Ghost (The Halloween Boys #1) (109)

“Wait,” I said, reaching out a hand and touching the being that bowed before me’s snout. I saw it then. Who it was. Who she was. Curls and ribbons . . . Memories of the photographs in Mr. Moore’s guest room flooded my awareness.

I gasped. “Ellie May?”

Something flashed across the demon’s eyes. She shook her head, her ears flapping as if to shake the thought away.

“They took you, didn’t they, Ellie? Your master . . . whoever he is . . . will meet me soon. You can count on that.” Rage coursed through me as the realization poured in, but I softened. “Your dad misses you, Ellie. He kept your room so nice.”

“No,” the creature wailed. “No, I don’t know that name. I answer to no name. I have no name”.

“When I came here, I was a scared little girl too. And a demon found me too.”

Her eyes shot up, looking faintly human in that moment. “Did he take you?” she asked, averting her red gaze.

“Yes . . . just like you were taken. Right?”

She slammed a loud hoof on the tile, shaking the building. I felt the guys flinch and move toward me, but I lifted a hand, telling them to pause. They’d kill her in a moment, rip her to shreds for taking me and trying to harm me. Her gritty voice spoke. “We’re just things to be taken and changed and fucked and fucked with and used. You’re no different than me. And soon you’ll look like this, too, when they’re finished with you.”

I felt her pain, the darkness that had been planted and taken root inside her. Who could blame her? “That’s not all we are,” I replied softly. “We are more than what’s happened to us, Ellie. Maybe they caged us because we’re the scary ones. Maybe we’re monsters too, all on our own. We’re powerful. You don’t have to stay this way. Let me help you. Let’s help each other.”

Her big, animalistic eyes stared into mine, flickering in pale awareness.

I didn’t know why I did it, maybe instinct, and I was done ignoring that. I reached out and touched her horns. The beast fell limp at my feet. Dead.

Behind, she stood, glowing and gorgeous with blonde ringlet curls tied up in blue ribbons. Her long petticoat grazing the ground.

She reached out a hand. “Come with me?”

I smiled, not registering the guys’ objections. Or not caring. “Of course.” When I took her hand, we vanished.

We appeared on a street I recognized. Ellie looked around and smiled softly at the trick-or-treaters that whirled past her. The little kids saw her and didn’t care. She was just another lost ghost. “It looks so different . . .” She put a gloved hand to her mouth in a gasp.

There he was, sweeping the street. I took her palm and held it tight. “He’s been waiting for you,” I said as we walked up to Mr. Moore.

“Papa?” she said, sweetly.

He stalled a moment, almost as if he were afraid to look up and not see her. I wondered how many times he’d done that for more than a century. But he did look up. And when he saw her, his lip quivered. “Ellie May . . . I’ve swept the road every day waiting for you. So the dirt doesn’t muddy your petticoat. I know you hate that.”

I swallowed back emotion and took a step back. “Papa.” Her voice cracked again, tears streaming down her face. She threw herself into his arms and he caught her, their embrace saying more than lifetimes of words could.

When he pulled back, holding his daughter’s petite shoulders, he said, “Let’s go see your mama. Let’s go home, Ellie May.”

“Yes, Papa. I’ve missed you both so, so much.”

Through cloudy eyes and hot tears streaking down my face, I walked up to them both and placed a palm on their shoulders.

Mr. Moore sighed. “Thank you. Thank you,” he whispered as they both faded away.





CHAPTER 37





Blythe





LA PETITE MORT





We stopped checking for monsters under our bed when we realized they were inside us.

Charles Darwin





I WAS DEATH.


The street fell silent as I stood alone in their wake. My touch freed them both from their curse. It was why I was brought here. How I found Ash Grove. In running from death and demons, I found that I was Death itself. And though I may have found family in monsters and all the darkness they brought . . . the greatest monster I’d befriended was me.

And somehow my power surpassed them all.

I felt it, a chilly and exhilarating wave through my bones. I pictured the horned lady on her throne of bones, her four men at her side. She was me, somehow. She showed me the way and revealed I’d been holding all the puzzle pieces to my own mystery the entire time. I never needed to run. The chains that bound me when the Baphomet hissed were only effective because I believed they were. Because I didn’t believe in myself. I watched in wonder as these magical beings were drawn to me, for some reason, and I sorted through the riddles of them and the town. But when I got close to the answer, I dodged it, not wanting to face what somewhere inside me knew was true.

I was Death.

Tingles ignited along my bare shoulders as I felt his presence. A tender, calloused touch skimmed my arms as warm breath hit my ear. “Did I tell you that you look beautiful tonight, Little Ghost?”