Something in me knew, then, that this didn’t have anything to do with a blown fuse. I gripped the blanket tighter, my hands beginning to shake when I heard the sound I’d been trying to chase from my mind for an entire week.
Not only did I hear the hoarse, tortured whisper… but I also felt it brushing the back of my neck in a chilly rush of air that sent a tremor down my spine. Breath catching in my throat, I turned slowly, too afraid to face what I knew I’d find, but unable to stop myself from confronting it.
A white face filled my vision, the colorless lips parted in a silent cry. The shard of glass jutting from her neck glowed from the light of the TV, her shoulder hanging limply at an angle, the arm twisted and mangled.
Screaming, I scrambled away from her, slamming back against the wooden entertainment unit. The television rocked in its place, but it didn’t tip over, continuing its static noise. She advanced on me, limping and dragging her foot, using the momentum of her good leg to propel her forward. Pausing for a moment as if something physically impeded her, she shook her head rapidly from side to side, creating the sickening cracking sound I remembered from last time. Suddenly going still, she glowered at me with her black eyes and then continued toward me, surprisingly fast despite her bad leg.
I dropped my blanket and darted left, running toward the kids’ rooms. I couldn’t let her get to them, no matter how badly I wanted to run and save myself. Swiftly closing both the kids’ doors, I turned back to find that she hadn’t pursued me. The hallway remained shrouded in blackness, the light of the television glowing like a beacon from the den. Unable to stop the way my breath had begun sawing noisily in and out of my lungs, I tiptoed back toward the den to take a peek, wondering where she had gone since she’d neglected to chase me. I reached the room to find it empty; the only thing filling the yawning space was the light and noise of the TV. Glancing left, down the hall leading to the kids’ room, I found it still empty and dark.
Turning right, I peered down the wing leading in the other direction, where guest rooms and the playroom were located. Nothing.
Leaning against the wall, I exhaled a long, low sigh of relief.
That was when I heard the sound again. The frigid breath brushed my cheek, chilling me to the bone.
When I opened my eyes, I found her right in front of me, close enough that I could reach out and touch her if I wanted to. Instead, I screamed, ducking when she reached out toward me, and breaking into a run. Thinking to draw her away from the kids, I headed for the staircase leading to the first floor.
On the landing, the ghost’s twin—the one wearing the white nightgown with the black ring around her neck—stood with her back to me. As I scrambled to change course, she turned, swifter than a blink. Her black eyes widened as she advanced on me with swift steps, her head cocking to one side and causing a loud ‘crack’ to echo through the house.
This time, my scream burned in my chest, unreleased as I turned to run again, the way down the stairs blocked. The first ghost shuffled toward me from the other direction, cornering me and leaving me with only one way left to run.
Glancing up the third-floor staircase and at the red rose petals guiding the way up, I hesitated for less than a second. My footsteps echoed noisily on the polished hardwood as I ran, taking the stairs two at a time. I could hear them breathing, the hoarse sounds scraping my eardrums like fingernails against a chalkboard. They followed me, side by side, their steps noiseless, the only indication of their proximity to me the rasping of their breaths.
Reaching the third floor, I turned right and ran as fast as I could. There was only one thing left to do, and I didn’t think twice about it.
Forcing myself to breathe, I inhaled, and then released one word on a panicked cry.
“Tate!”
My voice echoed, and—I hoped—carried down the hall to the only person who could help me now. He was just going to have to forgive me for intruding again… I needed a closed door between me and the two ghouls on my heels, breathing down my neck.
A sliver of light appeared, and then the silhouette of a person.
“Tate,” I said again, my voice a hoarse cry this time.
“Bellamy,” he bellowed, rushing forward, the hand still extended. “Bellamy, come on! Run!”
I wasn’t sure where I found the strength, but I sped up on the last few steps and leapt, throwing myself away from the wraiths and straight into the arms of the beast. He caught me up, wrapping an arm around my waist and practically carrying me the rest of the way. Hurling me over the threshold of his bedroom, he ran in behind me, slamming the door just as the two women appeared. They lunged, but the heavy panel shut them out. Yelping, I clapped one hand over my mouth, expecting them to appear through the door or slip under the crack. Yet, the closed door seemed to impede them, and after a few seconds of sobbing against my hand, I collapsed to the floor in equal parts relief and exhaustion.
My chest heaved, my shoulders shaking as I tried to calm down but failed. I was hyperventilating, my lungs expanding and contracting faster than I could draw and expel air. My face grew damp from tears, and my entire body became wracked by shudders.
“It’s okay.”
I heard Tate’s voice, but just barely, through the sound of my own harsh breathing and the terror turning me into a complete mess. I glanced up at him, still sobbing, unable to stop now that it had started. I’d been afraid… more than I’d ever been in my life. For a moment, I’d genuinely thought I wasn’t going to make it out alive.
Coming toward me, Tate knelt, his face shadowed by his hood. His hands shot out, gripping my upper arms in a tight hold. Giving me a shake, he squeezed harder, jolting me out of my panicked state.
“Enough,” he yelled, effectively silencing me. “It’s all right. They can’t get through closed doors. You’re safe in here.”
Taking a deep breath, I shut my eyes and exhaled, stifling my cries. Reaching up, I swiped the tears away and took another moment to compose myself before opening my eyes.
Tate had moved away from me, crossing the room to the door. He cracked it a bit and peered out for a moment, before swiftly closing it again.
“They’ll get bored soon and leave,” he said. “Once they do, I’ll take you back downstairs. You should be safe there.”
Standing, I approached him, but stopped short when I noticed him retreating into the shadowed part of the room, near a humongous four-poster bed.
He didn’t want to be seen.
“I won’t be,” I insisted. “That’s why I ended up on your floor. They came down to the second floor and chased me up here.”
Seeming to forget his issues with personal space, he took a step toward me. The light of a lamp revealed the smooth side of his face.
“They did what?” His voice was so low and rough that, for a moment, I was scared to answer him.
“Th-they came downstairs… to the den.”
Sighing, he shoved his hands into the pockets of his sweatpants. “That’s impossible. You had to have come snooping up here again and got caught. What part of ‘stay away from the third floor’ didn’t you understand?”
Taken aback, I stared dumbly at him as he began to pace, hands still in his pockets. Squaring my shoulders, I found my voice again.
“I didn’t come up here,” I said, my tone a bit harsher than I’d intended. “After what happened last time, I didn’t intend to set foot up here ever again.”
Scoffing, he shook his head. “And what happened last time, exactly?”
I folded my arms over my chest. “I thought your brother was playing another joke on me. Apparently someone is, because there are rose petals all over the damn staircase, but everyone wants to pretend they can’t see them.”
Halting, he spun to face me. “You can see them?” he whispered.
Frowning, I gave him a confused glance. “I just said I could, didn’t I?” Then, realizing what he’d said, I gasped. “Wait. You see them, too?”
Without answering me, he t
rudged to a sofa on the other side of the room, facing the television. Leaning forward, he braced his elbows on his knees, staring at the wall. I made my way toward him and the matching love seat positioned perpendicular to where he sat. Lowering myself onto it, I folded my hands in my lap and waited for him to answer.
“It’s been two years since those things appeared and started leaving rose petals behind,” he murmured. “In all that time, you’re the only person who’s been able to see them besides me.”
“I noticed the rose petals the first time I came here,” I told him. “I see them every day, and try to pretend they aren’t there, because I thought someone would think I was nuts if I kept bringing it up.”
Tate nodded, glancing up at me. “That’s good. Keep ignoring them… both the rose petals and the ghosts. If you keep doing that, you’ll be okay.”
“Are you kidding me?” I blurted. “One of them was practically breathing down my neck. They chased me as if they wanted to kill me! How am I supposed to ignore that?”
Giving me a grim look, Tate shrugged. “You’ll learn, just like I did. They only chase you if you run. Once they realize you aren’t going to give them the satisfaction, they’ll leave you alone. They might hang around you sometimes, but the chasing will stop.”
“Who are they?” I asked. Then added, “What are they?”
He shook his head and shrugged. “Ghosts, I assume. I have no idea who they might have been. I’d never seen them before in my life before they started haunting the place.”
Glancing down at my feet, I thought back to my dad’s drawings. None of the faces were familiar, yet time and time again they appeared to him, as if drawn like a magnet. Was Tate like him, then? I’d thought I could see them due to some genetic thing… but Tate had been seeing them for a while, which meant whatever was wrong with my dad and me had to be affecting him, too.
“What do they want?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he snapped.
Pausing, he sighed and ran a hand through his hair, lowering his hood. I wasn’t sure he even realized he’d done it, because he went on talking as if he hadn’t just exposed himself to me.
“Look, all I know is that those two showed up two years ago, and, not long after that, I got sick and haven’t been the same since.”
I gasped. “Do you think they had something to do with it?”
He nodded. “I do. But what am I supposed to tell people? ‘Hey, I think I know why none of the proven medical treatments for my disease are working… it’s because I’ve been cursed by two ghosts!’” Snorting in disdain, he shook his head. “What I suspect doesn’t matter. There’s nothing anyone can do if no one can see the ghosts.”
There wasn’t much I could say to that, because he was right. I knew firsthand what admitting to seeing ghosts could do to a person. My dad wasn’t the laughingstock of Wellhollow Springs for no reason.
“My dad can see ghosts,” I murmured, for lack of something better to say. “He sees them all the time.”
“Does his face look like mine?” Tate snapped.
Lifting my gaze to his, I found him looking at me, eyes narrowed and upper lip curled as if he didn’t like what he saw.
“No,” I whispered, lowering my eyes as he jerked his hood back over his head.
“Then he’s lucky.”
I wanted to disagree, but kept my mouth shut. My dad didn’t have Tate’s privilege, wealth, or the protection of a name that carried weight in this town. He certainly couldn’t afford to disappear from society and hide away in the lap of luxury.
For a long moment, neither of us spoke. We simply sat in silence, avoiding looking at each other in near darkness. After a while, I cleared my throat and attempted to break the uncomfortable silence.
“Thanks again… for the gift.”
“It’s just a book,” he grumbled. “No big deal.”
I leaned forward, seeking out his eyes from among the shadows of his hood. It unnerved me to stare at nothing more than the dark smudge of his face. He leaned back as if purposely avoiding eye contact.
“It was a worn-out copy of your favorite book,” I insisted. “It wasn’t ‘no big deal.’ Do you always give treasured books away to complete strangers?”
“Do you always analyze everything to death?” He huffed. “Is that like a girl thing, or exclusive to you? I acted like a dick… you didn’t deserve that. I gave you the book because I felt like crap afterward, and I knew you’d like it. End of story.”
“Are you always so surly?” I asked. “Or has being a hermit eroded all your social skills?”
He laughed, a dry, rough sound that sounded as if it didn’t get used often enough. “Both, actually.”
More silence. Now it was a bit less awkward. I rested my head against the back of the couch, closing my eyes. It had been a long night, and I was exhausted. I might have even dozed off for a moment, because before I knew it, Tate’s hand was on my knee, shaking me awake—not very gently.
“It’s all clear now,” he said.
I blinked and sat up, fighting against drowsiness. Tate stood over me, his face indiscernible with the light of the lamp behind him and his hood giving him shelter. But his scent tickled my nostrils—masculine and spicy, like the body wash from the TV commercials.
Standing, I stretched and yawned. “Okay. Thanks for letting me hole up. I’ll make my way back if you’re sure they won’t hurt me.”
Swinging the door open, he revealed the empty corridor. “I’m positive, but there’s no need for you to walk alone. I’ll take you down and wait with you until my parents get home.”
“You don’t have to do that,” I insisted, stepping out into the hall.
He followed me, closing his bedroom door behind him. “I didn’t have to rescue you earlier, either… yet, here we are.”
I rolled my eyes and blew a few stray curls off my forehead. “If the ghosts are harmless, you didn’t exactly rescue me.”
A sound like a chuckle came from him, and I smiled. “Was that a laugh?”
Leading me down the staircase, he shrugged. “It might have been. I don’t know. Do monsters laugh?”
I paused on the second-floor landing, turning toward him. “That’s not funny.”
The moonlight from a window illuminated the space, and I saw his face clearly now as he jerked down his hood and advanced on me, bending down a bit until he was face to face with me. I held my ground, staring at him as he jutted his face out toward me, meeting my stare in a bold challenge.
“No?” he murmured. “It’s true, isn’t it? Look at me.”
I did, not flinching away from him when he came even closer… so close I could feel his breath against my cheek. The handsome side of his face was shadowed by the dark, the moon shining on the marred half. I stared at his concave cheekbone, the sunken eye, unfocused beneath a drooping lid. My gaze traced the uneven line of his jaw and the hollow of his forehead.
“You don’t scare me,” I told him, though my wavering voice might have told him a different story. “Monsters are scary… you’re just…”
“Ugly,” he supplied, his tone harsh and clipped. “Say it.”
I shook my head. “No. Not ugly. Just… scarred. We all have scars, Tate.”
Snorting, he took another step toward me, so close now I could feel heat emanating from him. Far too close.
“You don’t,” he murmured. “Look at you… you’re practically perfect.”
Trapped in his stare, the green gaze penetrating mine without wavering, I wrapped my arms around myself and shivered. “Some of us have scars that no one can see,” I choked out before turning away.
He stood staring at me for another moment, but then turned to continue down the stairs, leaving me with no choice but to follow. Once on the second floor, I noticed that the television had returned to the Netflix menu, the static and pixel snow now gone.
“I’m okay now,” I told him, gesturing toward the couch. “I’ve got the couch and TV. I’m sure it won’
t be much longer before—”
“I said I’d wait with you, didn’t I?” he snapped, already heading into the den. “You want to be rid of me that badly?”
I stomped after him, scooping my discarded blanket from the floor on my way. “No. I just didn’t think you’d want to spend too much more time in my perfect presence.”
As I found the remote, I heard another sound come from him, much like the one before. Another laugh. Smirking, I cast a glance at him from the corner of my eye. He stretched out on the love seat, long legs sprawled in front of him, broad shoulders taking up quite a bit of space. Despite his height and the width of his shoulders, he’d lost a lot of the muscle I remembered him having back when he’d played football. Pity caused my chest to twinge as I thought of him forced to stop doing something he’d been great at. If what Ezra said about the amount of pain he experienced every day was true, then it was a wonder he functioned at all.
“Are you going to keep staring at me, or are you going to pick something to watch?” he said, in what could almost pass for a teasing tone.
Deciding not to respond, I chose an old sitcom, hoping it might help Tate practice that laugh of his a bit more. It needed some dusting off. After two episodes, the sound of the door opening sounded downstairs.
“Bellamy?” came Faith’s voice from downstairs. “We’re back!”
I stood, and, to my surprise, so did Tate. He silently gestured for me to precede him to the stairs. I descended with him behind me, finding the Baldwins standing in the foyer. Faith’s smile faded as she glanced up to find her son behind me, stepping off the bottom stair.
“Tate,” she whispered. “What are you… I mean… you’re downstairs.”
Beside her, Douglas stared at his son with a grim expression, his gaze betraying nothing about how his son’s presence on the first floor affected him.
Bellamy and the Brute Page 9
