That year was different. There was a tree in the living room with a couple of presents underneath it, but there were only a few ornaments on its bare limbs. The rest were still in the box on the far side of the room. Stockings hung from the fireplace, but that was the extent of the Christmas cheer, and it was probably the year my family needed it the most.
Cade had been spending more time with Dillon to play games and talk about Christmas, since my dad had been such a Scrooge. We hadn’t spent much time together and, to be honest, it was kind of refreshing. It gave me time to breathe and be more of my own entity than the person attached to Cade. I loved my alone time, and I hadn’t had much since I’d died. He always wanted to be there and didn’t understand why I didn’t want to be attached to his hip. There were just times I needed to be alone. It had nothing to do with him.
“Perhaps we should move,” my dad said with a sigh.
“I think that Briar would have wanted you to be happy, and you have been anything but that since she passed.”
She was right. I didn’t want to see them gone. I wanted them with me, so I knew they were safe, but they would soon drown in the house. I couldn’t be so selfish as to keep them there.
My dad wasn’t sleeping well and spent most of his night tossing and turning with nightmares. I was worried about his sanity.
“Perhaps,” he said again as he sat down on one of the stools and picked up the morning newspaper.
“She wouldn’t want you to be here moping about the place. You need to take care of Dillon, she would have wanted that.”
“Yes, she would have.”
Ugh, he frustrated me to no end. I walked over to the window and flung it open. A slight breeze swirled into the room. My father’s paper flailed around and made it impossible to read. He tried to steady the paper, but finally gave up and sat it down on the table.
“Stupid wind picked up. This is why I hated Tennessee. I hope it doesn’t last long.” He stood up and closed the window.
“It doesn’t normally get this cold. Maybe it’s the ghosts.”
“It’s not ghosts, Sandy. We need a good snow. I miss the way the seasons changed back home.”
“You won’t get that here. I can’t remember the last time it snowed.”
Dad sighed.
“Maybe when the holidays are over you could put the house on the market, so you and Dillon can move back.”
“Perhaps.”
And perhaps, just perhaps, I will find a way to make them leave.
When I walked back into my bedroom, Cade was pacing the floor in a highly anxious state. What I really wanted was to talk to him about what we could do to get my family to move out before something terrible happened, but he looked concerned so I pushed my own issues away for a minute.
“You’re going to burn a hole in the floor,” I commented and closed the door behind me.
He paused and looked at me as if I had surprised him. “Oh, hey.”
“What are you doing?”
“Nothing.”
“Well, I know what you could be doing.” I walked over to him and took his hands in mine. “At least, it would help me feel better.”
“What’s that?”
“We could…” I trailed off to let his imagination take over as I tilted my head up for a kiss.
Indecision flashed across his eyes. He let me go and walked across the room. He cursed under his breath as he started to pace again.
Something was definitely wrong.
I took a couple of steps toward him and reached out to touch his arm. He jerked away from me and ran his hands through his hair.
“What’s wrong?”
He dropped his hands from his hair and balled them at his side. “We can’t do this right now.”
“Why not?” I took another step toward him.
He continued to back away from me until he bumped into the closet door. “Because I need to tell you something, damn it.”
“What are you talking about?”
He raised his dark eyes to meet mine. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You’re not going to hurt me. Just talk to me.”
I didn’t know what was wrong with him, but I was determined to find out. I reached out to him slowly to take him in my arms. My hand brushed across his shirt, and he closed his eyes.
In a second, he reached out and wrapped his hand around my throat. His eyes snapped open, wild and angry. His shoulders heaved up in down as if he was fighting off some horrible urge. I’d never seen him look at me like that before. His anger had never been directed at me. I cried out and threw my hands up to grasp his.
“Cade.”
He jerked me toward him and lowered his face to mine. “Am I a monster?”
“No, you’re not; you’ve just been closer to death than you have been in a while. Just calm down.” I dropped my arms to my side and tried not to show him fear.
“I am. I am.” He pushed me back against the wall and aligned his body with mine.
“Cade, please,” I whimpered. Fear started to creep up into me.
He stepped in closer to me. “Do I scare you?”
“You are now.”
“I don’t want to scare you…”
“It’s okay, Cade. You wouldn’t really hurt me.”
“Wouldn’t I? Are you sure?”
I nodded. He leaned into me and planted a rough kiss on my lips. I pushed myself against him and away from the wall, but he pushed me back against it. His body pressed me into the wood.
“I wouldn’t hurt you. But I would hurt someone for you. I’d do anything for you. I have killed for you.”
“You haven’t killed anyone. What are you talking about?”
“I need to tell you something.”
“Anything.”
“That possessed man that killed you. I murdered him. He shot you, and I lost my damned mind.”
My mouth fell open in shock, my body freezing underneath his hand. That ghost had been telling the truth.
“I’m sorry Briar, but he killed you. My instincts took over, and I snapped. I rammed him through with the fireplace poker, and I broke his neck. I pounded his face in. I couldn’t take it.”
“Oh my God. Cade…”
“I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t. The darkness had me until you said my name. You brought me back from that dark place, Briar. I would’ve been stuck there without you.”
“No…”
“Don’t cry, don’t cry.” He ran his finger across the tears that started to drip from my eyes.
“Cade…I don’t…I don’t know what to say...”
“I’m sorry!” he screamed, loud, only inches away from my face. “I’ve never done that before, but I lost it. What if I lose myself with you? I don’t want to hurt you. I can’t.” He let go of me and walked over to a chair. With a kick, he knocked it over and started to rampage through the room.
My hands flew to my throat where he’d grabbed me. The tears stung my eyes, and I fought my body not to fall to the floor. I leaned back against the wall and breathed deeply.
I should have been more furious than I was, but the person killed me in front of him. I couldn’t even fathom what I would have done if someone killed him or my family in front of me. Still, I should have been fuming and going off on him since he had me by the throat, but I wasn’t. I was more worried than anything. We’d come so far, and I couldn’t lose him to the madness.
I took a couple of slow steps towards him, my voice low and soft. “Cade, sweetie, calm down.”
“I’m messed up. You deserve better.”
“I’m not scared of you.”
“You should be scared of me.”
I closed the distance between us and wrapped my arms around his waist. “Cade, maybe I should be, but I’m not mad at you for killing that man. He killed me in front of you.”
“But that doesn’t make it okay, does it?” His eyes searched my face for an answer.
“No, because that man was innocent. It
was the ghost in him that needed to be killed. But I don’t want you to lose yourself, so I’m not going to be mad at you. Okay? You can come back from this.”
He furrowed his eyebrows and caressed my neck with his hand. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.” My words were reassuring, but I wasn’t sure that I meant them. If he lost his mind, who would save me from him?
He pulled back and disgust played over his face. “I’m a psychopath. I’m sick.”
“No, you’re not. You have strong…feelings.”
“Just for you,” he argued. “Everything else is all a show. I don’t give a shit about anyone else.”
“You do too. You care for Dillon. I see the way you look at me when you talk about him. You love him, Cade. Just like you care for me. Psychopaths don’t care about anybody. They can’t love. You do.”
He laughed. “I’m glad you think that. I think I’m a monster.”
“You’re not a monster, stop saying that.” I grabbed his face and made him look at me.
“It wasn’t too long ago you were trying to convince me that this wasn’t real. That I was heartless.”
“I was wrong. So wrong. You’re safe, and I love you.”
His hands ran down my body, gripping my hips and pulling me closer to him. Cade kissed me, and I closed my eyes to let him take over. I wanted nothing more than to make him see how much I trusted him. I knew he wouldn’t hurt me. It was me and him, just like he’d said. He had a dark side, but he protected me. He was emotional, but I was his safe place; he could let out that rage and confusion with me. I was his strength, the thing that grounded him in reality and returned sanity to him when he was lost.
He moved me backwards across the room as I held onto him; I let him lead me, until we bumped against my computer desk. I reached back to steady myself on the wood. His hands ran underneath the back of my shirt, fingernails grazing my skin and making me shudder in his arms. I buried my mouth in his neck and felt his fingers tighten on my body as we lost ourselves in each other, and he claimed me as his own.
Chapter Thirty-Four
“Lay with me?” Cade slipped his jeans on and crawled up onto the bed.
I reached down to pick up his shirt off the floor and pulled it over my head. “Yeah.”
I crawled up to where he was and lay down. He took one of my hands in his, lacing our fingers and holding them up to his chest. “So, you’re not mad?”
“I can’t promise I wouldn’t have killed someone if I walked in on them shooting you.”
“Gotcha, yeah.”
He ran his free hand down my body and traced the now fading finger marks on my arm.
“I’m going to miss that,” I whispered.
“What?”
“Your love marks on me.”
He scowled. “They always look so brutal, man. I don’t miss ‘em at all.”
“But they feel so good at the time.”
“I’m not sure which of us is more fucked up, Briar.”
I shrugged. “I’m pretty sure it’s you.”
“Whatever you say, Princess of the Darkness.” He tried to mimic Dracula’s thick accent but failed miserably.
I laughed out loud and threw my head back. “That’s horrible. Stop it.”
“Vat do you mean?” He wiggled his eyebrows.
I laughed again. “Give it up; it’s so bad.”
“I vant to suck your blood.” He jumped up from the bed and onto me. He roared as he grabbed me and tickled me.
“No, Cade, stop!”
The laughter erupted from him, ecstatic and childish as he continued to torture me. I shoved my hands at him and tried to push him off, laughing uncontrollably. His knees were planted firmly on either side of my body, and I was trapped.
“I give! I give! I’ll do anything! Just stop!”
“Anything?” He smiled down at me mischievously.
I nodded frantically.
He lowered his face to mine slowly. “You are so beautiful in my shirt.”
“Maybe I will keep it.”
“I bet it’d look even better on the floor.” He growled and kissed me. His hands ran underneath the shirt, but a voice in the hallway made me pause.
“I won’t be but just a second, Mr. Summers. I will just get my stuff and leave.”
“Who the hell—” Cade started. He sat up and looked over at the door.
I put my hand over his mouth to shush him and sat up, eyes focused on the figure that crept into my room and shut the door. Meredith’s red hair was styled into spikes in the back but straight and long in the front. Her pink, plaid pea coat fell to her knees where her brown boots peeked out from under them. Her dark eyebrows pulled together in uncertainty; her eyes scanned through the room as she took a few cautious steps inside.
I pulled myself up from the bed and brushed Cade’s hands off me. I moved to perch on the edge of the comforter and watched Meredith take a few more steps inside.
She raised one green manicured nail to her mouth and nibbled on it as she looked around.
“Briar?” she asked, her voice quiet and unsure.
I let myself be seen. “Hey.”
She jumped and twirled around with fear in her eyes as they settled on me. Her hand flew to her chest. “Holy shit, you scared the bejesus outta me.”
“Sorry, I’ve not really…I’m kinda new to this, ya know.” I lowered my eyes to the worn hem on the edge of my skirt.
“That shirt is hideous. Who even listens to that nineties grunge rock anymore, anyway?” She took a careful step towards me.
“I do, but it’s not mine.” I laughed and looked behind me to see Cade’s unamused stare.
“What are you looking at?” she asked.
“Oh. Nothing.”
“You’re really here, huh?”
“Yea somewhat…”
“Do—do you feel dead?”
“No, not really.”
“It’s no different?”
“Well, yes and no?”
“No, as in…” She turned her hand over a few times as if to encourage me to finish the sentence.
“No, as in I’m still like a living breathing version of me…except not. I still hang out, read some, and listen to music. Cade and I, we still um…”
She scrunched her nose. “Ew, how does that work?”
“I dunno.” I shrugged. “But it’s really intense.”
“Oh my God,” Cade commented from behind me, still not amused.
“So, yes as in…” Meredith continued.
“Yes, as in I can’t show myself to my dad or Dillon. Yes, as in I can’t leave this stupid house.”
“Well, that sucks.”
“Parts of it.”
“I wasn’t sure if, um, if that text was really from you.” Her eyes filled up with tears. “I mean, I’d hoped…but ya know.”
“Don’t cry.” I stepped over to where she was and reached out to hug her.
She shook her head. “No, don’t, this is hard enough.”
“I’m not going to hurt you.”
“I know…but you don’t know what it’s like. I saw you in the casket. Saw them put you in the ground.”
I was speechless. What could I possibly say to understand what she was going through? It was stupid of me to text her when she was probably hurting as much as my family.
“I just don’t understand how you can be here. I thought, maybe, there was a better place for people when they died.”
“Maybe there is, Meredith. It’s just this house. There’s something different about it.”
“But it’s not fair!” she exclaimed, face rising to meet mine as she continued to scream. “Is it? That you’re stuck here, with crazy people and Goddess knows what else?”
“No but—”
“I told you that you needed to get out! You didn’t listen to me, and now—now you’re dead. Dead.”
“Everything is fine, Cade is—”
“That boy, he’s going to take you down with him when
this house loses its hold on you. He’s evil.”
“Are we really going back to this?” I crossed my arms and glared at her.
“It always comes back to this—your safety. And you’re not safe here.” She reached into her large, pink purse and pulled out a thick, old book. “This is the answer.”
I looked down at the ragged book and took it in my hands. The cover was dark brown with no title or author. The edges of it were worn and the pages yellowed; a musty smell drifted upwards as I opened the cover.
Ravencroft Book of Shadows.
I flipped to the next page and read the contents written in a hard to read cursive script.
This is the manuscript of Willow Ravencroft, daughter of the great Tara Saunder and George Ravencroft. Here I will document the spells of which I have been taught in my youth, family incantations, and those I will learn until the day I die. This book shall be burnt at my time of death as to not reveal the secrets of our coven. If this shall make it into the wrong hands, I fear what will happen. Its contents are not to be taken lightly.
“What the hell is that?” Cade demanded and jumped up from the bed. He came to stand beside me and glared at the book.
I ignored him, eyes focused on my friend. “Where did you get this?”
“I found it in my grandmother’s attic. I thought maybe we could find something in here. Move you into the light? Free your soul from this house? Do something.”
“I don’t fucking think so.” Cade grabbed the book out of my hand.
Meredith jumped back from me and gasped as the book flew across the room and slammed against the door.
“You can’t mess with this shit.” His body quivered to reveal himself to Meredith. His eyes moved to her, angry and cold.
She shifted her gaze away from us, no doubt more than freaked out by his random appearance. “Listen, you, you can’t tell me what to do.”
“Maybe not, but I’m not going to let you pull Briar into some nature loving bullshit.”
“It’s not bullshit; it’s real. I’ve seen it.”
“But you don’t know what the hell you are doing.” He shoved his hands into his pockets in an attempt to calm himself.
I laced my hand through his arm and pulled myself closer to him. “It’s okay, Cade; it’s something to think about.”
Ghostly (Darkly Devoted Book 1) Page 19
