Page 133 of Haunted Prey

Jamie and Lena held my cat, Sammy, both grinning at the camera while Sam looked a little concerned. Tears stung my eyes as I smiled at the photo.

A notification chimed on my phone and I checked it.

Finally.

I drank down the last of my coffee then closed my laptop, slipping it into my backpack. Thanking the woman at the counter, I headed out, unlocking my bike from a pole. I started off down the street, being sure to watch for the groups of peoplewalking along the road as I wove between them. Stopping a few streets down, I parked outside another building before hurrying inside.

The print shop was quaint and small, showing off several pictures with frames along the wall. There were a few shelves full of crafts. On another side was a printing station. I went to the woman at the counter and asked for my order and she brought them out right away. I stuffed the framed photos in my bag and thanked her before hurrying back out.

On the road, a warm breeze blew across as I made my way out of town and headed along the coast, the sun dipping closer to the horizon. I passed by several homes with families gathering, and one large cemetery where even more families stood around graves decorated with candles, flowers, and food. Eventually they disappeared and there was only the narrow road with me between the forest and the ocean.

I came upon a small drive and turned in. Up the dirt path was a two-story white and blue house with a deck. There were a couple of palms on either side but beyond that, nothing more than rolling grassy dunes and a sandy beach stretching for miles.

I parked my bike by the steps and went inside. The house was mostly dark, save for a light on in the kitchen.

“Emery?” I called out.

I glanced at the dining table and noticed a map and a journal spread across it. Despite having access to GPS and the internet, he preferred the old-fashioned approach. I walked over for a closer look and saw the marks he’d made along our journey.

Tracing my finger along the starting point, I followed the red line he’d drawn. First, we headed south through Kentucky and Tennessee, then veered west into Louisiana, marking New Orleans. We spent a few nights there, selling the car and buying a boat—nothing fancy, just enough to make a comfortable trip across the Gulf of Mexico. From there, we followed the coastof Mexico, passed through the Cayman Islands and Cuba, then south to Brazil. After that, we turned west again, eventually stopping north of Mérida.

Sometimes we stayed on the boat; other times we rented places, never staying anywhere for more than a month. Until now. We’d been in this house for most of the fall.

But soon, very soon. We’d be leaving again.

I traced through Panama out to the Pacific and then north. Way north. Up just a little past Vancouver. I flipped through his journal and saw all his sketches. The latest one of me sitting on a sand dune, smiling at him with my hair shorter and darker flying in the breeze.

I closed the journal and set my bag on a chair. I opened it up and took out the pictures, staring at each of them.

I felt my throat tighten, my hand trembling a little as I gripped the frame. To think that a year ago I learned so much. So much had changed.

A shadow moved at the corner of my eye, and I heard my name whispered.

“Eve.”

I didn’t think much of it, as I usually never did now. Sometimes my ghost still broke through even after a year of being medicated. If I ever had an encounter now, I ignored it.

I tried to at least, until I felt a heavy hand on my shoulder and nearly jumped out of my skin.

“Evee.”

I whirled around and found Emery. But not ghost Emery. My Emery. He smirked, his hair wavy, shorter now with the sides shaved. He wore a gray shirt and dark jeans and he was shoeless.

I smiled up at him, hugging the pictures to me. “Hey. Where did you run off to?”

“Just went down to the marina to check on the boat, wasn’t gone very long. How did it go?”

“Good. I think we got everything now. Are you ready?”

He smiled widened. “More than ready.”

I put the pictures in my bag, swinging it over my shoulder, and we went out the back door. On the deck, he put a blanket under his arm and picked up a box, glass clinking together inside.

We walked along a path through grassy dunes, making our way over to a small mound overlooking the water.

Emery set down the box and spread out the blanket on some flattened grass. I went to the box first and took out several colored glass candle holders, some tall in purple and orange, and a couple round ones in red. Taking out a lighter, I started to light the wick inside each of them, keeping my back to the breeze before placing them in a circle in the sand. I took out the pictures next and used the stand of the frames to keep them upright, digging them partially into the sand to keep them in place.

Emery stared at them, and I caught the glow of his eyes, his jaw clenching. He took out a string of marigolds from the box and placed them around the frames. I took one last object out of the box, a small rabbit figurine, and set it in the center.

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