The Girl Who Survived

A Riveting Novel of Suspense with a Shocking Twist

Lisa Jackson

• Publisher: Kensington Books
• Year: 2022
• eBook ISBN:
  9781496737434
• Print ISBN:
  9781496737250
• Subtopic: Crime & Mystery Literature

In this deviously volatile, deliciously creepy thriller from the #1 New York Times bestseller, the lone survivor of a brutal family massacre must uncover the awful truth about the fateful night that left her forever marked…

Has she already had her last chance to be the final girl?

A Goodreads Hot Summer Mysteries

All her life, she’s been the girl who survived. Orphaned at age seven after a horrific killing spree at her family’s Oregon cabin, Kara McIntyre is still searching for some kind of normal. But now, twenty years later, the past has come thundering back. Her brother, Jonas, who was convicted of the murders has unexpectedly been released from prison. The press is in a frenzy again. And suddenly, Kara is receiving cryptic messages from her big sister, Marlie—who hasn’t been seen or heard from since that deadly Christmas Eve when she hid little Kara in a closet with a haunting, life-saving command: Don’t make a sound.

As people close to her start to die horrible deaths, Kara, who is slowly and surely unraveling, believes she is the killer’s ultimate target.

Kara survived once. But will she survive again? How many times can she be the girl who survived?

CHAPTER 1

Mount Hood, Oregon
Twenty Years Earlier

Creeeaaak!

Kara’s eyes flew open.

What was that?

She squinted into the darkness.

“Don’t say a word.”

She started to scream.

But a hand came down over her mouth.

Hard.

“Shhh!”

Marlie? Her sister was holding her down, forcing her head back against the pillows?

She started to struggle.

“Stop it! Just listen and don’t say anything!” The warning was whispered against her ear. Hot breath against her skin. “Listen to me.” Her voice was urgent. This was no joke, not the kind of prank Kara had grown up with due to the antics of three older brothers. “Handfuls,” her mother called them. “Delinquents,” her father had said.

Now, though, it was just Marlie, and she was freaked. “Just do what I say,” Marlie warned. “No questions. No arguments. This is serious, Kara-Bear, so don’t make a sound.”

Why?

As if she read Kara’s mind, Marlie said, “I can’t explain now, just trust me. You’re a smart girl. That’s what all the teachers say, right? That you’re way ahead of kids your age? So just do as I say, okay? Now, come on.”

Kara shook her head, her hair rustling against her pillow, her eyes adjusting to the thin light. Whatever had scared Marlie so much could be handled. Mama would know what to do.

“You can’t make any noise, okay? Got that?”

Marlie lifted her hand and Kara couldn’t help herself. “What’s—?” she started to whisper and Marlie’s hand returned. Firmer. Pressing Kara back against the sheets.

“Just listen to me!” Marlie insisted through clenched teeth. Her sharp, desperate plea stopped Kara cold. Though Mama, at times, had accused the older girl of being a “drama queen,” this time was different. Marlie was different. Scared to death.

Kara sensed it. She lay still.

“You have to hide. Now.”

Hide?

“Right now. Do you understand?”

Wide-eyed, Kara nodded.

“And it can’t be here.” Marlie started to take her hand away from Kara’s face.

“Why? Where’s Mama . . . ?” Kara said in a whispered rush. She couldn’t help herself.

“Shit! Stop! Kara, please!” Marlie’s hand was over her younger sister’s mouth again. Harder. Forcing Kara’s head back into her pillow. “No questions! They’ll hear you!”

Who? Who would hear her?

Kara’s heart was beating crazily. Fear curdled through her blood.

“Just come with me and don’t say a word! I mean it, Kara. There are bad people here. They cannot find you. If they do, they will hurt you, do you understand?” Marlie’s face pressed closer and even in their dark bedroom, Kara saw that Marlie’s blue eyes were round with fear. She was dressed, in jeans and a sweatshirt, her blond hair pulled into a single braid.

Kara shook her head violently.

“Okay. Now, this is the last time,” Marlie warned. “Got it?”

Kara nodded slowly. Scared out of her mind.

“Promise you’ll be quiet.”

Kara swallowed against the growing lump in her throat, but nodded again.

“I love you, Kara-Bear. . . . I’ll come get you. I promise.” Marlie hesitated just a second, then withdrew her hand.

Kara didn’t speak.

“Okay.” Marlie glanced out the window, where moonlight played on the thick blanket of snow, then grabbed Kara’s palm. “Come on!” She tugged, but Kara didn’t need any more encouragement. She scrambled to get out of the tangle of bed clothes. They crept past Marlie’s bed, where even in the darkness Kara could see several neatly stacked piles of clothes piled over the rumpled coverlet. Even Marlie’s boots were on the bed. Now, though, she, like Kara, was barefoot.

So her footsteps wouldn’t be heard.

Kara’s blood turned to ice. This was wrong. So wrong. She stepped on a toy, probably a Barbie shoe, but held her tongue as Marlie cracked open the door to the hallway.

Along with the scent of wood smoke from the dying fire, the faint sounds of a Christmas carol filtered up from the floor below.

“Silent night . . .”

Marlie peered into the darkness.

“Holy night . . .”

Taking a deep breath, Marlie squeezed Kara’s hand and whispered, “Let’s go.” She pulled her younger sister into the dark, narrow corridor, past the closed doors of the boys’ rooms toward the far end of the hall, where the stairs curved down to the first floor, light curling eerily up from below, the massive doors to Mama and Daddy’s bedroom just beyond the railing.

“All is calm . . .”

For a second, Kara’s heart soared. Marlie was taking her to get Mama and—but no. She stopped at the last door before the staircase leading down, to the door that was always locked, the doorway leading upward to the attic and the warren of unused rooms above.

What?

NO!

“All is bright . . .”

Kara balked. She wasn’t going up there! No, no, no!

She started to protest when Marlie caught her eye and sent her a look that could cut through steel.

Bong!

Kara jumped at the noise, her heart hammering.

But it was only the grandfather clock near the front door, striking off the hours, drowning out the music.

“Jesus,” Marlie whispered under her breath and pulled Kara behind her as she slowly mounted the narrow wooden steps.

Bong!

“Marlie, no,” Kara whispered, feeling the temperature drop with each step.

“We don’t have a choice!” Marlie snapped, her voice still hushed as they reached the third floor.

Rather than snap on a light, she pulled a small flashlight from her pocket and switched it on, its thin beam sliding over draped furniture and boxes, forgotten lamps and stacks of books, open bags of unused clothes. Her family used the extra space for storage, though according to Mama it had once been servants’ quarters. “I wish,” Mama had added, lighting a cigarette as she warned all of her “patchwork family” that the area was forbidden, deemed unsafe. “Don’t go up there, ever. You’re asking for serious grounding if you do. Hear me? Serious.”

Her threat hadn’t stuck, of course.

Of course they’d all sneaked up here and explored.

Though the area was declared off-limits, her brothers were always climbing up here, and Kara had poked around the rabbit warren of connected rooms often enough to know her way around. But tonight, in the darkness, the frigid rooms appeared sinister and evil, the closed doors standing like sentinels guarding the narrow corridor.

Bong!

“Where’s Mama?” she asked again, fighting panic.

Marlie glanced at her and shook her head. She placed a finger to her lips, reminding Kara of the need for silence, then pulled her anxiously along the bare floor of the third story.

This was wrong.

Really wrong.

At the far end of the hallway was another staircase, much narrower and close. Cramped. It wound downward and ended up in the kitchen. For a fleeting second, Kara thought they were going down the back way, which seemed stupid since they’d just ascended, but Marlie had other plans. She stopped just before they reached steps, at the small cupboard-like entrance to the attic.

Kara’s bad feeling got worse. “What are you do—?”

Marlie pulled a key from the front pocket of her jeans and slipped it into the lock. A second later, the attic door creaked open. “Come on.”

Kara drew back and shook her head. “I don’t want to.” Marlie surely wouldn’t—

“Don’t care.” Forcefully, Marlie pulled her through the tight doorway and yanked the door shut behind them.

“What the hell is this?”

“Don’t swear.”

“But—”

“Look. I’m saving you. Us.” A loud click sounded as she flipped the old switch. Nothing happened.

“Shit,” Marlie muttered as they stood in the darkness.

“Don’t swear,” Kara threw back. “And saving us from what?”

“Shhh. Quiet. You don’t want to know.”

“Yes! Yes, I do! Tell me!”

“Look, it’s . . . complicated.” Marlie hesitated.

“And scary.”

“Yes, and really scary.” She clicked on her flashlight again so that they could see the stairs winding upward. The steps were steep and barely wide enough for Kara’s foot, a rickety old staircase winding to the garret under the eaves. It was freezing in the tight space and dark as pitch.

“I’m not going up there.”

“Of course you are. Come on.”

This was bad.

Kara’s skin crawled and though she wanted to argue, she didn’t. The tone of Marlie’s voice, so unlike her, made the ever-rebellious Kara obedient as she was prodded up the stairs. Marlie was holding the small flashlight, its weak beam illuminating the path.

At the top of the stairs, under the sloped ceilings where Kara was certain bats roosted, Marlie stopped, leaving Kara standing on the floorboards of the attic, while she hesitated on one step lower, so they were eye to eye, nose to nose. She shined the flashlight near her face, distorting her features in shadow, causing the small dimple on her chin to shadow and creating an eerie mask much like their brother Jonas’s face when he held a flashlight beneath his face for a macabre effect as he told ghost stories.

But tonight was different.

Tonight wasn’t a game. That much Kara knew.

“You need to stay here and wait for me to come back.”

“No!”

“Just for a little while.”

Kara shook her head. “I want Mama.”

“I know, but I already told you that’s not going to happen.”

“Why?” Panic welled in her heart. “You’re not leaving me here alone.”

“Just for a little while.”

“No!”

“Kara—”

“I’m not staying here. Why would you even say that?” Kara demanded.

“I just have to make sure it’s safe, okay—?”

“No, it’s not okay.”

“Then I’ll come get you. I promise.”

“Safe from what?” Kara cried, freaking. Anytime her siblings added an “I promise,” it was because they weren’t telling the truth. “You said there were bad people here. Who?”

“I-I don’t really know.”

“What’re they doing?”

“I’m not . . . I don’t . . . I’m not sure, but I know this, there’s something . . . something really bad, Kara.”

“What . . . what’s bad?”

“I don’t know.”

“And it’s here.”

“I . . . yes . . . please, just do as I say.”

Kara suspected her sister was dodging the truth. “Where’re Mama and Daddy?”

A beat. “Out.”

“Liar.” Why was Marlie lying to her?

“Kara—”

“What about Jonas and Sam and Donner?” Kara asked frantically. Her older half brothers. They’d all been here earlier. She’d seen them at dinner and after. Donner and Sam had been listening to music and playing video games, maybe even drinking, and Jonas, the loner, had been in his room practicing his ninja moves or whatever it was he always did. Sam had kidded him, calling him Jonas Joe-Judo. Which Jonas hated.

Marlie said, “Everyone’s gone.”

“Gone?” On Christmas Eve? That didn’t seem right. “Then what’re you afraid of?”

Marlie licked her lips nervously. Her voice was the merest of whispers. “As I said, there’s someone here. Someone else. Someone bad.”

“Who? How do you know?” This was crazy. “But you just said everyone was ‘out’ and now . . . You’re scaring me.”

“Good.”

“I want Mama.”

“I told you she’s not here!” Marlie’s voice was still a whisper, but there was an edge to it. Like Mama’s when she got mad or frustrated with Kara’s brothers. “Just listen to me, okay? You’re going to stay here for a little while, until i...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Also by
• Title Page
• Table of Contents
• Copyright Page
• CHAPTER 1
• CHAPTER 2
• CHAPTER 3
• CHAPTER 4
• CHAPTER 5
• CHAPTER 6
• CHAPTER 7
• CHAPTER 8
• CHAPTER 9
• CHAPTER 10
• CHAPTER 11
• CHAPTER 12
• CHAPTER 13
• CHAPTER 14
• CHAPTER 15
• CHAPTER 16
• CHAPTER 17
• CHAPTER 18
• CHAPTER 19
• CHAPTER 20
• CHAPTER 21
• CHAPTER 22
• CHAPTER 23
• CHAPTER 24
• CHAPTER 25
• CHAPTER 26
• CHAPTER 27
• CHAPTER 28
• CHAPTER 29
• CHAPTER 30
• CHAPTER 31
• CHAPTER 32
• CHAPTER 33
• CHAPTER 34
• CHAPTER 35
• CHAPTER 36
• EPILOGUE
• Teaser
• Teaser Chapter