Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
TOM
Ipark my car in the staff lot and walk around to the front of the building, bakery boxes—yes, plural—balanced in my hands. The estate isn’t officially open for the day, but someone should be waiting to let me in. I had to buzz at the gates, so they know I’m here.
Sure enough, Skye is propping the door open with his body, decked out in his olde-timey uniform. It goes amazingly with his pastel rainbow hair. He looks tired but smiles when he sees me.
“Didn’t you sleep last night?” he calls before I can speak. “Serves you right for ditching me.”
I laugh as I reach him. “I didn’t ditch you. I went home and left you here with your hot farmer boyfriend so you could role-play that he’s the plow and you’re the field.”
He chokes on his own laughter as I push past him to go inside. “Oh my god, you’re never allowed to talk to people. I can’t believe you just said that.”
Neither can I, really, but in for a penny… “Next time, Farmer Dan can plant his seed—”
“I’m begging you, stop!” There are tears of mirth streaming down his face. It’s good to see after the set, serious expression last night.
I wait until he’s calmed down, then nudge him with my shoulder. “All good?”
He gives a giant sigh. “I should be asking you that. I’m not the one who had all this dumped on me out of the blue.
” He closes the door and gestures through toward the office behind reception.
“Kieran and Josh are in here. I think we’re going to set up for this down at the cottage, though, or maybe at Gabe’s.
We need to keep Marc out of the way of visitors and the rest of the staff. ”
“Who are already suspicious,” Kieran says, coming to stand in the doorway. “There’s only so many times I can say that the owners have sent a consultant. By the way, if anyone asks, he’s a friend of Gabe’s who’s staying for a bit to help with his research.”
Skye and I join him in the office. Josh is sitting at one of the desks, swiveling his chair around and around. It makes me dizzy just looking at him.
“I’ll leave one of these boxes here, then, and take the other one to wherever we set up.” I put both boxes on a desk, and Josh stops spinning abruptly.
“Pastries?” he asks hopefully. “I would sell my soul for something fatty and sugary right now.” He winces. “Wow, I don’t think I can say that anymore.”
“Yeah,” Kieran agrees, “It feels different now that there’s someone around who might actually take you up on that.”
Ick. I look around. “Is he here?”
Skye opens the top box. “Yep. Turned up about twenty minutes ago. Buzzed the gate and walked up to the house.”
Um… “Why didn’t he just…” I snap my fingers while waving my hand. We all saw Marc disappear and reappear last night. We know he can do it.
“I had a very stern talk to him,” Kieran says, grabbing a cinnamon twist from the box. “With visitors and staff here all the time, we have to be careful, or people are going to start talking. Nobody can see him come and go like that.”
“Wouldn’t they just assume he’s a new ghost or something?” Josh asks.
Kieran shrugs. “Probably. But I felt the need to set boundaries. Do you know how much of Connor’s ranting I had to listen to last night? I deserved a little pettiness.”
“Petty for the win,” Skye and I say in unison, then laugh. That’s something we picked up from his dad.
“So Con’s still pissed off?” Skye adds.
“Yep. And Gabe didn’t help any.”
Something flutters low in my gut. Skye probably assumes I’m tired because the whole demon thing kept me up, but that’s only partly true.
I was also staring at the ceiling for hours because I couldn’t shake the memory of how good it felt to hug Gabe.
And wondering if he kissed my neck or I imagined it, and if he did, what does it mean?
He probably didn’t.
But what if he did?
Ugh. I do not need this right now. Even if Nonna was right and I was flirting with him two minutes after we first met, and I do want to… date him.
“What did Gabe do?” Skye asks, and I mentally thank him.
Kieran sighs. I get the feeling we’re all going to be sighing a lot for the next little while. “He suggested bringing Ian and Matt here until this is all over. He’s worried their parents might try to use them as leverage.”
Horror rises in me, and I see it reflected on their faces.
“I didn’t even think of that,” Josh breathes. “Oh my god.”
“Yeah, we didn’t either. Connor agrees with Gabe that it’s necessary, but he hates the idea of the boys—especially Ian—being around Marc. You know, with Marc being the demon that nearly killed Connor and Ian.”
“This is so fucked-up,” I say. It comes out on a laugh, but nothing about this situation is funny. “How old are they? College, right?” I’m sure someone said that last night.
“Yep. They’re just starting their senior year. Which is going to make this even more fun.”
I didn’t go to college, so I don’t know how easy it is to just up and leave for… what? A few weeks? Months?
A knock on the doorframe makes us all jump and whirl around. Kate, the museum manager, gazes at us with concern. Our reaction might have been a bit extreme. “Good morning. Are we nearly ready to open?”
“Sure.” Kieran nods and checks his watch. “Yeah, of course. All set in the museum?”
She gives him a strange look. I’m willing to bet he doesn’t usually ask that. Kate runs the museum more or less autonomously, from what I’ve heard. “All set.” She smiles at me. “Hey, Tom. What brings you out here so early?”
For a second, my mind blanks, and I’m sure guilt is written all over my face.
C’mon, this is stupid. When I was a teen, I used to lie to my family all the time.
Channel that, man. “Bakery,” I blurt. “Uh, I mean, Gabe asked me to deliver breakfast. Something about him having a guest to stay? And I figured since I was going to the bakery and coming out here, I’d bring some stuff for the rest of you.
” There. That sounds plausible, right? I point to the open bakery box as though needing evidence.
Her face lights up. “Oooh, are those cinnamon twists?”
“Have one,” Josh says, holding out the box. I grab the other one and tell myself to stop acting weird. As Kate takes a pastry, I sidle toward the door.
“Welp, just gonna take this down to Gabe. Good to see you all!”
The look Skye shoots me behind Kate’s back tells me I’ve failed at not being weird, but I just flip him off and race out the door. They’ll be opening the gates to visitors soon, and I don’t want to run into the tourists.
Gabe’s cottage used to be a cabin for teachers to stay in when Mannix still had dorms for overnight school trips.
They converted the dorms to family accommodation last year, since they thought that would be more profitable than the occasional school sleepover.
Actually, now that I think of it, the timing coincided really well with Gabe’s arrival.
I bet that’s why they did it—they needed somewhere on the estate for him to live.
As I stride down the hill, I catch sight of someone sitting on the little front porch. Is Gabe enjoying his morning coffee outside?
No… closer, I can see it’s Marc, wearing another classy suit, settled comfortably on one of the chairs Gabe keeps on the porch. What’s he doing sitting outside?
I step up onto the porch, and he looks up at me and tilts his head. “Good morning, Tom. Did you sleep well?"
He’s such an ass. It seems like a perfectly normal, polite question on the surface, but his little smirk makes me want to throw something at his head.
“Fine, thanks,” I say instead, and deliberately don’t ask him in return. “Why are you sitting out here?”
He rolls his eyes. “The hunter and the gatekeeper made me leave so they could talk privately. Even though they know I can still hear every word they’re saying. Why are humans so obsessed with illusions?”
Does he really expect me to answer that?
“Why don’t we go for a walk and give them some actual privacy?
” I suggest instead, and instantly want to kick myself.
Did I seriously just invite a demon who can, I don’t know, suck my brain out through my nostrils or something, to go for a walk with me when there’s nobody else around yet?
Good one, Tom. That’s not stupid at all.
If I keep this shit up, Nonna will start saying I’m as useless as my mom and uncle.
Marc scoffs. “Little human, I do not go for walks like a puppy. Especially not through the mud and… whatever it is that smells so… pungent.”
I clear my throat and bite back a smile. Yeah, between the horses, dairy cows, and chickens, this part of the estate sometimes has an earthy smell. And the breeze is blowing in this direction right now.
“They’re nearly finished, anyway,” he adds. “They’ve been talking on the phone to their brothers. Wasting time.”
“Family’s important,” I retort.
He smirks again. “Family is selling them out. Probably for selfish reasons. What you humans call family is usually just an accident of birth.”
Fuck, I wish he wasn’t right about that. Lucky for me, Gabe’s front door opens before I have to formulate a response.