Page 75 of Hexes and Exes

I have every intention of heading straight home and turning into a couch potato for the rest of the day. So I’m not sure how I end up in front of Bram’s burned-out shell of a house.

“This is a horrible idea,” I murmur to myself as I get out of the car and walk toward the house. The snow crunches under my boots and the wind immediately chaps my cheeks.

I gape at the devastation in front of me, my heart aching. I knew it was bad, but I hadn’t seen the destruction with my own eyes. The fire nearly destroyed everything. The only somewhat unmarred part that remains is the back wall of the house. The rest is burned down to the frame until now only a charred husk is left.

I don’t trust the porch, so I walk over to the side of the house. The layout of this villa is essentially the same as Roman’s house where Bram has been staying for the last few months. I know that I’m staring into the master bedroom, even without what’s left of the furniture to give it away. There’re the remnants of what used to be a bed, a dresser, a TV that’s been meltedcompletely and half hanging off a fragment of the wall. The closet is exposed. I don’t know why that’s where I’m drawn, but something compels me to step into the rubble and go straight for that space.

Bram told me once that he was able to save some photographs of his mother. But those were part of what he lost in the fire. I have no idea if he kept them in his living room or in the den, but something is propelling me toward this closet.

“Do not step on rusty metal. Tetanus is the last thing you need.” I talk to myself as I pick my way through the debris on the floor. Once I’m in the closet, there are fragments of burned clothing, and shelving that has warped and collapsed. Pieces of drywall that somehow managed to survive and are piled up on top of the charred remnants of shoes. I lift one of the pieces of drywall, revealing an old soot-stained shoebox. It’s blackened almost beyond recognition. I’m afraid if I touch it, the whole thing will crumble into pieces. Instinctively, I know this is what I’m looking for.

I murmur a prayer to the Crone, wishing I knew a spell to preserve things. Miraculously, when I lift the box, it doesn’t fall apart in my hands. It’s actually holding together better than I expected. With careful movements, I lift the lid and peer inside.

“Photos,” I whisper and the tears that I’ve barely been holding back all afternoon start to fall again. They’re so burned. The old film paper has blistered and melted. They’re ruined.

“No. Nothing in this life is so far gone that it can’t be fixed.” What’s the point in having magic if we can’t do a damn thing with it.

I carry the box back to my car like it’s a newborn baby. I will fix this.

32

BRAM

Everything is numb. My hands, my feet. My face. The only thing that isn’t numb is the rage inside me. The darkness that’s slowly smothering every bit of humanity I have left. I hate my curse. I hate my father. I hate this town. And Ava…

No. I won’t think about her.

My breath streams out of me in a plume of smoke with every exhale. I had to get out of my house. The walls were closing in on me. Even though the temperature is in the negative, I threw on my running gear and took off.

They’re going to bulldoze my house tomorrow. It’s already destroyed, so it shouldn’t matter, but it’s just one more thing in my life that’s been taken from me.

I have no destination in mind, and I’ve already been running for forty-five minutes when my feet shuffle across a familiar driveway. Looming ahead of me is Blackthorn Manor.

The house was built in 1906. It was fashioned to look like a suped-up Cotswold cottage. The sandstone siding, steeply pitched slate roofs, and arched windows all give the home its character; it has nothing to do with the people living inside it.

The family home. What a joke.

My father and his wife Diana live in separate wings. My father didn’t stop cheating on his wife after my mother. She was just one in a collection of many.

I stop at the steps that lead to the front door and stare at the heavy doors and arched windows overhead. Roman was the only reason my childhood has good memories. My father treated us both as an annoyance. When he snapped his fingers, we needed to be ready for him to show us off to his golf buddies or other cronies. Otherwise, we were to remain out of his sight.

Diana hated me from the first moment I stepped foot in this house. I was six years old when my mother died. My life was uprooted, and I lost everything familiar that day. My father showed up at the cemetery and took me away. I didn’t even get to return home to get my clothes or my toys, books or blankets. It was all labeled junk.

I managed to sneak away not long after and found our landlord cleaning out our apartment. I grabbed a stack of photographs and a few of my mother’s belongings. Then I lost them in the fire that burned down my house.

Why am I here? Giana, the family’s housekeeper, is the only adult who ever showed me an ounce of kindness. Maybe I’ll sneak into the kitchen to say hello. She’s probably baked something.

The front door opens without protest, and I wipe my feet. I don’t need to leave a snowy trail pointing out that I’m here. The smell of baked goods warms my insides when I step into the kitchen. Giana is bent over the counter, writing something on a pad of paper. While born in Italy, she grew up in Germany. She moved to the states with her husband when she was just nineteen and then lost him in a car accident a year later. She started working for my family not long after that. Her strange mix of accents and gruff love is comforting.

Giana looks up from her list with an emotionless face that cracks a small smile when she sees it’s me. “You look terrible. Sit. I have cake.”

You don’t mess with Giana. She tells you to do something, you do it. I pull out a chair at the counter and slide into the seat. Giana delivers a slice of chocolate cake and a glass of milk before I get settled. Her eyes dart to the doorway. The kitchen is down the hall and far from the main part of the house, but that doesn’t mean my step-mother won’t come stomping in at any point. My father doesn’t visit the kitchen.

“Your father and Diana have a guest.”

“I didn’t even mean to come. I’m not sure why I’m here at all.”

Giana cocks her head. She’s short and a little bit more rounded each year. Her dark hair is just starting to really show gray at the temples. It’s usually pulled back in a clip and up off her neck.

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