Read Bonfires Burning Bright for Free Online

quarter of an inch from the rest of the woodwork.
    “…we should start in the basement or wine cellar or whatever.”
    Griffin smiled at her. “Good thinking, Sherlock.”
    She shrugged. “I’m an ex-junkie. We’re good at hiding stuff.”
    “This mean I need to search our basement?” Griffin asked as they started to descend the main stairs.
    “Only if you want to find my stash of Playgirl magazines from high school.”
    “And… You have officially killed my last shred of innocence.”
    Avalon laughed as they rounded the massive cherry-wood newel and walked to the loose panel. Griffin gripped it and tugged. A door opened silently, revealing a carpeted staircase winding down under the main stairs. He reached inside and flipped on a light switch. It was dark in the stairwell, but now that he thought of it, it was dim in most of the house.
    He turned from the stairwell and strode across the foyer to a tall rectangular curtained window, and yanked the drapes aside.
    It was pitch black outside.
    “Did we shift again?” Avalon asked him, stepping up next to him.
    “We would have heard the church bell. And no one radioed to find out where we are.” He looked down at the two-way on his belt, then pulled it off, about to make a call.
    Just then, the radio crackled to life in his hand, and he almost dropped it in surprise.
    “Griffin, do you copy? Over.”
    Frost’s voice. In the background, the faint howling and shrieking of the screams. She must be outside. Ellison’s thick walls blocked out the horrid din.
    “Here,” he replied. “What’s up? You seeing the darkness? Over.”
    “Yeah, think it’s just whatever passes for nightfall in this world. But it happened fast,” she started, sounding slightly worried. “Pastor and I had a—well, not necessarily a run-in, but let’s say a sighting—of S.G. Over.”
    Griffin stared at the radio in his hand, unable to process what he’d just heard.
    “Griff, did you copy that last? Over.” Frost asked, the sound of her cruiser’s door slamming closed finally muffling the background screams carried over the radio.
    “Copy,” Griffin said. “S.G. Are you both okay? Over.”
    “We’re good. Heading back to town. No sign of Ellison or Turkette. How about at your end? Over.” she asked.
    “Still checking out the place. Be careful, Helena. Over.”
    “And you. Out.”
    They had used intentionally vague language about their locations and who she had seen, in case someone else in town was helping Turkette and Ellison.
    Griffin lapsed into silence for a moment.
    “Dad?” Avalon asked eventually. “Who’s S.G.?”
    Griffin stiffened, debated telling her, and then decided that they weren’t in a TV show where everyone kept silly secrets. He turned to her and pointed to her backpack. “The former owner of your baton-javelin thingie. Frost called him ‘Savage Griffin.’”
    “No way! I thought he was all burnt up. She said the lizards got his arm and she took his camouflage…”
    “Looks like he hitched a ride.” Griffin walked back to the basement stairs.
    “Creepy,” Avalon said. “So he was here all last week, when we thought we were safe…” Avalon pulled her backpack off and looked inside the pack at the collapsed telescoping javelin inside. “You don’t think he’s after me to get his property back, do you?”
    Griffin shook his head. “She said he had dozens of them. I doubt it. If he’s after anyone in particular, it would be her, for revenge. Or me, for… Hell, I don’t know. Maybe he’s just taking his best shot at surviving. Either way, he’s an unknown and a danger. I haven’t seen the guy, but the way she described him, I doubt you’d mix the two of us up. Just in case though, we should have a secret phrase that only the two of use would know, so you’ll know I’m the real me, if we ever get into a doppelganger situation.”
    “If the guy’s an alternate version of you, then any phrase you come up with, is one he might come