Chapter Six #2
Celeste was quiet. Still. Watching Alaric shake out his bruised knuckles, tuck that ridiculous waistcoat tighter, and glance at the Blackwood family plot with a jaw set like justice.
“I mean, that’s our boy,” Alice went on, her grin so wide it nearly cracked the ether. “Did you see the way he decked that man? Bam! Right in the jaw!”
“He didn’t have to do that,” Celeste murmured at last, voice quieter than the wind.
Alice turned. “Pardon?”
“That wasn’t for show. That wasn’t to impress Thea. No one was here to see, to witness. That was—” She blinked hard. “That was for us.”
Alice beamed so hard she practically glowed. “Darling, you’re feeling things. I could cry. If I had tear ducts. Which I do not.”
“Don’t make it weird.” Celeste rolled her eyes.
“Oh no, we’re celebrating,” Alice crowed, twirling midair. “He bled for us, Celeste. For you. For your azaleas and your bloody lilacs and the daughter who never listened to a word you said but somehow turned out perfect anyway.”
Celeste pressed her ghostly lips together. “She did, didn’t she?”
“And he just punched a man for trying to steal your funeral urn. That’s practically a vow recital, if you ask me.”
“He’s not so bad.”
“Oh-ho! I knew it. Do you hear that, world?” Alice yelled into the swirling mist. “Celeste Blackwood approves!”
“I said not so bad,” Celeste snapped. “Let’s not write the invitations just yet.”
Alice looped her arm through her daughter-in-law’s with spectral satisfaction. “Oh, we will. I’ll even haunt the cake.”
*
Down at Metro Station…
The Metropolitan Police station was lit like a mausoleum at dusk, lamplight flickering, shadows yawning across floorboards, and the scent of old ink and damp wool heavy in the air.
Alaric rubbed a hand across his jaw, smearing dried dirt from Highgate down to his collar.
His coat was torn at the hem, his left knuckle was split, and the bastard grave robber’s blood had long since dried in the crease of his palm.
There were bruises blooming beneath his waistcoat and a wretched stain on his trousers he was certain wasn’t his—but none of that mattered.
Not when he had to sit here filling out forms while Thea Blackwood was likely upstairs in her grandmother’s townhouse, curled up in some dim little sitting room, mourning the mother she’d just lost—again.
Damn it.
He shifted at the narrow desk, scowling at the forms spread out before him. Name of perpetrator. Date and time of arrest. Location of incident.
“Highgate Cemetery,” he muttered, pen scratching furiously. “In the morning. All Hallows’. Because the gods enjoy irony.”
“Talking to yourself, Ward?”
Castlebury’s gruff voice emerged from the doorway, carrying with it the aroma of pipe smoke and the weariness of a man who’d seen too much—all of it stupid. The chief inspector stepped into the room, his eyes sharp despite the hour.
“I’ve had worse days,” Alaric replied, not looking up. “But only barely.”
Castlebury grunted and leaned on the opposite desk.
“So. Two would-be robbers, three damaged headstones, one sacred plot nearly desecrated, and a camera plate that somehow managed to go off without a living soul manning it.” He paused.
“You wouldn’t happen to know anything about… ghost interference, would you, Ward?”
Alaric stilled. Slowly set down his pen. Met Catamount Castlebury’s gaze. “No, sir. But if I did, I wouldn’t put it past any of Thea’s ancestors to hurl a gargoyle to make a point.”
Castlebury’s mustache twitched. “Damn peculiar family, that one.”
“They grow on you.”
“Fungus grows on you.”
Alaric allowed himself a twitch of a grin.
Castlebury sighed. “Go on, then. Go tell her. You look like hell, and if you don’t get this off your chest, you’ll muck up the rest of your life.”
“I thought you were going to lecture me about fraternizing with fiancées and how this is a bad look for the Yard.”
“I was. But you did your job. You protected the plot. Got your man. And didn’t even break your nose this time.” He squinted at Alaric’s shirt sleeve. “Although your spleen might’ve taken a hit.”
Alaric rose, wincing as his side pulled. “It was worth it.”
Castlebury didn’t argue. Instead, he waved him off with a grunt and reached for a stack of untouched paperwork. “Go. But if she winds up back in that cemetery before dusk, I’m sending you and the ghost of my grandmother to drag her out. And trust me, nobody wants that.”
Alaric nodded, tugging on his coat with a wince and buttoning it despite the blood. “Understood.”
“And Ward?”
He paused in the doorway.
Castlebury looked at him, something unreadable in his expression. “Tell her… I’m sorry.”
Alaric’s throat tightened. He gave a single, solemn nod. Then he turned and strode into the gray-stained evening, aching all over, one hand pressed carrying Thea’s trunk, the other gripping the strap of the bag that held her camera and the undeveloped plate.
He had no idea what she’d see when she looked at it. But he prayed—with every ache in his damn ribs—that she’d see him there. And know what it meant.
By the time Alaric reached Thea’s townhouse, the London sky had surrendered to a weeping dark.
Drizzle clung to his coat in stubborn patches, and gas lamps flared in the mist like watchful eyes.
The entire day had gone to hell in a ledger, every minute since sunrise devoured by blood, bureaucracy, and one very smug grave robber now missing two teeth and nursing a sprained wrist.
He was soaked. Bruised. Exhausted. And all he could think about was her.
He shifted the weight of the trunk on his shoulder and adjusted the long camera bag in his other shoulder, the strap digging cruelly into muscles already sore from hauling bodies—living and otherwise—out of Highgate.
A coal cart splashed past, sending a wave of cold muck over his boots.
He didn’t flinch. Couldn’t afford to. Not with his insides already a quagmire of guilt and unspoken things.
The townhouse was lit.
Not brightly, not rudely—just a low golden glow from the front windows, warm and steady, like a hearth that didn’t judge.
He stood there longer than he meant to, watching the flicker of movement behind the curtains, half tempted to leave the trunk and camera on the step and vanish back into the night like a man without tether.
But then he imagined her opening the door and not finding him there. And that—that was unbearable.
He knocked. Once.
The door opened almost instantly. Thea stood there in a shawl and stockinged feet, curls piled messily atop her head like she’d tried to distract herself with something domestic and failed spectacularly.
Her eyes were wide and dark in the lamplight, catching on his bruised face and damp shoulders, then on the trunk, then—gently—on him.
“You came back,” she said, voice soft as chimney smoke.
“I said I would.” He cleared his throat. “Didn’t realize I’d have to beat a man with a tombstone to do it, but—”
Her mouth fell open.
He set the trunk down. Then, with more care than he’d shown anyone all day, he unslung the long camera case and held it out to her like an offering. “This was still there. Dry. Untouched.”
Her hand hovered over it like she was afraid it might vanish. “Thank you.”
He hesitated, eyes flicking from the case to her face. “Camera went off on its own. Thought you’d want to… see if it caught anything.”
Her brow knitted. “It just… went off?”
He gave a slow nod, jaw tight. “No one was near it. No one touched it.”
She blinked at him like he was a hallucination. He blinked back, bone tired.
“You’re just in time,” she finally said.
“For what?”
And before he could so much as ask if she’d eaten today or tell her that her family plot had nearly been desecrated, she reached out, grabbed his coat lapel with those ridiculous ink-smudged fingers, and hauled him over the threshold.
The parlor looked like a séance had collided with a theatrical production of Macbeth and lost.
Candles everywhere. Wax puddles on the floor. A lace-draped table tilted slightly like someone had kicked a leg out. And at its head—gods preserve him—sat a woman in a velvet turban and too much rouge, whispering nonsense to the ether.
“The spirits are restless tonight,” she intoned, waving a feather fan that had no business being indoors.
Alaric stood there, water still trailing down his temple, staring at Thea like she’d grown another head. She mouthed, Don’t say a word, and slid into a chair.
He followed stiffly, lowering the trunk and case to the floor with the same delicacy he’d use placing a bomb.
A chair squeaked. The table creaked. The candles hissed like they knew he wasn’t welcome here.
The medium’s eyes rolled back. “There is someone new among us,” she hissed. “A man. With a soul knotted in duty. A heart… in chains.”
Alaric’s jaw tightened.
Thea cleared her throat and gestured toward him. “My fiancé.”
That did not help. The medium pointed a bejeweled finger at him. “You… you tread in grave places.”
“I’m a detective inspector.” He narrowed his eyes.
“She means that literally,” Thea whispered, grabbing his arm as the table gave an ominous groan beneath her teacup.
The lights flickered.
Alaric looked to the ceiling. “Is the gas line safe?”
A candelabrum shivered.
He turned his head and, very calmly, murmured, “Miss Blackwood, is this safe?”
“I’m not sure,” Thea whispered, eyes wide as the table gave another low knock from beneath. “But I think my mother’s about to arrive.”
Another knock. Then another. Then three hard raps on the underside of the table—and every candle in the room flared with a sudden, eerie blue flame.
Alaric didn’t move. Didn’t speak. He just clenched his jaw and thought of Castlebury, who had warned him—warned him—that falling for a chaotic woman led to moments like this.
The room spun with cold. The lights dimmed again. The camera case at his feet gave a quiet click, as if the ghost in the machine had just taken a snapshot of this exact moment.
Thea reached for his hand beneath the table and squeezed. And Alaric, utterly soaked, still bleeding from his temple, and somehow more in love than ever with the maddening woman beside him… squeezed back.