Page 196 of Haunt Me

Pretty soon, icy rain is pelting the windows, but inside, the fireplace is blazing. Theo and Walter are reading Dickens in front of it cozily, and the smell of something delicious wafts over from the kitchen.

“Now this feels like a proper Victorian Christmas house party,” Spencer says, smirking smugly, as if he had anything to do with the turkey that’s currently in the oven. Maybe he did; nothing normal is happening in this house right now. Spencer glances at his watch. “Since we have a few hours until the bird is ready, what do you say we prepare a production?”

“Did you say ‘a few hours’?” Manuela jumps up from the sofa where she was cuddling Noah, both of them half-asleep. He looks around, confused, his cheeks red.

“We say it’s a lame idea,” Ari says at the same time that Eden whispers:

“Yes!”

Everyone turns to look at her, then turns abruptly around, as if they’ve just remembered we’re not to put her on the spot. She laughs.

“I like the idea,” she says, “but what do I know about what’s lame or what isn’t?”

“Easy rule of thumb,” Ari explains. “Everything that Wes says is usually lame. Then we all do as he says anyway, and we discover it’s brilliant.”

“Ah, we’ll make a Brit out of you yet,” Spencer beams at his girl, which gets him a playful smack on the neck. He grabs Ari by the waist and kisses her on the mouth, as if he can’t help himself.

Lou pantomimes gagging and I laugh. Eden looks down at her Christmas bear slippers and blushes and I stop laughing. The need to kiss her right now, in a way that will steal her breath and make her beg for more, nearly incapacitates me for a second.

Theo says: “This Victorian house party is getting too graphic.”

I don’t know how it happens, but pretty soon, everyone hunkers down to prepare a ‘Christmas play’, which Spencer is optimistic we will be allowed to perform at the community center—I doubt our security teams will think it’s a good idea—but he seems sure of it.

It turns out that the community center down the block is important to the girls and Walter: they’ve spent a lot of weekends and holidays there, especially after Eden’s mom passed. They used to feed the homeless, give classes to the children, and put up little performances for them. Wes is in love with all the stories they have to tell. He listens to Walter and Faith talk about it, and his eyes glow. He pledges to give money to it, but he wants to do more.

“I’d like to do something real for them,” he says, his voice turned serious. “I’d love to get to know them, the people who helped you survive.”

Walter nods. “I’m sure they would love that too,” he says, “even though we never had a billionaire interested in our affairs before.”

“He’s not a billionaire anymore,” Theo murmurs from his corner.

“Aren’t you a billionaire?” Faith gasps without thinking. I wince.Now is not the time, Fee.Seems like the drama production has started.

“Not anymore,” Wes replies to her, calmly.

“What? What happened—”

“Fee!” Manuela sounds so horrified I have to bite back a chuckle.

“Sorry.” Faith goes beet-red.

“No, it’s fine,” Wes shrugs. “I gave it away.”

“You did? And you’re shrugging about it?”

“There was no way to be who I wanted to be unless I did that,” Spencer replies, as if he’s had this conversation before. I smile: he has, with me. “Besides, that’s more money than I and my offspring can spend in fifteen lifetimes, right?”

“Right,” Faith says. Then she goes pale. “Wait, what?”

“Bottom line,” Spencer explains patiently, “I didn’t need it. So I lost my ranking in the… That’s not important right now. The treasure is right here.” His eyes roam over to Ari and I’m about to lose it, because I too have a treasure right here, but she won’t even look my way.

Play it cool.

Wait her out.

Stay.

Even if she doesn’t end up with me. I will stay in her life for as long as she needs me to. Or allows me to.

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