Evermore (Emily Chambers Spirit Medium Trilogy #3)(56)

His mouth twisted, his nostrils flared, and for a brief moment he fainted away to almost nothing before flickering back into existence again. "It's impossible, Emily." His voice was thick with emotion and exhaustion. "She's right. I've tried. I tried to give you up. But I can't."

"Me?" I whispered.

"What is it?" Celia asked. "What did he say?"

"That he must give up me, yet..." I shook my head. We'd suspected that he had to stop loving me and let me go, but when he had tried, nothing happened. "It didn't work last time."

"That's because I couldn't do it. I couldn't give you up. Anything else, yes, but never you." The corner of his lips curved into a wry smile. "Not even for everlasting peace. I love you. Stopping is an impossibility."

I pressed my cheek to his heart but there was no beat. He felt so cold and he faded a little again.

"There is another way." I heard Mrs. Stanley's words, but they didn't sink in until Louis, George, and my sister prompted her for more. "Now that Leviticus is...gone," she added, "there is something else you can do. Is he weak, Miss Chambers?"

"Yes," I whispered. "Why? What is happening to him?"

"Please Mrs. Stanley," Celia urged, "make amends. Do the right thing, and tell us what to do."

She didn't answer for so long that I thought I'd scream with frustration. Louis adjusted his grip on the handle of the pistol, but he didn't use it to threaten her. I was afraid my sister would snatch it from him and do it herself if Mrs. Stanley didn't speak.

Thankfully the landlady did. "You must find Beaufort's body," she said. "And quickly. Now that the one who laid the curse on him is gone, Beaufort's body is dying."

"He's already dead," George said.

"No, he's not," she said. "He's still alive. But not for long."





CHAPTER 13





Alive? Jacob was alive?

Impossible. It had to be. Either I was dreaming or Mrs. Stanley was lying.

And yet...and yet...

"Why should we believe you?" George asked her. "You've lied so many times already. How do we know this is not one more?"

"It may be." Mrs. Stanley's accent seemed thicker and her manner was of someone who no longer cared what anyone thought. I felt a little sorry for her. I didn't understand why she could love someone like Price, but I understood deep, soul-wrenching love, and that was enough for me to forgive her role. "But you will not know for sure until you find his body."

"We have to trust her," Celia muttered. "We cannot risk doing nothing." She looked to me. Everyone did.

I clutched Jacob's shirt, even as he faded in and out. I didn't look up at his face. Could not. If I moved, if I spoke even in a whisper, I might shatter this dream and wake up into a nightmare instead.

It was Jacob who roused me. "Emily," he said urgently. "Emily, ask her where my body is. Ask her how she knows this. Ask her...bloody hell." He pressed his forehead to mine and breathed deeply, despite not needing air.

I pulled away and held his hand as if that could stop him disappearing. He shimmered but remained.

"You had better tell us what you know," I said, putting as much of a threatening tone into it as I could.

Mrs. Stanley sat heavily on the chair and smoothed her apron over her lap. She looked much older and somewhat weaker, as if all the life had gone out of her. "When Leviticus first came to me at the circus and asked for a curse to use on the Beaufort boy, I was hesitant. He paid me a large sum, but still, I did not like the idea. I was not in love with him then. I sympathized with his tale, but what he asked went against everything I was brought up to believe. I could not do it."

"But you took his money anyway," Louis said.

She nodded. "I gave him a curse that I told him would obliterate his victim completely. He would have no existence, not in this world or the Otherworld. All he had to do was make him lose consciousness, not kill him, then speak the curse."

Jacob let go of me and I thought he was going to fade away completely, so faint was he. But he sat on the floor, his back against the sofa. He clasped is drawn-up knees and stared straight ahead. I knelt beside him and touched his shoulder. He didn't move.

"The curse you gave Price...what did it really do?" I asked.

"It turned Beaufort into a spirit, separated him from his body. But he was more than a spirit, or perhaps less, depending on your point of view."

"He is more solid than other ghosts," I said, "and can go where others cannot."

"But he could not crossover, could never be truly dead unless he gave up what he loved most."

Me.

I tightened my grip on Jacob's shoulder. He did not acknowledge my presence. It was as if he wasn't even listening.

"Jacob said his killer told him that he must give something up," I said, "something he loved dearly."

"I did not want to dabble in the spirit world back then," she said. "So I gave the milder curse to Leviticus and told him to tell Beaufort that he had to give something up. It was my way of helping Beaufort end the curse himself and return to his body and his life, but I told Leviticus that it was merely a part of the curse and would not work if left out." She cast a longing gaze at Price's body. "I lied to him and I did not know how to end the lie."