Page 28 of One Last Touch

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry you’re dead.”

“Me too.”

The silence settled around us like a blanket, warm instead of stifling, an ease between us now that hadn’t been there before. I understood him better, I realised. He’d been withdrawn, even rude, because he’d had to be. He’d lied to me to protect me.

I wasn’t sure if that made it okay, but it made it bearable.

Sage settled next to me, his long legs stretched out against my body and his head at the opposite end to the bed. It felt like my mind was made of questions, each flitting into my head and bouncing around harder than the last until it was a constant hum. I stared up at the ceiling, waiting for them to subside and then huffed, rolling onto my side in frustration when they didn’t. There were small gaps in the wall of my bedroom, probably in all the walls of the manor if I looked close enough. They were small, but wide enough that I could see the light and the shadows in the hall running together, flickering like someone had run their fingers through the beams. The gaps were probably the cause of the inescapable chill in the house, unless—

“Are you cold?”

Sage’s eyes opened and looked at me from the end of the bed. “I’m dead.”

I snorted. “I wasn’t asking if you wanted to come under the covers. I meant the house, it’s always freezing. Was it like that… before?”

He shrugged. “It’s been so long that I don’t remember warmth, save for your touch. You’re so hot it almost burns, like trying to hold the sun.”

I fell quiet, my eyes fluttering closed as I listened to him breathe—it had to be a force of habit. “Do you have to concentrate to sit on the bed with me?”

“No.” I could hear the smirk in his voice when he spoke again. “I can get in bed with you any time, Georgina.” I shook my head at him and he chuckled. “I have to concentrate to become insubstantial, like I did earlier when I passed through the door, but it’s easy really, like deciding to walk or run. But this…” His fingertips brushed over my calf through the duvet. “This takes effort.”

It hurt to say the words, to move my leg away, but I did it regardless. “Then you shouldn’t. You’ve already given too much.”

“When it comes to you, I’m not sure such a thing as too much exists.”

“Who knew you were such a romantic under all those scowls you gave me.”

We laughed quietly together, the sound of the rain filling in the silence like we were in our own cocoon of protection.

“How do you think—”

“Georgina,” Sage said with an exasperated sigh that was more than a little amused. “Turn off your brain. Go to sleep.”

“I can’t.” I untucked my arms from the duvet and thudded them down on top of the covers. “I can’t stop thinking about the fact that I might be the daughter of a murderer. Doesn’t that bother you?”

“No.”

“No?”

“No,” he repeated simply. “I know who you are. You’re not him. I don’t think you could be even if you tried.”

“I would do terrible things for the people I love,” I whispered, thinking back to the night I’d almost come face-to-face with Jared, how I’d felt such anger, such a need to hurt the person responsible for killing my mum.

“So would we all,” Sage said. “But you are good, Georgina.”

“Why do you say my name like that? Nobody else says my name so much or in the way that you do. Most people shorten it.”

“I like the way it feels in my mouth. A beautiful name for the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met.”

I blushed and hoped it was still dark enough that he wouldn’t see. I almost wished he wouldn’t say every thought in his mind, it made it that much harder to keep a level head, to try and protect my heart from the inevitable pain of letting him go. He wasn’t supposed to be here, none of them were, and as soon as we got Jared to move on… they would all leave too.

I sighed. Despite the ugliness of its past and the dark that crept in the halls, Alswell felt more like home than anywhere I’d been before, typical really, that the place I fit in best was full of the restless dead.

“What were you going to ask me before?”

I cast my mind back, having already forgotten as other thoughts and questions consumed me. “Oh. How do you think Ja—” Sage shushed me and I winced. “Is there a reason I shouldn’t say his name?”

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