Page 27 of Haunted Heart
I look back at the man and squeeze Julia’s hand a little tighter, going to her side. “Is this the entrance for the wrathful?”
“Yes,” Julia says, softly. “This ismypath to punishment.”
“And that’s the man who killed you?” It’s not hard to guess.
“Yes.”
For the first time since we arrived in Hell, I feel a faint tug.
Even though he’s already dead, I’d like to kill him all over again.
It offers Julia her murderer—I assume that’s why Minnie is inside as well, to tempt the guy from the cornfield.
Julia touches her throat, and I see a faint pulse of light there. The shape is too obvious to miss.
Handprints.
“He got what he wanted. But I didn’t let him enjoy it, even for a moment.” She doesn’t look away from him, and I see the tendrils of her skirt flow toward him, its tug is stronger than it was before.
I catch Julia’s hand. She flinches at my touch, but I make her look at me.
“Come back with me.” I look to where I know the man waits for her wrath. “Choose me. He’s dead. If you stay, you’re punishing yourself… and you’re punishing me. Not him.”
She smiles, squeezing my hand in return and turns her back on the specter of the man who killed her.
“I’ll always choose you, Genevieve. That temptation is hollow. I know better than to trust anything here that offers to give me what I want.”
She kisses me, and I hear a low curse from behind us as the chain tugs a little.
When I look back, Jonas has turned away from us and is adjusting his pants. “Sorry. I’m not trying to be a creep.”
Julia laughs, the sound low. “Lust is trying to claim you. You’re more susceptible to it here than you were in the living world.”
I start to tell Jonas that it’s okay when movement catches my eye, just a second too late.
The weight of another person knocks me to the ground, and I shove at the man from the cornfield.
My hand hits something hard and… There’s a corn cob buried in his chest. The strangeness of that makes me pause, just long enough that he gets his hands around my throat.
But he’s weak and broken, and his grip doesn’t hurt as much as it should.
I’m able to knock his hands away. One flies toward the barn, his arm disconnecting at the elbow.
Jonas hauls him off of me right as I land a kick, and Chad goes sprawling backward into the barn.
Immediately, his skin catches fire and I watch in horror as it melts from him like he was a wax figurine.
I stare until there’s nothing more than a blackened skeleton left behind.
“I can officially say I hate it here.” Jonas helps me up, and Julia inspects my throat.
I shiver as I think about how easy it would have been for any of us to cross that threshold.
“We’re going back to the house.” I nod at my own words. Saying it out loud has solidified my determination. “I don’t know where else to look, and the longer I keep you here, the more chances you have to be stuck here forever.”
I grip Jonas’s chain tighter and take Julia’s hand. Once they’re safe, I’ll come back and search, alone.
I have to fix this.
