Page 32 of Ghoul as a Cucumber

“What?” I whirl around. His fork is hanging out of his mouth, and his eyes are glazed over.

“You terrified me!” Mum clutches her chest.

“I spilt my tea,” Dad reaches for a cloth to mop his shirt.

“Sorry.” Ambrose grins sheepishly as he stabs another breakfast sausage. “This food is simplydivine.”

I push my chair out. “I have to go.”

“Bree-bug, don’t be like that. Let’s talk about this.” Dad peers at me with huge eyes. He plasters this silly expression on his face, the kind of face he’d make for me as a kid that never failed to cheer me up.

It won’t work this time.

I spin around and stomp out to the garden.

* * *

“Why are you following me?”I growl at one spirit and two ex-ghosts as I trudge through Grimwood’s overgrown vegetable gardens. The rows of raised beds butt up right on the edge of the Grimdale Wood. Over the years, the wilds have crept in to claim them. Vines twist around the beds, cracking the stone planters and snaking through the jungle of weeds and foxgloves that have taken up residence. Roots poke through the cobbled paths, creating an uneven surface that’s making life rather difficult for Ambrose. He frowns as he pokes at the ground with his stick. Pax slips Ambrose’s arm through his elbow and leads him toward me, Edward floating at the rear with a sullen expression on his too-pretty features.

“Because you’re upset,” Ambrose says.

“Because you haven’t had an orgasm in at least twelve hours,” Edward adds.

“Because you need to tell me who I should stab to make it better.” Pax folds his arms over his barrel chest.

“No stabbing,” I say automatically.

It’s too much. It’s all too much. I thought that after Father Bryne’s confession and that one word – Lazarus – that things would be better. I have a name for what I am. But the name means nothing when my powers still make no sense, and when Pax nearly died, and I don’t know if the Ripper can come back from where I sent him. And now I’m going to lose Grimwood, just when I came to see it as home…

I sink into a bed choked with foxgloves and peer up at the house. To most people, Grimwood is a scary, cold, creepy manor. To me, this is one place where I’ve always felt safe. Even when I was on the other side of the world, Grimwood and her ghosts called to me, tethering me to my past, my family, my secrets.

All my life I’ve told myself a story about why I left, a story I’ve repeated so many times that I’ve started to believe it. I left Grimdale because I wanted a chance to be normal.

And that’s part of the truth, but it’s never been the whole truth. I left to keep my homesafe. Safe from me and my strange powers. Safe from me hurting the people I love, the way I hurt the ghosts so much that they left me.

If my parents sell it, I won’t have a home anymore.

The thought is scarier than facing down a resurrected Victorian serial killer.

“I know it’s upsetting, but there is always a positive way to look at things. We’re not tied to the house anymore,” Ambrose says helpfully. “Home can be wherever you rest your head. Wherever you want to go, we will make a new home with you.”

“Speak for yourself,” Edward mutters.

Ordinarily, Ambrose’s suggestion would resonate with my vagabond soul. I glance to my right, across to the cemetery, where only two nights ago I had stabbed Jack the Ripper and buried Father Bryne’s body in another man’s grave. I think of Vera, and Penny Hatterly, and I know that I cannot run fast enough or far enough to stop the Order of the Noble Death from finding me.

But Ambrose is still stuck on the idea. He paces through the garden, his stick swinging wildly in front of him, getting tangled in the weeds. “With enough moldavite, we can take Edward anywhere with us, couldn’t we? We could go to Egypt, or the Wild West, or this Bali place you were telling me about. We could have cocktails on the beach and…hey, what’s this?”

His walking cane clangs against something metal. I glance over and am nearly blinded by the sun reflecting off a flat surface. Is that…glass?

I stumble over and clear away some of the weeds to reveal several panes of dirty glass in a metal frame. The rest of the structure is completely buried beneath weeds and vines. “This must be the glasshouse Dad was talking about, where he’s growing his cucumbers. I can’t believe he’s got anything to grow out here.”

I try to shove open the door, but its too choked with weeds. Pax picks me up and plonks me down to one side, which the angry feminist inside me would object to if it weren’t kind of hot watching him attack the weeds.

Edward turns his head to the side and smiles as he watches Pax tear out the thick weeds with his bare hands. “He may be annoying, but he is a glorious specimen.”

“Yes, yes he is.”

Pax makes short work of the weeds and yanks the greenhouse door open. Edward, Ambrose and I follow him inside. I’m surprised to see that the interior is relatively tidy. Dad must have cleaned it out before he started his giant vegetable experiment. A few weeds have crept through underneath, but the majority of the space is filled by two raised beds of cucumber plants.

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