Page 49 of Trick Me
Sera steps in closer and pulls a leaf out of my hair. “You weren’t dumb. And you are something special.”
I don’t answer. I can’t.
Because if I open my mouth, I’m scared all the softness I’ve spent years bolting down will come pouring out.
A flicker of motion pulls my gaze to the trees. A spirit. A little girl in a tattered Gothic dress drifts between the trunks, her expression lost and confused. Child ghosts often look that way. I wait for the familiar chill to rise along my arms, the icy whisper of the dead that has always wrapped itself around me like a second skin.
My ability is back, and I smile to myself with the comfort of what I’ve always been accustomed to.
I close my eyes and search inward, reaching for the wolf who’d curled himself inside my head like he belonged there. But he’s not there. Only a hollow space where he should be. I can’t stop running my thoughts over it. Around the edges of that emptiness, something lingers. A presence. A thread tugging gently toward a place I can’t see. A bond.
No. I’m not doing this.
I am not going to be the girl who builds entire futures around one night. Even if it was a night full ofimpossible things. Even if it changed everything. Even if it meant something.
My chest tightens. And if Ash is gone… if he chose to leave after everything we just went through…
Then maybe the truth is that I really am better off with ghosts.
At least they don’t leave.
“Rich left too,” Sera says quietly beside me, trying for solidarity. “Come when they want. Leave when they’re done.”
“They’re the same,” I admit. “Ash was just a guy. At a party. Who happened to save me from killer wolves, raise the dead, merge his soul with mine, and help me break an ancient curse. You know. Casual.”
Sera doesn’t laugh, but her lips twitch.
“Let’s go home,” I say, stepping back from the clearing.
She starts tracing symbols in the air, her fingers glowing with blood magic. Crimson sigils spark in the rising sunlight. Portal magic is delicate work. You need blood. Intent. And the kind of insurance that covers accidental transport into a stranger’s bathtub.
“You sure you don’t want to wait?” she asks softly. “Maybe he’s just?—”
“He’s gone, Sera.” I stare at the patch of dirt where the pool used to be. Where he and I were. “It was what it was. A weird, cursed night that’s already over. We’re back to normal now. Everything’sfine.”
“You keep saying ‘fine’ like if you say it enough times, it’ll turn into truth.”
“It’s a legitimate coping mechanism.”
“It’s denial with extra steps.”
The portal begins to form. A tear in the air opens, revealing my apartment’s living room. My couch. My coffee table. My poor, dead plants that I forgot to water for two weeks straight. Everything just as I left it. Dull. Ordinary. Mine.
“How do you do it?” I ask, suddenly tired. “With Rich. How do you handle him leaving all the time?”
Sera pauses, one hand still glowing in midair. “I don’t make attachments. Not the kind that hurt. I care about him, yeah. But I don’t let myself need him. You can’t lose something you never let yourself hold.”
I nod slowly. “I didn’t think I made attachments either. It was just one night.”
She looks at me, sympathy softening her eyes. “Give yourself time.”
“It was a mistake, apparently.” My voice catches in my throat. “He left.”
“Maybe he didn’t.”
“Can we just go? Please?”
She finishes the last symbol. The portal hums, its edge shimmering with quiet power. “After you.”
