Page 37 of Diesel

“Fuck if I know. Let’s get our asses to Boston and then figure it out. I fucking need breakfast.” He hooked his arm around Skitlles, and they walked across the street to a Cracker Barrel, Wendy and Brainiac following.

“I missed you,” Gigi said.

“Do me a favor, G. Never leave again. I need you. You keep me sane.”

Gigi giggled. “How do I do that?”

“There’s comfort in knowing someone cares about you, you know? I know the club cares about me, but that’s because I do things for them. But you? I feel like you genuinely care about me. About Ludwig and not just Diesel. That makes all the difference in the world.” I kissed the woman I loved but was too afraid to say those three little words. I’d wait until after Boston, and we safely returned to Pine Bluff.

“Do you think before we go eat, we could go back to your room and have a little fun?”

I stepped back and held out Gigi’s arms, studying her body and the new clothes. “Been a while since I had a Walmart special.”

“Careful, you might just get a discounted blowjob.”

I lifted G into my arms and carried her back to the room, passing Trixie, who continued staring out the window. I had no doubt she was figuring out her next move. The question for me? When she decided to kill Cinder, would I stop her?

Five hours later, and thirty minutes from Boston, we turned off Interstate 90 right before the rain started.

My uncle’s house, my future house when he kicked the bucket, sat back off the two-lane road two hundred yards away.

Trees lay across most of the gravel drive leading to the house, and several times, Brainiac and I had to get off our bikes to move them. Weeds and overgrown bushes were also pressing down on the gravel road from each side. The Ushers had plenty of money for upkeep, so why had he let the place go? When he answered the phone after Gigi, and I was done fucking, all he said was okay to come, and there was plenty of room. That was the extent of the conversation.

The fountain in front of the house was in crumbles. There had been a statue of a woman in the middle of the fountain, holding a spout. Half her body lay in the fountain, the other half outside.

The old stone mansion, vine-covered and cracked in too many locations to count, was also in disarray. Candles glowed in each of the windows. The gas lights outside the front door flickered, threatening to extinguish against the growing wind.

“Damn, Diesel. You sure this is the right place?” Beast walked to the fountain and picked up the woman’s head. He sat it on what was left of the fountain ledge. A streak of lightning flashed across the sky, and thunder erupted overhead moments later.

“Yeah. I’m not sure what’s going on.” From the corner of my eye, I caught a shadow crossing one of the second-floor windows. “Come on. Let’s get inside.”

The eight of us stood under the front door overhang as the rain fell more rapidly. Several lightning bolts flashed on the horizon, and the rumbles of thunder grew louder. Gray, puffy clouds practically turned day into night.

I grabbed the lion-head door knocker to knock, but the rusted metal broke off in my hand. “What the fuck?” I tossed it away and knocked using my fist.

We waited for several minutes, but nobody answered the door. I turned the rusted knob and pushed. The door opened, and we were met by candlelight from within. I stopped everyone from going inside.

“My uncle is a strange man,” I said. “He’s eccentric. Practically everything in the house is from the late eighteenth century. There are pathways between walls, and the place creaks like a ninety-year-old man.”

“The place is exactly how the story describes it,” Gigi said. She shrugged. “I reread the story after we talked about it.”

“Get the fuck outta here,” Brainiac chided. “You saying that shit’s real?”

“See for yourself.” I pushed the door open, and we stepped into the eighteenth century. “I told you so.” I closed the door as the breeze threatened the lit candles. The musty smell brought back childhood memories. Not much had changed, and I liked it like that.

Cobwebs hung in every corner along the ceiling, glistening in the candlelight. Dust covered a mahogany table in the foyer, the gold patina and gold stenciling in dire need of shining. I regretted not being around more for my uncle.

Gigi checked out the box sofa along the far wall, running a finger through the dust covering marble arms. The mahogany matched that of the table, the upholstery having changed since I last was in the house.

Trixie started to sit in a walnut armchair, but I quickly stopped her. “It’s one of my uncle’s favorite pieces. It was built by a Philadelphia craftsman in the mid-1700s. When I was a kid, my uncle came here and stared at the chair for hours.”

“The chandelier is beautiful,” Skittles said.

“It’s a Palatial eighteenth-century French chandelier,” I said. “Carved Giltwood. He lights the thirty candles by lowering the chandelier with that rope attached to the wall.”

“Ludwig,” my uncle said. He stood at the top of a staircase laced with red carpet. The sides of the carpet near the railing and the wall were decorated with golden lions holding golden crowns. “I’m so very happy to see you.”

He looked as old as the house and moved with lethargy. The candelabra in his hand shook from his trembling. Wax dripped from the candles to his hand.

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