody isn't scamming you? That dump at Brookside Apartments is worth over a million?"

"Just do me this favor. You set the interest."

Any other time I wouldn't have dared touch it, but this was different.

In three days I'd have the keys, and that same night I'd take down the wall.

Over eighty million landing in my hands. What was a loan-shark loan next to that?

The day the money came through, my mom called. "Lydia, have you lost your mind? Barret says you took out a loan-shark loan to buy an apartment? Flipping property like some hotshot?" "Your father was so furious he didn't sleep all night! Our family has lived honest, steady lives for generations. I think that agent talked you stupid! You get that money back right now, forget about the apartment, do you hear me?"

I gripped the phone and said nothing.

She cursed at me a few more times, then hung up.

The three-day deadline came.

I wired the full million I'd pulled together to Rupert, got the property deed and the keys, and changed the locks the first chance I got.

I shut the door, drew the curtains. Tonight I'd smash the wall.