Page 140 of The Spider & the Storm

My eyes darted toward the broken picture frame. The glass had marred the photograph of Luke and me—one taken by Melanie during one of his earlier stints with sobriety—leaving half of his face untouched while the other was scraped to hell. It had broken my heart to find it'd been destroyed when it was one of the few pictures I had left, and beyond the heartbreak,there'd been the terror of how exactly I was meant to interpret this message—or if it was a message at all.

Stormy followed my gaze and let go of a forlorn sigh. “It sucks that it was ruined,” she said, reading my mind. “You know, people do some crazy shit with Photoshop. Maybe we can find someone who can fix it up and print out a new one.”

“Yeah. Maybe.” I nodded, appreciating the thought.

“I can ask around the shop. I mean, Cee's man—you know, Shane—is a hotshot editor forModInk. He probably knows someone with some serious Photoshop skills.”

ModInk—as I'd learned at dinner with Stormy, her coworkers, and their significant others—was one of the top magazines in the tattoo, piercing, and body modification world. I'd never heard of it personally, but I also had no reason to. Magazines weren't my thing, and body modification wasn't either. Still, I'd found it impressive that Cee's husband was so successful, and I was grateful for Stormy's possible connections and dedication to having the photograph restored.

“I'd really appreciate that,” I said, unwinding my arms to press my hand on the small of her back. I kissed her forehead and breathed in the scent of her hair, allowing the faintest touch of lavender to curl around my mind and calm my soul. “Sorry I'm off this morning. I just didn't sleep well, and …” I huffed and looked once again toward the picture. “I don't know.”

It was the truth; I didn't know. Something seemed off, strange, and that sense of intuition was now heightened. The world felt like it had been set off its axis and was about to roll toward something unknown and terrifying.

“Maybe it'll actually do you some good to get out of here for a few days,” she suggested, lifting her hand to press her palm to my chest.

I hoped she couldn't feel how frantic my heart was beating, out of fear and helpless panic. I hoped that, instead, she could tell that it was no longer mine, but hers and that, at some point along the way, it had ceased its normal thumping rhythm to only beat to the sound of her name.

“You kinda look like you've seen a ghost.”

The statement locked every one of my vertebrae in place as I recalled the intruder I'd chased after not long ago. God, how had it not crossed my mind sooner that my run through the headstones might've been in pursuit of a ghost and not a man?

Because I've never seen one before, I told myself, remembering the blurred image of a man on Max's security camera. Remembering the hooded figure in a leather jacket, sending spirals of exhaled smoke into the air. He had run from me, yes, but maybe he'd never meant for me to see him to begin with. Maybe he was only meant to torment me from afar, to haunt me in death as he had in life because what if … God, what if …

What if the one to leave the mementos at my door was Tommy Wheeler?

***

The time passed by without any other paranormal incidents … or maybe it was that I'd been looking for them. Every day while making my rounds, every corner I turned, every bush or tree I passed by, I was looking for the scent of cigarettes and a hoodedman wearing a leather jacket. Every night, I'd listen for the howling wind and the creaks, squeaks, and bumps in the walls and floorboards. And nothing happened. But I remembered all the incidents before had been accompanied by the element of surprise. Now, I was ready. Now, I was smart. But the spirit was smarter, craftier, and …

Good God, I was almost certain I had lost my mind.

Max had stopped by on a few different occasions to assure me that he hadn't seen any other trespassers on the cemetery grounds. I never had the heart to tell him what we were looking for wasn't someone of this realm but the next. He was a nice guy, and while I was sure he'd seen his fair share of questionable, possibly creepy shit while working in a graveyard, I wasn't going to be the reason he had nightmares.

It was bad enough sleep had become nearly nonexistent for me.

But at least there was Stormy, and she still hadn't run. Even as I sat, slumped with my back against the headboard, a hand over my exhausted eyes, while she stuffed an extended weekend's worth of clothes into a couple of overnight bags, she was still here.

“You're so tired,” she observed sympathetically. “Why don't you take a nap before we hit the road? We're not leaving for a few hours, and honestly, it won't take us long to get there in the first place. If you want—”

“No, it's okay.” I dropped my hand to my bent knee and offered her a weak smile. “I'll sleep when we get to your parents' house.”

Truthfully, I wasn't so sure about that either. Being at her parents' place meant being in Connecticut, and just the thoughtof being within a few hours of the scene of all our crimes—Luke's and mine combined—was enough to keep me awake for days.

Trust me, I would know.

She eyed me skeptically, and I knew she didn't believe me. “You know, sometimes, when I can't sleep, I take some melatonin,” she said, folding a shirt and tucking it into one bag. “I mean, back in the day, I'd suck down a bottle of tequila or pop a couple of pills, and that'dreallydo the trick. But melatonin works better than nothing.”

I studied her skeptically and folded my arms over my knees. “How do you do that?”

Her lips—unpainted today, but just as beautiful and tempting—curved in a smile. “Do what?”

“Make light of your demons.”

The smile faded as she hummed a gentle sound. Then, she shrugged. “I don't know. I guess because they're not really mine anymore. They're in the past. I'm more than ten years sober.”

“The past can haunt us just as well as anything else, if not better,” I countered, not meaning to argue, but wanting to offer another perspective. One in which the past was incapable of remaining where it belonged. “It is, after all, by nature, full of ghosts.”

“That's true. But I made the conscious decision to leave my demons where they belong, and that's that.”

---