Ghost (The Halloween Boys #1) (50)
The hug reminded me of when I’d launched myself into Ames’s arms after our motorcycle ride. I’d felt so alive and real that I’d cried. This feeling, this offer, was comparable to that experience.
“Are you sure it’s not too much?” I asked, skeptical that Yesenia’s abuela would be okay with this arrangement after her stern words during our first meeting.
Yesenia smoothed my outfit out on the bed and then placed my makeup on the dresser, unzipping the bag and helping herself to a perusal of my eyeshadow palettes. “Girl, you’re doing us a favor. We need someone downstairs, and we never use this office anyway.”
“Wow,” I breathed, slumping onto the bed. “Thank you so much, Yesenia. Please tell Marcelene thank you from me too.”
“I will.” She smiled. “I like your sexy black fox look for tonight. I have a lacy black fox mask downstairs that would go perfect with it. I’ll go grab it. And then I want you to do my eyes all smoky like yours were the other day. I’m going for sexy, spooky ho tonight. Which isn’t too different than my everyday look but, you know.”
I laughed, feeling the unfamiliar but welcomed warmth of female friendship. A new, free, and gorgeous apartment and a new job had found me in one night.
It almost sated the pain I felt from potentially losing Ames and the guys.
Almost.
CHAPTER 18
Blythe
IF GHOST HASN’T KILLED YOU, YOU’RE HIS FRIEND.
A world in which there are monsters, and ghosts, and things that want to steal your heart is a world in which there are angels, and dreams and a world in which there is hope.
Neil Gaiman
As promised, I gave Yesenia the smoky eye look of her dreams. Her golden-brown skin glowed magnificently under bronzer, and the deep purple lip I’d added made her sensuous features come to life. My outfit was sexy and comfortable, though the skirt was a little too short. The trench coat would protect me from my ass falling out, at least. After taking it upon herself to haul in my clothes from the back of my car and hanging them in the room’s white vanity, Yesenia put her hands on her hips in appreciation. “Well, I’m hot and you’re hot. My work here is done. I’m going to scoot home and get changed.”
I laughed. “Thanks again, this helps me more than you know.”
My new friend scanned me with a compassionate and considering gaze. “I don’t know if you’ve figured this out about me yet, but I’m a nosey bitch. You want to tell me about what happened with Ames Cove before I leave?”
I buzzed my lips on an exasperated exhale. “He’s been so nice and sweet since the moment I got to town. He’s handsome and just perfect.”
“Wow, sounds like a real problem,” she said playfully. Rummaging through the tiny office closet, she pulled out a bag of tortilla chips and an unopened jar of salsa that she brought over to the coffee table in the center of the room. We’d already devoured a pizza we’d ordered while doing makeup, but I was still starving. “These are my favorite, thanks.” I appreciatively scooped a mouthful of salsa, careful not to spill on my delicate crop top. It would be like me to be in a sexy get-up with food stains “It is a problem, because I’m very not perfect, and I feel like he’s only interested because he wants to save me and score more good boy points or something.”
The confession rolled off my tongue so much easier than the stuttering first conversation I’d had downstairs with Yesenia. This town and its people had grown on me and helped me in such a short period of time. “I get what you’re saying. Sometimes good guys are too good to be attractive.” She eyed a chip as she broke it in half. “But Ames isn’t such a good guy.”
I raised an eyebrow. “How so?”
“I don’t know, really. But I do know my abuela and the older w—” She stopped herself. “Women,” she stated carefully, “don’t like him, or his friends, but especially him. None of them will tell me why except to warn us all to stay away from him.”
“Huh,” I pondered. “That’s strange. And you have no clue why? Haven’t you known him for a long time?”
“I’ve known of him since high school. He’d come by to counsel whatever new kids arrived in town. But I have no memory of him or Onyx or Wolf before high school.” She shrugged. “Dr. Cove was just kind of a quiet nerdy guy. Not much to tell. But the reaction from my abuela and her . . . friends . . . makes me wonder what I don’t know.”
Bewilderment but also a strange sort of confirmation unraveled at her words. I’d known there was something about Ames and his friends. Even if I were no closer to figuring out what that something was, it was validating to have it confirmed by someone else.
I shook the salt off my hands. “Well, when he was angry at me this evening, he did say he was the villain. Something like he makes the gates of Hell quake.” I chuckled. “So he’s a little melodramatic, if anything.”
But Yesenia didn’t join my laughter, or even smile, as she tucked a brown wave of hair behind her bejeweled, multi-pierced ear. “He said those words? The gates of Hell?”
“Yeah, along those lines. Why?”
She shook her head softly, lost in thought.