2. Freddie #2
Stella shakes her head, a tired, soft smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. “Thanks, Delphi, really. But I need to get back to the office to meet with Nisrene.” She pulls her dripping coat tighter around her shoulders and steps back toward the door.
Delphi turns her gaze on me next, her hands planting firmly on her hips.
“And you need to get home before this downpour washes out the lower ridge road, Winifred. I’ll keep my phone volume turned all the way up tonight just in case that rinky-dink death trap you call a car breaks down in a ditch somewhere. ”
“Hey!” I point a finger at her. “Don’t talk about Mercury that way! She’s a good gal. She just has character, that’s all.”
Stella laughs, a knowing smirk breaking through her exhausted expression. “I’ll keep my phone up, too. Just in case Mercury decides to stall out on you going down the hill.”
I roll my eyes at both of them, though the fond annoyance takes just enough edge off my panic.
Delphi starts flapping her hands at us, making shooing motions toward the door. “Out. Both of you. I’ll finish this room. The rest of the guest rooms are made up anyway.” Her shoulders drop an inch. “Tonight we rest. Tomorrow we go back to wringing our hands and figuring this out.”
“Deal,” Stella says, pulling the hood of her rain jacket up over her head. “Goodnight, Delphi. Night, Fred.”
She turns the brass handle to leave, but right before her boot hits the threshold, she hesitates. She turns back, her hazel eyes softening.
“Hey, Fred?” she asks softly. “Have you heard anything from your parents lately?”
I sigh. “Nothing noteworthy. Got a letter from a tavern up near the northern ridge a few days ago, but it was pretty boring honestly.”
Stella gives me an understanding nod. “Hopefully they find some real answers soon.”
“Yeah,” I say, offering a small smile. “Hopefully.”
She heads down the stairs and steps out into the dark, the heavy oak door to the inn latching shut behind her and cutting off the worst of the howling wind.
My parents, Atticus and Cassandra Rowley, packed up their gear and started traipsing all over Amberhollow the second the first disappearances happened six months ago.
They aren’t the type to sit on a porch swinging their legs while their neighbors vanish either; they immediately went out into the dense woods along the boundary lines, hunting down ancient lore and looking for answers where the Veil runs thin.
Six months. It’s the longest I’ve ever gone without seeing them in my entire life, and this part of town feels entirely too quiet without them. My brothers and I are used to them being loud, disheveled fixtures in our daily routine. I miss them so much it hurts.
I miss my dad and the smell of Gojo hand cleaner and motor oil that always clung to his flannel shirts.
I miss leaning over the open hood of a rusted truck with him while he handed me a socket wrench and taught me how to fix a carburetor.
He loved cars and the outdoors with a passion, and he passed that same love down to all his kids.
I miss the damp morning fog rising off the lake when he’d take us fishing, and the crunch of pine needles beneath our boots on early morning hikes.
And my mom—we’re twin flames. Eccentric, headstrong, and entirely incapable of keeping our opinions to ourselves. I miss dragging her through dusty antique shops on rainy afternoons, or finding a vinyl record at the shop that I knew she’d love and tossing it into her bag for her to borrow.
She was always dying her hair a new, outrageous color depending on her mood. It was an electric violet when she left six months ago.
I stare at the rain-streaked window pane, wondering what color it is now. Emerald green? Copper? I hadn’t even thought to ask in my last letter, and I made a firm mental note right then to ask at the very beginning of my next one.
Delphi places a warm hand on my shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze as if she can read the spiraling clutter of thoughts jumbling around inside my head.
“They’re fine, Winifred,” she says gently, her eyes softening. “You know Atticus and Cassandra. They can take care of themselves.”
I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding. “Thanks, Delph.”
“Now go home and get some rest,” she instructs, already turning back toward the bed. “We’ll tackle the rest of the world tomorrow.”
I give her a quick two-finger salute. “Come on, Jett.”
We head down the creaking mahogany staircase into the main lobby.
The Inn always gives me a sense of pure nostalgia with its dark oak wainscoting, the tarnished brass lanterns casting warm amber light, and the lingering, rich scent of clove and cinnamon.
I grab my black leather jacket off a wrought-iron hook by the heavy front door, tugging it on over my shivering arms.
In the parlor off to the right, a few of the town’s permanent spectral residents are gathered around a cold stone hearth, floating a deck of translucent cards between them for a late-night game.
Geraldine—a ghost who looks to be in her mid-seventies, complete with a dramatic pearl necklace and a tight silver perm—hollers at me over the top of her hand. “Be careful on these roads, doll! It’s nasty out there!”
I toss a wide grin back over my shoulder as I pull the door open a crack. “Figured it’d be a great night to try to do some donuts over in the Moonlit Market parking lot, Gerry!”
Geraldine and her card table buddies burst into a wave of cackling laughter, her ghostly shoulders shaking. “Ah, what it is to be young!”
Jett scampers past my boots, pressing himself against my ankles as we step out into the entry porch. “That woman gives me the heebie-jeebies,” he mutters under his breath.
I look down at him as I pull the heavy timber door shut behind us. “Why? She’s harmless. And a whole lot of fun.”
“Too much fun,” Jett grumbles, his ears pinned flat. “Last week, she kept me in her lap for two whole hours while she knit. Do you know how agonizing it is to listen to old women gossip for hours on end?”
“Poor Jetty boy,” I tossed back sarcastically. “Endless pets and belly rubs. It’s a hard knock life you live.”
Twyla, who is still flitting around in my hair, lets out a tiny, high-pitched grumble against my skin. “Why do you always have to park so far away?”
“Because the Inn lot is always packed by four in the afternoon and I’m not paying the street meters, Twy!” I shout over the howling wind.
Twyla humphs, ducking lower to dodge the stray raindrops blowing sideways. The storm has officially gone wild. The wind is whistling through the gables of the brick storefronts and tossing wet autumn leaves through the air like confetti.
Jett and I make a mad dash for it, sprinting a block and a half down the slippery sidewalk, water splashing up over the cuffs of my boots.
We finally reach my pride and joy: Mercury, my black 1989 Honda CRX.
I yank the door handle open and Jett leaps straight inside, landing in a dramatic heap in the tiny back seat. “I hate the rain,” he grumbles, shaking his paws out. “I hate the cold. I hate this entire evening, matter of fact.”
“Yeah, yeah,” I say, sliding into the driver’s seat and slamming the door to cut off the worst of the roar.
I stick the key in the ignition and turn it. Chug-chug-chug…Nothing. I pump the gas pedal once, give it another hard twist, and the engine finally catches with a guttural sputter and a satisfied groan.
“Good girl,” I whisper, patting the top of the cracked leather steering wheel.
Twyla zips out from behind my neck, flying straight into the backseat to drop down next to Jett.
She burrows directly into his thick fur, grabbing his fluffy tail with her tiny hands and dragging it over her petal-dressed shoulders like a duvet.
Jett narrows his dark eyes at her, letting out a long-suffering sigh, but he doesn’t move an inch to push her away. The softie.
I crank the heater all the way to high, holding my rain-slicked hands right in front of the vents to soak in the heat.
Today was an undeniably stupid day to wear a leather mini skirt, sheer black tights, chunky boots, and a black halter top, but Amberhollow weather is obnoxiously unhinged. It can be a gloomy seventy degrees and sticky-humid at noon, only to turn into a freezing downpour by eight.
I reach up and twist my wet hair into a messy knot at the top of my head, letting my curtain bangs frame my face as I catch my breath. I stare at the faded Queen sticker stuck to the plastic dashboard, then pop open the cassette organizer in the center console.
I flip through the plastic cases—Fleetwood Mac, Bowie, Prince, Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin, Guns N’ Roses—before my fingers settle on Stevie Nicks’ Bella Donna. I slide the tape into the deck, pushing it in until it clicks, and fast-forward straight to “Stop Dragging My Heart Around.”