Page 112 of Possess Me! (I Want You To)

The sheer amount of times he’d mentioned her was a testament to that fact. Made me wonder if he’d ever spoken about her to his sisters. If this was the first time he was truly telling someone how much she had impacted his life.

We were both finding something in these woods, and I could only hope the end of our adventure wouldn’t eviscerate us.

My heart fluttered.

“She made me feel like people weren’t…” Prudence trailed off, but—I waited quietly. The owl hooted again, and a spark from the fire popped next to us. The bright orange flames licked greedily at the dry wood we’d gathered, seeping between the rocks stacked to block in the fire. “Like people weren’t—” he tried again, “all horrible.” I watched his Adam’s apple bob, my hands frozen still. “I was proven wrong.” His entire expression shuttered as he glared down at the flames beside us and the muscle in his jaw jumped again.

I forced myself to move to distract him. Halfway done with his second arm, with my body still aching from trauma, and my head spinning, I clutched the pieces of my heart together. I wanted to kill whatever had made him sound like that…so…so defeated.

Prudence wasn’t allowed to be defeated.

He was supposed to be pissy, angry, and unforgiving.

Not…this.

Whatever this was.

“When Lydia woke me up I thought that I had dreamed the whole thing. Amanda’s murder, Lydia’s betrayal, my own death. That illusion didn’t last long. The first time I fell into the Nothing, I realized it was real. All of it. Trapped in limbo, I was forced to come to terms with everything that had happened. Everything I’d ever known became confused. Lydia molded me into what she wanted. She used me as a tool for devastation.” Prudence swallowed again, and when I caught his gaze, his eyes were lost.

“It didn’t take long to find out the truth.” My heart beat thundered. “That she’d fabricated all of it to kill her twin sister,” he shrugged.

“Wait, what the fuck?” Shit, I hadn’t meant to say that out loud. “Sorry, I don’t think you mentioned they were twins before. That’s even more like…wow. Sorry.” I waved a hand at him. “Continue please.”

Prudence blinked, his expression carefully blank, like none of this mattered at all—even though we both knew it did. “She was the murderer. And like idiots, we’d all fallen right into her trap.” The fire cast flickering shapes along his cheeks as my breath left in a startled burst. “Lydia came from a long line of hunters, longer even than my family line. With her hunting background she’d realized early on that she could get revenge against me for attempting to save her sister—and benefit from my death.”

The marker skittered inside my grip, but I forced myself to steady, starting another rose on his shoulder, even though my hands were shaking.

“No one goes looking for a dead boy.”

Jesus Christ.

No one goes looking for a dead boy.

Those words shook me to my core. I couldn’t even imagine what Prudence had lived through—everything he said was honest to god terrifying. How could such cruelty be real?

Suddenly my shady past no longer looked quite so dark.

The stars glimmered above, their beauty a direct contrast to the indigo night surrounding them, and I couldn’t help but think that Prudence was like that. Bright. Despite the blackness that had threatened to stifle his light.

The fire crackled and I drew another rose on his skin.

“You said that becoming a ghost was rare, right?” I reminded him gently. Now that he was talking, it was important he didn’t stop. I didn’t want to make him relive this more than once. I almost didn’t want to have the conversation at all—but I needed to know. For both our sakes. “That’s why that guy is after you. Because you’re…”

“A weapon?” Prudence huffed out a sigh. My grip on the marker was slick with sweat as I finished up another petal. “Yes.” He took a fortifying breath. “Originally, the ‘creation’ spell was made to help the hunters. The war against the supernatural—before sanctuaries like Elmwood were established—was a bloody one. Even humans that were aware of the supernatural didn’t stand a chance against their monster counterparts.” The fire popped again, and I jumped a little, my breath skittering out in a rush. I inhaled. “They needed to even out the playing field.”

My chest was tight. “And?”

“The Companion Spell was created.” Prudence’s skin somehow felt even colder than before. A ghostly glow began to softly emanate from his skin, as he grew more and more transparent. For a moment, my marker pushed through him—before he reined himself back in, and grew solid enough I could keep drawing.

Upset.

He was upset.

I didn’t want to push anymore…he didn’t need to—

“Using a complicated ritual, hunters would resurrect their deceased comrades, bringing them back primed and ready, stronger than even the monsters they were fighting.”

“How is that possible?” I blinked. “It seems too good to be true.”

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