Beautiful Demons

3. Trouble Always Finds Me

"The rules are as follows. No back talk or disrespect, especially when it comes to the staff. You will need to keep your grades up at Peachville High. We expect to see A's and B's only. If any of your test grades are lower than a B, you'll need to bring them home for one of us to sign.

"Ella Mae went on to list rules that were pretty common for foster homes. Lights out at eleven. No boys allowed upstairs. Keep your hands to yourself. Don't take anything that doesn't belong to you. All standard rules. Then, as if it were just another rule, she said, "And never, under any circumstances, are you to go up to the third floor.

"Immediately, a strange tingle went through my body. If she had never mentioned it, I probably wouldn't have given the third floor a second thought. But now it was mysterious. Forbidden. Tempting. What could they possibly be hiding up there that would be so important to protect?

"Let me be completely clear about this. If you are found breaking any of the rules we've talked about today, you'll be expelled from Shadowford without a second chance. Do you understand?"

I nodded.

"And from what your case manager said on the phone when she called last night, you'll go straight from here to the detention center in Atlanta. You seem like such a sweet girl. I would hate to see you end up at a place like that."

I didn't want to see myself end up there either. Juvenile detention was like a jail sentence. Not to mention that going there for my last few years of high school would kill my chances at ever getting into a good college. I had to make things work here, no matter what. That meant putting whatever was up on the third floor out of my mind. Not to mention whatever had happened with Mrs. Shadowford's teacup. I told myself it was nothing - that it couldn't be the same thing that happened to me when I got angry - then followed Ella Mae through the first floor of the house.

Shadowford was even bigger than it looked from the outside. The large staircase split the floor in half. On one side was a formal sitting room with a big brick and tile fireplace. Heavy gold drapes hung in the windows and the antique furniture looked ornate and expensive. Ella Mae told me that the sitting room was only used for formal meetings and sometimes for special occasions.

Behind the sitting room was a formal dining room that held a long, shiny table and ten matching chairs. Against the wall, a china cabinet held beautiful bone china, crystal champagne flutes and silver serving trays. A sparkling chandelier hung above the table and a pretty stained glass window sent colorful light dancing across the room.

"Is this where we'll eat everyday?" I asked. I had never even been in a room so immaculate and fancy. If I had to eat here, I'd be scared of messing something up.

"No. Usually we all eat at the table in the kitchen. It's a little more casual and laid back in there. But on nights when Mrs. Shadowford joins us, she prefers us to eat in the dining room.

"I wondered how often that actually happened. Hopefully not very often. The old woman completely creeped me out. If at all possible, I planned to avoid her.

The kitchen ran along the back of the house. It was a huge room with lots of large windows that bathed the room in natural light. A large oak table with a scarred top and six mismatched chairs took up a large part of the floor on one side, while the other side held the main area of the kitchen. The cabinets were painted a buttery yellow that gave the whole room a happy, cheerful feeling. So far, it was my favorite room in the house.

"Sharon Griffith is our cook here. Sharon, this is Harper, our newest resident."

Sharon was a tall, pudgy woman with super short brown hair. She was cleaning the countertops and barely looked up to nod a curt hello to me. I had never had an actual cook before. At several of the foster homes, I'd been expected to fix my own meals most of the time.