FOLLOW YOUR HEART

Chapter 16 - Airy Fairy Dreams

Shawn didn't sleep a wink after that. At first, he stood and watched the figure, trying to work out if it was a figment of his imagination, maybe he was still asleep or something? But the figure was still there, it didn't move. About half an hour of staring, the figure turned and walked back up the driveway. Tally had said he dropped George at the station, so why was he back here? Shawn didn't understand, but it gave him the creeps. Perhaps he should call the police? He had been trespassing after all. But something told him he shouldn't tell Camila right now, and if he called the police, it could send her back into that depressed state and he didn't want that.

He went upstairs and put his shorts on then opened his laptop and started tapping away. He couldn't find any link between George and the Hall or George and any media outlet that might pay for their story. In the end, he slipped back into bed with Camila and fell asleep, but not until he had checked every door, and locked their bedroom door with a key, propping a chair underneath the handle.

***

"Shawn," she said, shaking his shoulder. "Wake up!"

She was frightened. The room was locked and barricaded. What the fuck had happened in the night?

He stirred and rolled over. "What time is it?" he slurred.

"About seven-thirty," she said, and he groaned.

"I got hardly any sleep, I need more...."

"What happened? Why are we locked in?"

"Just a bad dream, I needed to feel safe, I couldn't sleep," he mumbled.

She was wide awake now, but she didn't want to leave the safe room. She sat up, and tried reading her book and about half an hour later she heard the slow and soft tread of feet on the stairs. Her heart started thumping. She heard the creaky stair, the steps along the hallway and finally a gentle rattling of the door handle.

"Miss Camila? Master Shawn? Is everything alright?" called Tally. She jumped out of bed and went and moved the chair and answered the door.

"Oh, there you are. I thought you might have left early. Not a good idea, we'd have to start the days for this month from scratch again apparently."

"No, we're here," she said quietly so as not to wake Shawn. "Shawn got scared in the night, I'm not sure why, a nightmare he said."

Tally frowned. "That's interesting. Maybe he heard something. I was coming to tell you both that something happened last night."

"What?" she asked.

"Someone broke into the kitchen and went through Garry's room."

"Garry's room? I didn't think there was anything left in there?"

"Well, it's a mess, I'm going to have to go through it to find out if anything is missing. Maybe they were looking for drugs?"

The thought that someone had been in the house while they were asleep made shivers run up and down her spine.

"I thought we had a security system?"

"We do, well we did. It got damaged during the storm and I need to get it fixed. I didn't realise it wouldn't go off at all. I'm sure if it had, then you would have heard it."

"Heard what?" Shawn came to the door, wearing shorts and a head of fluffy curls.

"Someone broke in last night," Camila said looking at him fearfully. "Lucky you locked and barricaded the door!"

Shawn looked like he was going to collapse.

"What is it Master Shawn? Did you see something?"