Page 5 of Crimson Shadows
He doesn’t answer; he just holds the white envelope out for me to take. Curiosity gets the better of me, so I take it and open it.
Narrowing my eyes at the black bank card in there, I purse my lips when I pull out the letter that accompanies it.
Then, I nearly choke on my saliva.
“What the fuck is this?” I spit out, eyeballing more zeroes than I will probably ever see in my lifetime of morgue work.
“I’ve been putting money aside for you since before you were born,” Randall says with the gentlest tone I’ve heard from him yet.
“Putting money aside,” I murmur, trying not to panic. There is too much here for me to even contemplate being in possession of. “No thanks,” I add stiffly, handing it back.
He doesn’t take it. “It’s yours. Do with it what you want. Spend it all in one place or don’t. I don’t care, it’s not mine,” he states loftily.
“Randall.” My mother’s voice, sharp and cutting. “This isn’t how we do things.”
“Well, it’s how I do things,” he retorts, his gaze never leaving mine. “Adelaide is my daughter, and she deserves to know she has options, especially now.”
Ignoring their bickering, I glance down at the black card again. Images of what I picture this MistHallow University to be, flash in my mind—dark corridors filled with secrets, professors who could teach me things my high school science teacher never could, students like me, and they are probably all rich and spoiled and entitled. I have precisely two options. Cut my nose off to spite my face or take what he’s giving me and fuck it.
I choose to fuck it.
I’ve been broke my entire life. If someone arsehole wants to give me a few million quid, who am I to stop him? It makes me wonder how much money he has… that leads me to wonder how old he is. Are vampires immortal like in the myths? Am I? Or am I half-immortal? Whatever that could entail, who the fuck knows. I have questions. He can give them to me. He knows this, and he is looking at me expectantly. But right now, I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of answering them.
I grip the card tight and shove it in my pocket before either of them can say anything. “Fine. I’ll keep it,” I mumble. “But this doesn’t make us square.”
Randall nods once. “Understood.”
Without waiting for more awkwardness to unfold, I stride out of the house and hop on my bike. The evening air is chilly, slicing through my coat as I pedal furiously towards the morgue. My mind buzzes with a thousand thoughts about MistHallow—what it will be like, who I’ll meet. Or if this is all a dream I will wake up from. I know if that is the case, I will be gutted. It answers so many of my life questions, and I’ve always been ready to believe that something else exists out there. I didn’t think I’d be one of them.
My doubts rise as I pedal. Is Randall legit? What if this is all a big joke? Or maybe he’s delusional? Why is my mother going along with it if that’s the case?
“Rah!” I growl as all these questions flood my mind. I was so quick to accept it all because it’s what I wanted to be real, but now, in the harsh dark of night, it doesn’t seem possible.
Does it?
When I arrive, the morgue is dead—it always is. No one really wants to work with corpses in the middle of the night except oddballs like me and the chief mortician, Wesley.
The morgue is eerily silent as I push through the heavy double doors, seemingly more so than usual. The familiar scent of disinfectant mixed with something less pleasant hits me, but I barely notice it anymore. This place has been my sanctuary for the past year, a place where the dead don’t judge, and the living rarely venture.
As I’m pulling my hair into a tight bun, I hear a muffled thud from the main examination room. Curious, I head towards the sound.
The sight that greets me as I push open the door stops me dead in my tracks.
Wesley is standing over a body on the examination table. It’s not unusual, but this time, the sight makes my blood run cold, and goosebumps skitter over my skin. Wesley’s hand is clamped around a wooden object that is buried deep in the dead man’s chest.
I watch, frozen in horror, as the body on the table begins to disintegrate. It crumbles away like ash in the wind, leaving nothing but a fine grey powder on the stainless steel surface.
A strangled gasp escapes my lips before I can stop it.
Wesley’s head snaps up, his eyes wide with shock as they meet mine. For a long moment, we just stare at each other, neither of us moving.
“Addy,” he finally breaks the silence, his voice strained. “I... this isn’t what it looks like.”
I want to laugh at the absurdity of his statement, but fear has paralysed my vocal cords.What the hell did I just witness?
Unfortunately, I’ve seen enough episodes ofBuffy the Vampire Slayerto know what I just saw. A staking.
Wesley takes a step towards me, and I instinctively back away. “Let me explain,” he says, holding his hand up.
