QUIET ONES Prologue

Quiet Ones is the third installment in the Hellbent series, a spin-off of the Fall Away series. This prologue is still being grammar-checked.

Quinn

Nine Years Ago

“We don’t have to find you, you know?” he calls out.

I step from one rafter to the other, and then kneel down and peek through the slits in the ceiling beneath me. My niece and nephews are below, searching the great room of the main lodge of our family’s summer camp. At only ten—a couple of years younger than me—I don’t think they know that the ceiling above them is false, the rafters I stand on hidden away up here decades ago by the previous owners to conserve heat.

I’m so close to them and they can’t even see me. 

“If we turn off the lights,” Kade goes on. “You’ll come to us!”

I drew the short straw, so I have to hide. If they find me, then I’m the one who has to steal the keys to the ATVs for a no-parents midnight ride this weekend.  

And I really don’t want to steal anything. I’m not good at breaking rules.

“Quinnnn…” Hawke sings in a calm tone, and I watch him look from left to right like a cyborg scanning for heat signatures. “I know you can hear me, and I don’t have to shout. Where are you?”

I smile. Hawke is actually only a year younger than me, and I don’t usually stump him.

I never really felt like the oldest out of the kids. I’m still wondering where I fit. My older brothers are their parents, and since the age gap between my brothers and me is more than twenty years, they act more like my parents too. And their kids grew up more like my cousins, but not in the same way that they’re cousins with each other. I never understood why it felt different, but I just knew that someday it would be.

Maybe I liked that I’d be treated more like an aunt to them when we grew up. Or maybe I didn’t. All I knew was that something separated them and me, and it was more pronounced when we were all together like this, because that’s when I noticed the couples. How everyone broke into a natural pair. Dylan and Hunter. Kade and Hawke.

The babies, A.J. and James, would also grow up together.

They didn’t exclude me. But none of them gravitated to me like they did to each other.

Even the adults were all in pairs.

“Quinn!” Dylan yells, searching underneath lunch tables, dressed in her Chucks and hoodie.

Kade’s twin, Hunter, follows her. Always within reach of each other. “Quinnie!” he calls.  

“Quinnie-bean!” I hear Kade tease from farther away.

I hate those names. I should tell them, but everyone teases each other in this family, and I don’t want to make it awkward.

Hawke stalks slowly, out of view, and I plant my hands on the rafter under me, pushing myself up. I leap from one beam to another, following their voices in the faint light streaming up from below.

It’s a little dark up here, but it was the only hiding place I suspected they didn’t know about.   

They trail through the lodge, and I don’t peer down to see which rooms they search. The kitchen, the pantry, the offices…

Taking out my compass, I flip the lid, finding north. I turn to where the needle points, knowing the lake is ahead of me—out of the lodge, across the lawn, and to the beach. Then I pivot to the left, knowing the way out is that way. 

“We’re coming for you, Quinn!” Hunter threatens.

Followed by Kade, “I just hope we find you before sheee does.”

She…

I glance over one shoulder, then the other, looking above me and all around.

Undergrove.

That’s what they call her. The spirit who lives on the tiny island in the middle of the lake. A summer camp urban legend. I scan the far recesses of the dark corners, the walls of the attic disappearing into a blackvoid. She could be there.

But I shake it off and kneel back down. He’s just trying to scare me out of hiding. I don’t believe in ghosts.

And I don’t know why I’m even playing Hide & Seek. I don’t want to steal the ATVs for a secret ride in the woods, either. One of the many other things about me that made it feel like I never really fit in with my family. They all love to drive things. Especially the adults. Cars, motorcycles, drones, boats, side-by-sides…

Lowering myself, I peer through a small hole in the ceiling.

They all love speed, and they’re all in pairs.

My brothers and their wives…

My parents…

“Can I help you?” I hear my mom through the peephole.

I watch her pick up the other end of a table, helping my brother’s mom—my dad’s first wife—clear the room. The whole family is gathered this weekend to help my brother Jax and his wife, Juliet, clear and clean the lodge and cabins for renovations that’ll happen over the fall and winter, before next summer’s campers arrive.

Madeleine, my dad’s ex, tenses. “No, I’ve got it.”

“It’s okay.” My mom walks backwards, leading the table out of the room.

But Madeleine drops her end, snapping, “Katherine, please.”

I narrow my eyes. Madoc’s mom has always been nice to me. Why is she being mean?

My mom freezes, her expression timid. She looks like Jared, a little. And like me when I don’t know what to say. We all have the same eyes. Brown, like chocolate, is what everyone says.

My blonde hair is my dad’s, though.  

I curl my fingers into a wooden beam. I don’t like Madoc’s mom talking to mine like that. Madeleine didn’t yell, but she sounded like my brothers when they’re scolding their kids.

My dad appears in my view. Dusts covers his khakis, and there are green paint marks on his white T-shirt. He doesn’t say anything to his first wife, cupping my mother’s face instead and looking at her softly. His fingers thread through the wisps of long, dark hair that’ve excaped her messy bun.

I lean down more, watching carefully. I’m not supposed to know why my dad’s first wife doesn’t get along with my mom, but I do.

My mother pulls back from my father. “I’ll see what they’re doing in the kitchen,” she tells him, tears trapped in her throat. 

My mom leaves the small room—once a little old library, I think—and my dad turns to his first wife. “It’s been years—decades,” he points out. “How long are you going to make her pay?”

“I’m not trying to hurt her,” Madeleine tells him. “But we’ll never be okay.”

My mom was my dad’s mistress. For a very long time, I think.

Madoc’s mom, while kind to me, doesn’t visit much. She lives in New Orleans with her husband, and Madoc and his family go there to visit most of the time. They even took me once.  

My dad lowers his voice. “It’s me you should be mad at.”

“I am.”

My father steps closer. “She was young.”

“And then she wasn’t,” Madeleine replies quickly.  

There’s a five or six years’ age difference between my parents. He was in his twenties and already married with a kid. My mom was a teenager with a baby of her own. It’s weird to me that someone hates them, but I love that my dad only worries about someone hating my mother. It hurts him to see.

Madeleine sighs. “I’m not going to get into this with you.” She squares her shoulders. “You’re married, you’ve been married for fifteen years, and I know you’re happy. So am I,” she tells him before dropping her voice to almost a whisper. “But I can still feel it, you know?”

I tilt my ear to the peephole.

“Being forgotten,” she goes on. “The nights I was alone, knowing where you were, and wondering what the hell was wrong with me that you kept running to her.” Her tone grows harder. “And it doesn’t change the pain that your daughter is beautiful and kind and Madoc adores her, but she’s going to get you at your best when he got you at your worst,” she growls, a sob thickening her voice. 

I want to defend my dad. And my mom. They’re good parents and good grandparents and they don’t do anything wrong.

“All that pain because you couldn’t stop fucking her,” Madoc’s mom says.

I wince.

She continues, “You don’t get to demand that I forget simply because you perceive that an acceptable amount of time has passed.”

My dad drops his eyes and part of me understands the sadness on his face. I guess I’d be mad if I were her and it were my husband.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers.

“Would you have done anything differently?”

He doesn’t say anything at first. Maybe he’ll say he shouldn’t have married Madeleine in the first place. I mean, if he didn’t love her, then…

But instead, he says, “I would’ve…left you sooner.”

I flit my eyes to Madoc’s mom, and it’s brief, but I see it. The flinch.

He would’ve still married her.

To get Madoc.

I can’t help but wonder what their wedding day was like. Celebration and laughter and dancing. Does it hurt her how much she hates him now? Could that happen to my brothers and their wives? Could it happen to me someday?

She leaves the room, and my father barely has time to run his fingers through his hair before Jared’s wife, Tate, walks in. “Can I help?” she chirps.

He flexes his jaw, struggling to find his words. After a moment, he exhales and forces a smile. “Thanks.”

They pick up the table and move it out of the room.

I watch them disappear from view and inhale though my nose as if pushing everything I just heard down into my stomach. Hiding it away. Keeping it to myself.

I don’t know why. Maybe because no one talks to me about the past. They don’t want me to know things.

Maybe it just feels good to know more than the other kids. Everyone acts like I don’t have a clue because I’m quieter than they are.

Or maybe it’s just fun to see and listen to what people say when they’re not around children.

“Just give us a clue!” Kade bellows, pounding walls.

“A bird chirp,” Hunter adds from the distance.

“Or a knock!” Dylan offers.

I grin to myself.

But then I hear the booming voice that knots my stomach. “Quinn?!”

My oldest brother, Jared. There’s no reason to be scared of him, but I am, because I can never seem to stand up to him. It’s like my brain leaves my body, and I forget English.

“How long have you guys been seeking?” he asks them.

“A while,” Hunter gripes.

“But I’m not forfeiting!” Kade immediately yells loud enough for me to hear.

Me either. I slide over to another beam, about to slink down for a better view, when a knock echoes through the blackness of the attic.  

I pop up straight.

I jerk my head, scanning the dark corners of the loft. What was that?

Another knock, and I jump, feeling a scream rise up my throat. I clamp my hand over my mouth to stop it.

But maybe I should just yell. I don’t want to be here anymore. I watch the black voids, waiting for something to emerge.

 Three more knocks vibrate through the attic. I think they’re coming from the kitchen area.

Heading from one beam to the other, I crouch down, spotting Lucas Morrow through a sliver in the panels. Hunched over the steel work table, he makes notes on his blueprints, and my stomach does that thing where it spins, like an ice skater pulling her arms in close to her body to go faster and faster.

Is he the one who knocked?  

His light gray T-shirt is streaked with dirt and patches of sweat, the fabric a little tighter on him than it used to be. I don’t really like it.

I know he’s twenty-four—always have his birthday on my calendar like the rest of the family’s—but he’s looking more and more like my brothers. The way you can kind of see his body underneath his shirt. How his arms have little hills on them, up and down, up and down… And the veins in his hands and neck are always pushing up through the skin. Girls are always looking at him now. He had girlfriends in high school, but it’s all the time anymore.

He pulls off his light blue Chicago Cubs cap, slides a hand over the long strands of blond hair on top of his head, and fits it back on, backward this time. I don’t know what Jax had him doing today, but he glows with sweat, the stubble on his jaw glistening.

Lucas was only eight when Madoc took him under his wing as part of the Big Brothers, Big Sisters program. He’d lost his dad not long before. As my brothers’ honorary little brother, he’s been a part of the family since before I was born.

“Are you sure she didn’t go outside?” I hear Madoc call out from another room.

“We’re all supposed to stay in the great room,” Hawke shouts. “That’s the rule.”

“When’s the last time you heard from her?”

I sigh at Jax’s question. What does he think? That I stuffed myself in the deep freezer in the kitchen? Got kidnapped? Their kids climb trees taller than my house, but I can’t survive without wearing bubble wrap. Why do they worry more about me?

“Quinn!” Jared growls.

Followed by Madoc’s bellow. “Quinn Livia Caruthers!”

I straighten my spine. I’m in trouble now.

But Lucas moves under me, standing up tall.

“Quinn?” he says in a low voice. “I know you’re there.”

I keep my lips locked together, but I can’t stop the smile rising. He did do the knocking.

“I didn’t tell them where you were,” he tells me, his head still bowed to his blueprints as the rest of my family search the other rooms.

It’s not like it was hard for him to find me. He showed me this was here in the first place. They found it when Jax was planning the renovations, but it won’t be here for long. He’s tearing down the false ceiling to open up the room. 

“You could at least say hi to me,” he says, probably unsure if I can see him through the cracks. “It’s Lucas.”

“Yeah, I know.” I sniffle, the dust up here tickling my nostrils. “I always smell you before I see you.”

A laugh escapes him, and he hops up onto the table and comes at me, opening the latch. A square door big enough for a person to climb through opens up right under my head. “Hey,” he chides, pulling out the collar of his sweaty T-shirt to take a sniff. “Your sister-in-law bought me that cologne.”

And why are you wearing cologne to the lake?

But I don’t ask out loud. I like how he smells, I guess.

He jumps back down, and I slide to the opening, peeking my head out.

He pores over the blueprints. There are lines and numbers—measurements or something—and I can see several sheets for individual buildings. But he inspects one that has a layout of an entire ski resort. His dream project. 

 He probably brought them with him today to get Fallon’s advice. Madoc’s wife is an architect and Lucas’s mentor at the architectural firm where they both work.  

“What are you going to call it?” I whisper, glancing around and not seeing anyone else.

He sharpens his pencil. “I’ve tried not to think about it,” he replies. “If I plan too far ahead, it’ll jinx it.”

“Don’t you need a mountain first?”

It’s a ski resort. He’ll need a lot of land.

He nods. “I’ll need investors for that.”

“We have mountains here,” I tell him, hopeful.

He tosses a smirk up at me. “No one flies here for skiing.”

But they could. We have a small ski place about forty minutes away. My parents like it. It has an inn and restaurant and stuff, but I don’t think it brings in people other than locals. Maybe if we were closer to the city, we’d get some tourists.  

Unfortunately, I’m not very good a skiing. The other kids are, though. Everyone else loves speed.

I float my eyes around the papers, trying to make out how it would look in real life. There are buildings, ski lifts, chalets…  

“Why do they call it the bunny hill?” I ask, remembering that slope being the only one I was good at last winter. And the winter before.

He leans over his blueprints. “Sounds like a question for your journal.”

My journal. Juliet gave me one when I was little and told me to put all of my questions in there. Then, we could work on researching the answers.

I never did, though. I mean, I use the journal, but by the time my family and I sit down to look something up, I don’t care anymore. I just have other questions by then.

“Have you ever tried snow-shoeing?” I inquire next.

I don’t like skiing, but maybe if there are other winter activities, I can go to his resort too. 

Lucas shakes his head. “That just sounds like work to me.”

I twist my mouth to the side. Does everything have to be fast to be fun?

I point to the chalets dotting the areas around the ski slopes. “Why are the roofs shaped like that?”

They’re like tall, upside down Vs. 

“I don’t know.”

I sneer. “Yes, you do.”

He looks up at me. “And so do you if you think about it for a minute.”

I dig in my eyebrows.

But sure enough, I look back at the houses, ponder if the shape of the rooves helps keep in the heat before I remember that chalets are commonplace in mountains. Mountains get a lot of snow. And the steepness of the rooves lets the snow fall off easier.

“Did you figure it out?” he presses after a few moments.

“No.”

“Yes, you did.”

I try to keep my smile inside at the twinkle in his blue eyes, but it starts to peek out. “Maybe.”

I see his cheeks crinkle with a smile as he leans over the table again.

“Quinn!” Jared growls.

I sigh. I guess I should forfeit, but it’s either get into trouble for hiding too well or get into trouble for stealing ATV keys.

“Alright, let’s go outside!” Jared barks. “Spread out. You guys, stay in here and find her. Search the pantry, the closets…”

“Would she have gone into the lake?” Madoc asks as they leave.

I can’t make out Jared’s grumble, but no, I wouldn’t have gone into the lake. I’m not allowed to go alone.

“You’re not going to give them a hint?” Lucas asks as the boys and Dylan shout and slam doors below. “Kade’s going to shut off the lights on you.”

My eyes dart left to right, and for a second, my heart speeds up. I don’t believe in ghosts, but it’s harder to not believe in them in the dark.

“Your brothers are worried,” he points out.

“Why?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why are they always worried?” I ask him. “About me, I mean.”

They worry about their own kids, sure. Madoc is always dragging Kade away from one kind of trouble or another, and Jared is constantly telling Dylan ‘no’.

But I’m not their kid.

“Is it because I’m a girl?” I inquire.

The way they tell it, they were running around town unsupervised, even at my age. Why treat their sister differently?

Lucas looks up at me. “I think…” He hesitates. “I think it’s because they didn’t have the best experience with your parents growing up, Quinn.”

I lower my eyes, anything I was going to say lost on my tongue. Lucas is the only one who tells me the truth. 

I share a dad with Madoc, and a mom with Jared. My parents are great with me, but they weren’t around for Madoc and Jared as much when they were younger.

And Jax never had parents. Not really. His and Jared’s dad was a monster, and Jax’s mom left him when he was little. Mine and Jared’s mom took him in when he was a teenager, and she’s a good grandma to Jax’s son, Hawke, now. Very different from how she was when my brothers were young. 

I’ve put the pieces together from overhearing things in my life. I guess it’s just hard to imagine they used to suffer when I didn’t see any of it.

“They want to always be there for you,” Lucas says. “And to make sure you know you’re loved.”

They still don’t trust their parents. Not…completely.

But still, I clear my throat. “Well, you can tell them to stop now.”

He just chuckles. “They won’t ever stop. Your first boyfriend is going to be in for it someday.”

“Not if I like somebody they already like.”

“That might work.” He shrugs. “Or not.”

It’ll work. It’s my only hope.

“You’ll learn how to drive in a few years anyway,” Lucas points out. “You’ll be able to escape them any time you want.”

“Not likely.” I ring out my hand, whipping off a spider web I picked up. “Half of my family race something motorized.”

Like I would get very far.

Lucas just laughs—the first time, I notice. He hasn’t laughed in a while.

“Well, then you will too,” he assures.

“You know I won’t.”

My tone is final. I don’t feel that need for speed that the Trents and other Caruthers do. I like walks. And bicycles. And being a passenger. 

But he continues, “You could change your mind. When you were eight, you thought you were going to marry me too. Remember that?”

“Oh, my God.” Every follicle of hair on my head electrifies, but I force a scowl. “Gross. Shut up.”

He laughs again, but I can feel the blush on my cheeks. When I was eight years old, I declared my devotion for him, but now I just feel embarrassed.

Even if butterflies are taking flight in my stomach.

Right now, I feel like I belong.

I only feel like that when he’s around.  

Tilting his head back, he peers up at me. “How do you—”

But his voice is cut off as Kade bellows, “Quiiiinn!”

I round my eyes. He’s close. Is he coming to the kitchen?

“I’m turrrning off the lighhhts!” he taunts.

I suck in a breath, turning my head side to side. My skin crawls at the thought of the things that come out in the dark. Bats and spiders and clowns.

Lucas puts a knee on the table below again and pushes himself up, about to close the hatch.

But something on the little door catches on his shirt and he hisses. “Shit.”

He jumps down, the nail nearly tearing the T-shirt off his body.

Long, jet black lines fall down the back of his right shoulder. Like an upside-down V but curved like branches, arms splitting off from the main limb.

“Lucas, what is that?” I burst out.

I’ve never seen him with a tattoo. Did he have it this summer when we were all swimming? I would’ve noticed.

He slips out of the shirt and yanks it down off the nail, causing it to rip. He turns, his back to the wall. “It’s nothing.”

He avoids my eyes, inspecting the shirt in his hands. Shooting back up, he closes the hatch, but he gives me a wink as he hides me away again. “You got this,” he whispers.

I smile.

“Quinn, come on!” Kade bellows.

But Dylan barks at him, “Just forfeit.”

“Well, why don’t you?”

“I’m bored,” Hawke mumbles.

A door creaks open downstairs and several pairs of feet hit the floor.

“Where is she?” Jared growls. “Now!”

“Ugh,” someone groans. “Fine, we give up!” Kade shouts. “Come out! I forfeit.”

I release a breath and race to the attic door in the great room, whipping it open. Climbing down, I hop onto a long dining table and dust off my clothes, everyone turning to look at me. Not Lucas, though. He’s gone.

“What the…” Kade runs over.

Dylan smiles. “Hey!”

“What were you doing?” Madoc and everyone else follows, all of my brothers’ brows etched with aggravation.

But Hunter pushes past his dad and climbs onto the table. “I didn’t know that was there! Let me see!”

Kade, Dylan, and Hawke rush over as I jump down and out of the way.

“We’re tearing it down to open up the room,” Jax tells his brothers. “There are yards of rafters up there.”

Madoc peers up through the opening. “I wondered if there was a second level or something.”

Jax shakes his head. “Just empty space.”

“Who told you that you could play up there?”

I look up at Jared. His voice is curt.

Before I can answer, Dylan speaks up. “Oh, Dad. Leave her alone.”

“Do you know how thin these boards are?” Madoc gripes at me. “What if you fell?”

“Then I would’ve gotten hurt,” I point out. “And Dad would’ve blamed you.”

Madoc steps in. “Why you little—”

Jax pulls him back, clamping a hand over his mouth.

Dylan giggles, and I fold my lips between my teeth. I can’t believe I said that.

“Let me up!” Hawke yells as Hunter pushes Kade through the opening.

“I want to see next,” Hunter says.

But Dylan takes my hand, and we run as Jax grabs the twins by the waists of their jeans. “You two, come here.”

Dylan and I race outside onto the porch and down the steps.

I did it. I didn’t forfeit!

“Kade has to steal the keys now,” Dylan brags.

It won’t be hard for him, unfortunately. But I’ll admit, it’s nice to see him lose. He never does. Especially against me.

The lake ripples with the light breeze, and I spot Lucas’s torn shirt on the beach. Dylan runs, joining her mom on the sand as she bounces James, Dylan’s baby brother, in her lap. 

Where’s Lucas? I walk down the dock, scanning the water, and then I turn my head left and right, looking down the beach. I want to tell him I won.

Of course, that means I still have to go ATVing, which sucks. 

Sliding off my sneakers, I sit down on the dock and dip my feet into the water. I study the island out on the lake. Maybe a little smaller than a football field, it’s filled with trees and large boulders trailing up the hills. There’s a cliff you can jump into the water on one side, and I even heard there’s a small cave somewhere. A canoe sits on the beach. Is that where Lucas went?

But just then a phone rings, and I look behind me, seeing a couple of people in the parking lot. I squint through the sun in my eyes and put my hand over my brow to see. Lucas?

The next thing I know, something grabs my ankles, pulls, and I’m flying forward off the dock. Ah! My heart leaps in my throat, choking my cry just before I hit the water. I flail, screaming, but it’s just bubbles coming out of my mouth underneath the surface.

I kick, but I’m hauled backward and quickly lifted up.

I cough and sputter as Lucas holds me by the shoulders.

“You big…” I struggle for breath. “…jerk.”

He presses a finger over his lips. “Shh…”

I wipe the water out of my eyes, both of us crouched down and hidden underneath the dock. He casts his eyes upward, completely drenched himself.

“That wasn’t funny,” I whisper-yell.

His voice is a murmur. “It was kind of funny.”

Footfalls hit the dock, and he goes still.

So do I.

“What?” I mouth.

But he just gestures “Shhh” again.

Are we playing Hide & Seek again?

The dock creaks under the footsteps, and I think I see two figures through the slits in the wood. Madoc and Jared maybe?

They don’t say anything, and I try to move to get a closer look, but Lucas keeps hold of me. I gaze up at him, his golden hair and long lashes over blue eyes.

There’s two of them up there. And two of us. A pair.  

Finally, they retreat, but Lucas waits anther minute or so. Eventually, he releases me and swims backward out from under the dock. “Later, gator.”

My hair is plastered to my cheeks. “I hate you,” I gripe.

He grins wide. “But you’re making me pizza tonight back at Madoc’s, right?”

“Yes.”

But I pout about it, not sure if I’m mad at him for getting my clothes wet or mad that I’m never really mad at him.

He beams. He loves my pizza.

I wish we could play Hide & Seek as a team, but…

We never get another chance.

A year later, he’s gone.

Leaves town. Doesn’t text. Doesn’t call.

He’s grown up, and I’m not. I guess we weren’t a pair, after all.

***

If you haven’t read anything in this world yet, here’s a guide. https://pendouglas.com/2022/02/28/get-ready-for-hellbent/

Quiet Ones is set to release in February 2026, but we should have a firm date the moment we hear from the audio publisher.