CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
MASSACHUSETTS, PRESENT DAY
It was hard to deny the possibility of an afterlife after I'd spent nearly half of my life working in a cemetery. There were things I couldn't explain as being anything but otherworldly, and I accepted those things without argument.
Perfectly timed gusts of wind, the casting of shadows when there was otherwise nothing there, unintelligible whispers carried along a breeze when there wasn't anyone else around, and the indisputable feeling of being watched. Those were just a few of the things I was used to. Those were the things I could brush off as being occupational hazards, and they never ever scared me.
But this empty foil package had my heart and lungs in a viselike grip. And when I remembered the other recent incidental findings—the cigarette butt and the mysterious flower on Annabel’s grave—I was downright terrified to do anything more than blink against my will.
Someone knows. Someone knows who I am, and they know what I did . The thought crept into my mind like a digging, wriggling worm, and I shuddered at the very real possibility that I'd been found out. That I could've been followed . But who? Who would've cared enough to dig into the past of a withdrawn cemetery caretaker?
I couldn't even begin to guess.
Over my shoulder, a twig snapped, and my hair whipped against my cheek as I spun on my heel to look in the direction of the sound. A squirrel dashed between headstones to scurry up a nearby white oak, but apart from that one small creature, I was alone.
“Shit,” I whispered, my voice cracking.
A flood of memories came rushing back as if a dam in my mind had been broken. The things I kept tucked deep inside, things that only crept up to haunt me in my nightmares.
The creaking of the floorboards outside my bedroom door.
The weight of the knife in my hand.
The heat of the blood pooling against my fingers and dripping onto my bare feet.
I gave my head a rapid shake and turned back to the cigarette packet, crushed and lying on the doormat. I wouldn't touch it, wouldn't dare add my fingerprints to the cursed thing, but I nudged it with the toe of my boot until it was away from the door. Then, after making a mental note to dispose of it later, I hurried to unlock the door and took cover inside, praying that whoever had come looking for me would understand that all I wanted—God, all I had ever wanted since Luke had gotten himself in more trouble than I could do anything about—was to be left alone.
And yet …
***
“Wow. I gotta say, Charlie, when you asked for my number earlier, I didn't expect to get a phone call a couple of hours later. I thought you’d be more of a text kinda guy.”
I huffed a laugh as I got out of the truck to approach one side of the iron gate, keys in hand. “You didn't have to answer,” I pointed out.
A cluster of laughing kids, all dressed up for Halloween, walked by with a couple of adult chaperones following close behind. I mustered a smile at them and nodded my head in greeting. The kids scurried along, not daring to look at the creep who lived in the cemetery, but the adults with them acknowledged me with tired smiles and wishes for a good night.
Despite the eerie finding outside my door, that was the plan and the very reason for my call to a certain body piercer.
Stormy scoffed, feigning offense. “What kind of monster do you think I am? Of course I had to answer. I finally got a hot guy's attention after pining over him for weeks. I'm not gonna just … I don't know … play hard to get now.”
The frozen metal of the gate sent an ache through my bones as it creaked loudly against its hinges. I swung it into the center of the driveway and headed for the other side as my flushed cheeks warded off the chill in the air.
She thinks I’m hot?
“Cool, uh … so …”
What am I, twelve?
I leaned my forehead against the heavy iron and squeezed my eyes shut. Up until this point, Stormy was one of the few people ever in my life to somehow leave me relaxed. I wasn’t going to let my nerves get the best of me now that she’d called me hot .
“Anyway”—I cleared my throat and went back to closing the gate—“I was wondering if you had plans tonight.”
The speaker was flooded with Stormy’s forlorn sigh. “I wish. Normally, I’d be at my apartment, handing out candy to trick-or-treaters, but I’m stuck in a hotel room this year, watching shitty reality TV. Why do you ask?”
I unlocked the padlock hanging from the heavy chains as I said, “Just wondering if you’d maybe wanna hang out or—”
“Wait. Are you actually asking me out, or is this a hookup situation?”
She wasn’t going to be satisfied until my face was completely set on fire—I was sure of it.
“Um, I—”
“Because honestly, I’m down for either. Anything to get out of this freakin’ room. I’m pretty sure it’s haunted, by the way.”
I know the feeling . I glanced behind me down the dark, winding driveway, disappearing into the cemetery.
“Well, I—”
“I just need to know what I’m wearing. If we’re going out, I can throw something on. But otherwise, are you good with shitty old leggings and my brother-in-law’s sweatshirt? It doesn’t scream sex appeal, but I can promise a good time once I’m naked.”
Holy shit . I choked on a blend of nerves and amusement. “Um … your brother-in-law?”
“My sister and her family visited a few weeks ago, and her husband left his hoodie at my place, so I called dibs. The guy is huge. It’s like wearing a fuckin’ blanket.”
Her penchant for cursing and lack of filters tugged at the corners of my mouth, pulling it into a sad, nostalgic smile.
In a way, she reminded me of Luke.
“Ah, I gotcha,” was all I said, my voice soft and wistful, even if a little melancholy.
“Anyway, so, yeah, whatever you wanna do, I’m down. Just let me know, presentable or bridge troll, and I’m good.”
I snorted a laugh. “Bridge troll works for me.”
“You know, I had a feeling it might.”
“If you wanna run out now, I’m just about to lock up,” I said, looking across the street and lifting my eyes to her floor of the hotel. “I’ll wait for you.”
“I’ll be right out,” she said in a softer tone. “And, hey, Charlie?”
“Yeah?”
“Is it weird that I can’t wait to see you again when I just saw you a few hours ago?”
***
I was leaning against the stone pillar outside the cemetery gate when Stormy emerged from the hotel's front entrance. She was dressed just as she'd described—tight black leggings, an enormous black hooded sweatshirt, and black high-top Chucks—with her raven-colored hair gathered on top of her head in what seemed to be her signature style. Her eyes lit up at the sight of me, standing with my back to the stone and my arms crossed tightly over my chest, but she kept her gait purposely casual and controlled, like she didn't want to seem as excited as she felt.
She looked both ways before running across the street, dodging a bicyclist on his way past the cemetery.
“Hi,” she said, breathless. “Sorry it took me a few minutes to get down here. I had to help some old lady get into her room. I was gonna just leave her standing there, struggling with her key card, but, man, she started to cry and how the hell was I supposed to leave her like that? Felt like bad karma.”
“It's fine.” I shrugged as I turned to unlock the side gate.
“I mean, I probably could've just let her stand there, weeping, but I would've felt like an asshole.”
I snorted a laugh as I worked the key into the lock. “Abandoning a crying old lady in a creepy hallway is an asshole move, I gotta agree.”
“Oh, that's nice to know.” Stormy bumped her shoulder against me. “How a guy would handle a crying old lady says a lot about his character.”
I held the gate open for her to walk inside as I said, “I take it, I passed the test?”
She met my eye as she grinned. “With flying colors.”
We both entered the cemetery grounds, and I locked the gate behind me. Stormy didn't take a step further as she shivered and wrapped her arms around herself, sweeping her gaze over the moonlit headstones.
“You cold?” I asked, doubting it. It might’ve been the very end of October in New England, but her sweatshirt looked too heavy and warm for her to be shivering like it was the middle of February.
“No, not really,” she easily admitted. “I’m just wondering how you walk around here at night without shitting your pants. That’s all.”
I grunted a laugh as my palm found the small of her back. “Actually, this is where I feel safest,” I admitted as I led her along the path to the waiting truck in the parking lot. “When there’s nobody here but me, the ghosts, and the security guard.”
And even though I said it without any qualms, my nerves jolted at the mention of those ghosts. Or was it only one in particular?
Is it even a ghost at all?
“Where’s the security guard?” she asked, turning her head in one direction and then the other, as if she might catch a glimpse of a man I seldom saw myself.
I pointed into the distance. “He’s in the office over there. We don’t cross paths much. I think I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve even seen or spoken to the guy.”
Maybe I should talk to him now , I thought. Maybe he’d have some insight into who’s been leaving shit around my house .
“You’re not scared of the ghosts?” Stormy asked as we reached the truck.
She quickly glimpsed toward the first row of headstones and visibly shivered. She was obviously terrified, yet she had still come.
To be with me.
“Ghosts can’t hurt you,” I assured her, unlocking the car and opening the passenger door.
Stormy leveled me with an incredulous look. “That’s not what those ghost hunters on TV say. They’re always walking through some haunted cemetery or some shit, dealing with pissed-off spirits that like to throw random shit around.”
I draped my arm over the top of the door. “And you believe everything you see on TV?”
She crossed her arms, leaning against the truck. “I didn’t say I believe it. I’m only saying I don’t have a reason not to.”
“Fair enough.” I nodded my chin toward the shadowed headstones in the near distance. “Well, I can tell you with a decent amount of certainty that the ghosts here don’t wanna hurt anyone. They just want to be respected and left to rest in peace.”
She pursed her lips and muttered a thoughtful, “Hmm,” before climbing into the cab of the truck.
I shut the door behind her and got into the driver’s side, immediately struck by how weird and also nice it was to share the truck’s confines with another person who wasn’t Ivan.
When the seat belts were buckled, I started the engine and pulled out of my usual parking spot, ready to get back inside my house. Because while I might’ve told Stormy that the ghosts didn’t want to hurt her, I wasn’t so sure anymore that they didn't want to hurt me .
We drove in silence for a moment, slowly rolling beneath a canopy of branches and falling leaves. I stole quick glances at her through the corner of my eye, unable to believe that she was here in my truck, going to my house by invitation. My tongue was tied into a thousand knots; I was unsure of what to say or if I should say anything at all. This type of thing—inviting a woman back to my place—wasn’t my area of expertise, and I was already failing miserably.
Not knowing what else to do, I reached out to turn up the radio when she asked, “Do you like being here because you feel connected to them?”
I narrowed my eyes at the black road ahead. “What?”
“The ghosts. Do you feel a connection to them?”
It was a weird question, one I didn't quite understand. “Why would you think that?” I asked, my tone flat and teetering on the edge of defensive.
Stormy didn't seem to notice. “Because that’s all you want too, right? To be respected and left to be at peace.”
Had I told her that? I couldn't remember now, and I held my breath, unsure of how to respond, until I decided that the best way was to say the things I'd avoided in every other interaction I'd had in the past several years—the truth.
“I didn’t always want to be by myself,” I answered, already feeling lighter from being honest. I allowed a huffed chuckle to rumble from my chest as I added, “God, I fucking hated being alone when I was younger.”
Nostalgic melancholy barreled over me as I remembered a time when just the thought of being alone would push me deep into an uncontrollable panic.
In my peripheral vision, I watched her turn her head and regard me with a soft, curious expression.
“So, what changed?”
“Life,” I answered simply with a helpless shrug.
Stormy scoffed, like the answer wasn’t good enough. “Life happens to everyone, Charlie, but not all of us make a complete one-eighty when it happens to us.”
Her tone was almost harsh, and it stung, like she was speaking from some kind of experience—her own trauma perhaps. I thought about what Blake had said earlier, that she had been hurt, and I resisted the urge to ask her what he had meant by that.
“Yeah, well, losing everyone who ever meant anything can do that to a guy,” I said, the words leaving a bitter taste on my tongue.
Stormy shook her head. “I think there's more than that.”
I smirked to hide my surprise. “Oh, that’s not enough?”
“I’m not saying that. And I think that's part of it, sure, but I think something really serious happened. I mean, you said your brother is in prison, right?”
My jaw clenched at the mention of Luke, my knuckles whitened against the steering wheel, and I regretted ever saying something about him to her.
“So, maybe it has something to do with that, or maybe it's something else. I don't know. But”—she nodded thoughtfully, her eyes glinting with empathy—“there's definitely more.”
“And how are you so sure about that?” I challenged, my voice cold and even as I pulled the truck into the driveway and parked without so much as glancing at her.
“Because a drastic change requires a drastic reason.”
“You say that like you're speaking from experience,” I muttered, wondering further about her past and the pain she'd endured.
“I think you already know that I am.”
I pursed my lips and swallowed as I killed the engine and pulled the key from the ignition. Stormy followed my lead—unbuckling and getting out of the truck—but instead of going straight to the door, I rounded the hood to meet her somewhere in the middle in front of the truck, the toes of her shoes nearly touching the toes of mine.
“What happened to you?” I asked, deciding on the spot to stop with this stupid dance around the truth and get right to it.
There was little light to speak of, but a sconce hanging beside the door was enough to illuminate the look of cool disregard on Stormy's face. The tilt of her head; her stony, bright green glare; the firm set of her pouty lips. There was a dare in her eyes that lit a flame somewhere deep inside my gut, and I knew, if I wasn't careful, I was likely to combust if I stared for too long.
I just wasn't so sure I cared much about being safe anymore. Not with her.
“Why do you care?”
“I don't fucking know,” I nearly shouted. Helplessly. Honestly. “But something tells me that I should.”
Green eyes darkened by the night flitted over my face in a dance as erratic and graceful as a butterfly, swooping through the wildflowers planted along the cemetery path. They filled with tears, twin crystal pools, and my fists clenched at my sides as I seethed, hating the way her face fell with distress and a pain I understood yet couldn't touch without knowing exactly why she hurt so badly.
Her gaze landed on my lips, and there was no time to think or speak before her hands were reaching up to grip the back of my neck, to anchor herself to me, like it was she who was drowning in this life and I was the saving grace keeping her from going under.
Then, she kissed me.
At this point, I thought I'd had somewhat of an idea of what it was like to kiss Stormy. She’d radiated passion, and her lips and tongue had moved with only the purpose of keeping that fire burning for as long as we were allowed. It had been intense and exciting, a taste of what it meant to be alive in something as simple as a kiss, and every time, I left the moment drunk and already craving the next.
But this kiss …
There was no passion or lustful need to be found in the fuel that drove her mouth to press against mine. In this moment, when she trembled and sniffled and my hands pressed to her cheeks to collect her tears within my palms, I could sense nothing but a raw and tremendous pain. One that sliced so deep that I could do nothing to stop my brother's voice from permeating my mind.
“I know you don't believe it now, but one day, you're gonna learn to live without me, Charlie. And I promise, it's gonna be okay.”
Was this it? Was I finally living without him? Because nothing about it felt okay, yet it felt right . Her lips and her cool hands around my neck felt so, so fucking right, and the more I thought about it, and the more my palms grew wet with the tears she couldn't seem to stop crying, the more my mind warred with how much I wanted it to feel wrong.
“I promise, it's gonna be okay.”
Leaves rustled from behind where we stood. My eyes snapped open, and my hands dropped away as I took one quick step away from Stormy, both of us breathless and panting. The pounding of my heart echoed against my eardrums as I whipped my head in the direction the sound had come from. But the night was dark, and I saw nothing.
Another rustle, and Stormy closed the gap I'd created, pressing her trembling hands to my thundering chest.
“Wh-wha—”
Hoo-hoo!
An owl burst from a nearby tree, and I slid my arm around her shoulders as I pointed my gaze skyward. I urged my heart to calm as I watched the bird take flight against the deep, blackened sky.
“Shit.” Stormy groaned before laughing, shaking her head as she wiped her palms over her face. “I'm sorry. That was … that was freakin' weird of me.”
“It happens,” I said, blowing out a deep breath, still watching that owl beat its wings against the backdrop of a moonless night. “You get used to it though. The sounds—”
“Not … that. I mean, crying. I shouldn't—”
“No,” I interjected. “Don't ever apologize for that.”
The owl flew overhead. And maybe I was seeing things, but I could swear it had peered down at me before it passed.
Stormy cleared her throat and sniffled again, taking a step back and wiping her palms against her sweatshirt. “I honestly can't even remember the last time I really cried . Probably not since Soldier was in the hospital and—”
“Soldier?” I looked back to her as the bird disappeared from my sight.
Stormy brushed a few strands of hair from off her forehead as she nodded. “Sorry. Um … my brother-in-law, his name is Soldier. He almost … well, actually, he did die several years ago, but they brought him back.”
“Wow.” I blinked, tucking my hands into my jacket pockets. Unsure of what else to say.
Where I had come from, nobody was brought back from the dead. Nobody was saved.
They only left, disappearing to vanish from my life altogether.
“Yeah, it's a, uh … it's a long story.” She shifted from one foot to another to hide her discomfort as she lifted her hand and waved the topic away. “Anyway, that was probably the last time I cried, so I guess I was due or something.”
She tried to force a laugh, leaving the moment as awkward as we both seemed to feel. But I guessed that was what happened when two souls were stripped naked after being wrapped in impenetrable armor for so long.
She saw me, and I knew now that I saw her.
Without another word, I turned to head for the door, still spooked by the owl, still reeling from words I'd wished Luke had never said, still remembering the empty foil cigarette pack. Stormy followed just as quietly as I fished my keys from my pocket and unlocked the front door.
I pushed it open and gestured inside. “Ladies first.”
She laughed, smoky and hoarse. “Such a gentleman when you're not threatening to slit my throat.”
But she walked inside, and I followed, closing the door behind me and ensuring twice that it was locked before turning to watch her assess my small but cozy cottage.
Stormy walked slowly around the living room, taking in the wingback chairs in front of the stone fireplace, sliding her fingertips over the upholstery.
“No couch?” she asked, sweeping her gaze around to answer her own question.
“Never saw a reason to have one,” I admitted as fantasies of laying her down filled my head.
“Why have two chairs then?”
“Sometimes, my friend Ivan stops by.”
Stormy looked up to meet my eye, one side of her mouth lifting in a barely there smile. “You have a second chair just for him?”
I shrugged before nodding.
“That doesn't sound like the kinda thing a cold, axe-wielding murderer would do.”
My fingers twitched, and I could feel the chilled handle of the knife in my hand. But even though I couldn't force a smile to my lips, I chuckled brusquely and dropped my gaze to the floor, relieved I didn't see a pool of blood at my feet.
“No. Guess not.”
“Honestly, I'm surprised you have a friend at all.”
I lifted my gaze to find her unabashedly raking her eyes over my small desk and the clock on the wall that had once belonged to my mother.
“He was kinda built into the job,” I explained, my voice roughened by memories I wished I could erase. “He was the caretaker before me.”
She turned, her head cocked and her smile growing affectionate. “And you stayed in touch?”
“He didn't give me much of a choice.”
That smile was a full-on grin now. “I like him already.”
The table between the two chairs held my sketch pad and marker, and it caught Stormy's eye, like a brand-new shiny penny to a magpie. She hurried over from the desk and ran her fingers over the drawing I'd done of the trio of blackbirds that had perched themselves on my roof just a little over a week ago. Their presence had left an impression on my mind, and I'd sketched them down onto the page when I couldn't take their black-eyed stare any longer.
Stormy stared at their feathered forms, her lips parting with her hushed gasp before she shook her head and uttered, “Damn.”
She could've had any other reaction, she could've used any other word, and it wouldn't have fazed me. But it was that one— damn —that sent me back in time like a slingshot, and I could see Luke staring at the back of my bedroom door. At the spider trapped inside his storm. Shaking his head and muttering that one little word.
“Damn.”
“Your brother was right,” she said, as if she could see the scene in my head. “You are one talented motherfucker, Charlie.”
“He never said it quite like that,” I replied with a melancholy chuckle.
Her fingertips brushed gingerly over the spider at the bottom of the page, looking up from beneath the perched birds. “This is you?”
I narrowed my eyes with startled intrigue and tipped my head to watch as she grabbed the pad and flipped the page. “How did you figure that out?”
“Doesn't take a genius to figure out how you view yourself, Spider,” she muttered absentmindedly before looking up at me and raising a brow. “You wear it, literally, on your sleeves.”
“Maybe I just love spiders.”
“Hmm …” She puckered her lips and flipped another page. “I'm sure you do. But they're also your spirit animal.”
She presented the book to me, flashing a sketch of a black widow, surrounded by towering headstones. Ghouls swept from the graves, clouding the sky and shielding the spider from the world outside.
“These aren't just drawings,” Stormy assessed with enchantment twinkling in her eyes. “This is your diary.”
It had never been described that way before, but she wasn't wrong. She had me figured out, more than I could've ever expected. My chin lifted in a fake display of confidence as the little boy in my heart prayed she wouldn't turn the page. But she did, and her eyes widened before softening with the simultaneous parting of her lips.
I knew what she was seeing—the long-legged spider, curled inside the storm cloud, in deep, peaceful slumber, like a baby in a womb. The page beyond that cloud was blacked out, but that darkness couldn't breach the shield of lightning, illuminating the clouds’ edges. The spider wore a smile as he slept. He was finally comfortable, and even as the world outside was drenched in chaos and tragedy, he'd somehow found comfort in the most unlikely place. As if all those years of being trapped outside, all he'd needed was for one of those clouds overhead to invite him in.
Stormy raised her eyes from the page to pin me with her gaze. “Is this me?”
I swallowed, struggling to not allow my embarrassment and anxiety to take hold. Still, I dropped my chin in a single nod and replied with a quiet, “Yes.”
“Oh,” she whispered, looking back to the page, too stunned to do anything but stare.
She hates it.
My palms started to sweat as her eyes continued to dance across the page.
God, she thinks I'm insane.
I turned my head, diverted my gaze. All too aware of the uptick in my pulse and the raging in my heart.
Probably for the better, but … shit, why didn’t I put that fucking thing away?
I swallowed relentlessly at the prickly ball in my throat, certain I was about to choke on nothing but my shame and panic.
I don't want her to le—
“Hey, Charlie?”
A harsh whoosh of breath escaped my lungs as I replied, “Y-yeah?”
I looked in time for her to lower the sketch pad back to the table. She still stared at the open page, tracing her fingers over that cloud and the spider held within its shelter as she cleared her throat.
“I really hope you plan to show me your room. Like … now.”
My brow furrowed as my brain struggled to compute what exactly she was saying. “My room?”
She lifted her eyes back to mine, strong determination and lustful need coalescing in the sea of green. “And I swear, if you end up only having a twin-size bed or some weird bachelor shit like that, I'm dragging your ass back to my hotel room.”
I laughed while my entire face heated with the understanding of what she was alluding to. “I haven't slept on a twin-size bed since I was, like, seventeen.”
“Thank God.” Stormy's eyes held mine as she moved around the chairs and across the room. Her palms pressed to my bearded cheeks, and I touched my forehead to hers, struggling to find my confidence and breath. “Lead the way, Chuck.”
My eyes squeezed shut, and I shook my head with my groan.
“Just one thing,” I grumbled.
Stormy giggled, already steering me without an idea of where she was going. “What's that?” Her voice was flirtatious and eager, like she couldn’t imagine being anywhere else than here with me.
She wants me , I realized, driving it home with a certainty I hadn’t known or understood since the early days of my relationship with Jersey. And, Lord, I wanted her .
My eyes opened with new confidence, new purpose, and I stared into hers, moving her backward toward the hall, toward my waiting bedroom. Her breath hitched, and the green in her gaze popped with excitement and carnal anticipation as she bit her lip.
“Don't ever—and I mean, ever —call me Chuck again.”