Chapter 29 #2
I nodded in agreement before sitting cross-legged in the center of my bed.
Catsper purred and ran his back under my fingers.
This was routine for me these days. Ever since I ran into Terrance again, the two of us had managed to reestablish our relationship.
I was reluctant at first, too lost in all the darkness that his presence brought back up for me, but talking to him became easier over time.
Now, we talked almost nightly, simply checking in on the other and their day. Now, I was fine.
“Did you get the wedding invitation?” Terrance asked. “Have you checked to see if you can get off work to come?”
My heart stopped.
I was fine … until home and its occupants were brought up.
Swallowing down the lump in my throat, I answered, “Not yet. Crazy busy.”
Terrance was silent for a moment. I could practically picture his defeated frown, the same one he’d wear when we were little and I pretended to be too tired to play.
Just like he could tell I was lying back then, he knew my excuses were just that now, too.
Some things never changed, and Terrance really hadn’t.
He never asked what was really wrong back then, almost like he was afraid of the answer, just as he still wouldn’t ask questions today.
“Okay,” he replied kindly, though I caught the traces of dejection in his tone. “No problem. Just let me know when you find out. Speaking of finding out, guess what I just learned.”
Thankful for the shift in topic, I guessed teasingly, “That you’re actually adopted from the circus?”
“Ha ha,” he responded mockingly. “No. Mountview Psychiatric Hospital abruptly closed. It happened last week.”
“What?” I gasped in surprise.
“Yeah. Funding had apparently been getting worse since there were those incidents of unexplained activity that some patients’ families brought up to the higher-ups.
Dad was a mess, trying to figure out what was actually happening and trying to get the funding back.
But it didn’t happen. It closed last week, locked up to keep trespassers out and everything left behind.
Kinda creepy thinking about all that stuff just sitting in there, huh?
Hospital beds, those empty rooms, even folders and stuff.
Dad and the staff weren’t allowed to take anything other than personal belongings when they closed. ”
My mind raced with the information. Admittedly, I’d had horrible experiences with seeing and hearing things when first arriving at Mountview, but employees didn’t care since that made me look mentally unsound.
I’d heard whispers among other patients about alleged haunted activity and people who were tormented by ghosts within the wards.
I’d always thought those were just fun scary stories for patients to tell each other, especially since the few ghosts I’d seen roaming the halls made no such attempts to interact.
Then again, those spirits always hid or ran from me.
“That’s crazy,” I murmured, lost in my thoughts.
“Yeah. I think someone has already purchased the place, even though there isn’t much someone could do with a building like that. It’s really only fit to be what it is. A psychiatric hospital.”
“Those are hot commodities in the paranormal world,” I told him. “I wouldn’t be surprised if some rich ghost hunter bought it.”
“Good point.” A female voice called his name from the other end of the phone. “Oh, Becca is calling for me. I’ve gotta go. Good night and sleep well, Kendy-Bug.”
“You too, Terr-Bear.”
I hung up and stared at Catsper’s transparent black body.
His one eye met mine. He always seemed to know when my thoughts were spiraling, so he floated up from the mattress to hover in front of my face.
His ghostly nose tapped mine, but of course, also went through me.
Still, I smiled and tried to scratch at the cat’s round cheeks.
“I’m okay, Catsper,” I grinned. “Run around the hotel and collect energy from people so I can give you better scratches.”
When the two of us had been with Xander, the demon supplied spare demonic energy to the ghost cat so that I could see and touch him a little easier.
The feline wasn’t actually solid, but there was enough ethereal substance there that, when I closed in on him, I was met with a slight resistance.
That gave the illusion of petting something.
Without Xander, Catsper had to hunt for his own energy wherever we went.
Thinking about Xander, my heart deflated all over again.
Catsper had vanished upon my direction, so I was left to dwell on my run-in with the Mischief demon.
I groaned and wrapped my arms around my bent knees and dropped my forehead onto them.
I could still clearly envision the hurt hidden deep in his gaze as it flashed briefly upon hearing my icy words.
It had been so long since we’d seen each other, and yet my entire body and soul felt as though it had only been yesterday that the demon’s lips were on mine or my frame was wrapped in his arms.
A whole year, and the defenses I’d built were nearly demolished with one single five minute interaction.
Not that he felt the same way. No. He looked much too busy with the two women with whom he’d arrived. I dug my fingers into my palms as I pictured what the three of them were most likely up to at this very second in his room.
Was he touching them the way he’d touched me?
Was he fucking them the way I’d wanted and nearly been ready for him to do to me?
We’d been working our way through my reservations and toward a complete physical relationship, but before we could, I’d done what I always did.
I ran.
“I hate this,” I muttered into my knees with my eyes tightly shut.
“Good. That makes me feel less alone.”
I gasped and looked up to find Xander casually lounged back in a chair in the corner of my room. One ankle rested on the opposite knee, and both toned arms were draped along the back of the chair. His human guise was still in place, so his smoldering obsidian gaze was fixed firmly on me.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded, though the biting tone came out shakier than I’d intended.
“Oh, you know,” he shrugged. “Just taking a stroll through every room on this floor.”
“Why?”
He gave me a pointed look. “Obviously, to find you.”
The demon had shadow-walked the whole floor to find which room I was staying in? I wanted to shake my head, but I wasn’t surprised. It was exactly because he was like this that I had to leave the note so that he wouldn’t try to find me.
You were a mistake, and I regret it all.
Don’t look for me, because I won’t be looking for you.
Gritting my teeth, I turned away. “I’m not sure why you’d want to find me. It seems you had plenty to keep you entertained.”
I realized too late how jealous that sounded.