Page 28

Embarrassment is the one emotion I’ve never been able to handle, so I get to work mopping up the mess on the floor. It’s kind of my fault. Delphine’s, really, but I guess she falls under my jurisdiction. I wonder if there’s a version of human resources in the underworld where I can complain about wayward spirit guides.

I dump the coffee-soaked towels and empty plastic cup in the trash can, forcing myself to meet his eyes. He’s still dabbing at his bloodied nose, elbows braced on his knees. It seems to have stopped, but there’s still a smear of red across his upper lip that my gaze fixates on.

“Eyes up here, Parris,” he quips, wiping his mouth and tossing the towel away.

An awkward silence descends over the room.

Sunday is the one to shatter it. “Are you… I mean… Is it finalized?”

My stomach twists at the mention of my divorce. “Yeah. I’m a Parris again.” My voice comes out quieter and weaker than I want to. I cross my arms and rub circles absentmindedly over my skin.

“What was it before?” His voice softens at the edges, dropping into a low, comforting rumble that slides through my ears like butter.

“Van Doren.”

“Bellamy Van Doren? Sounds pretentious as fuck.” His tone flips so suddenly that it forces a surprised laugh out of me. He’s dead right, too.

“Says Sunday Mourning,” I tease, my thumb stilling on my skin.

“Hey, it’s not pretentious. Just fucking terrible.”

I scrunch my nose to stop myself from grinning. “Whatever you say, Gravedigger.” The old college nickname slips out before I can stop it. The shape of it in my mouth feels like sliding into my own bed after returning home from a long trip.

“Haven’t heard that in a while, pip-squeak.”

His nickname for me stabs my heart as images from memories cascade in front of my eyes.

This is one of the problems with being me, being a spirit witch. Memories, emotions, scents, sounds—so fucking potent, they blind me. They deafen me. They choke me.

It’s like someone is flipping through a stack of printed photos of the time me and Sunday were an ampersand and not a period—little things that don’t feel little at all when you are face to face with the person who broke it all.

A flash of his hand in my back pocket.

The phantom sensation of his long hair tickling my cheek.

The cold shock of seawater combined with my squealing laughter.

The gentle pressure of a hand on my arm jolts me back into the present. My eyes sting, but I manage to keep the tears from spilling.

Heart racing, I look at where the heat of his palm is searing through the fabric of my baby-blue cloud-patterned hoodie.

“Are you okay, Bels?” he asks, his eyes filled with concern. He’s so close I can smell the fresh mint on his breath.

My throat tightens. No, I’m not.

Only, I must have said it out loud, because Sunday swears under his breath. “I shouldn’t have brought it up,” he says, his fingers tightening on my arm. “Fuck, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

I try to shrug out of his grasp, but his arm wrap around me, crushing me into the hard planes of his chest.

I don’t want it.

But I need it.

Because the more I try to heal, the more it hurts, and the more it hurts, the more I realize how much my marriage was just a band-aid over a wound that refused to heal. I should be reeling from my divorce, and I am, in some ways.

Yet it’s Sunday who I can’t stop thinking about.

I let him hug me, even though I can’t reciprocate. If I do, I’ll fall apart and he’ll find a way in. I know he will. He got through my defenses in school, and now all my walls are shaped like him.