Eternally Devoted (Frostbite #4)

by Stacey Kennedy

  Looking at Nettie now, who continued to peel off the bark with her boot, I had the feeling it didn’t much matter to her either way, only that I needed to decide. I wondered what life would be like without my gifts.

  Peaceful, I thought.

  At the same time, how could I turn my back on the gifts that led me to Kipp? Without them, I wouldn’t have met him, and I wouldn’t have seen so many wrongs made right.

  What did I want?

  Kipp.

  Now that he had been saved—of course, that still hadn’t been confirmed—did I want to continue helping ghosts that seemed to always put me in danger? Or did I want a normal life with Kipp, ghost-free?

  I glanced down the long street of such a strange world and pondered, but I instantly realized I was already decided. As I knew when I first came to the Netherworld with my family what the right decision was, I knew now equally as intense in my soul.

  What kind of selfish bitch would that make me to find the love of my life because of my gifts, only to refuse the reason for why I discovered him in the first place? Besides, with all the new understanding of my powers, plus Gretchen’s magical spells, I had a lot more control around ghosts.

  It turned out being eternally devoted to ghosts wasn’t such a bad thing after all. “You know, I kinda like me just the way I am.”

  Her smiled beamed as she waved. “Goodbye for now, Tess.”

  Before I had a chance to say anything more, my soul was being pulled and tugged at in no way I’d ever experienced before. This wasn’t like my last trip to the Netherworld—now it hurt. The very core of my soul ripped apart, yanked between worlds, and it seemed like every fiber of my body exploded to bring me back to reality and the danger that soon awaited me.

  Bringing me back to Wayde…

  Chapter Nine

  A hum filled my ears right before I snapped my eyes open and sat up on a loud gasp. My head pounded like elephants ran through it, instantly forcing my eyes shut again. “Oh, god...”

  I rubbed my temples, begging the headache to go away, especially since I had no clue what caused these damn headaches. If it wasn’t due from my travels to the Netherworld, since I couldn’t become trapped there, and from all appearances, Kipp had been saved, which meant they weren’t linked to my emotions, then why was I continuing to get such brutal headaches? More so, since right now it seemed worse than ever.

  It didn’t add up.

  However, I had to admit it could be all stress related, as I had thought once before. Who knew what I’d find when I woke up—perhaps a crazed Wayde ready to butcher me.

  Oddly enough, I had the sense I hadn’t woken up on my own, and I couldn’t tell if Nettie had forced me awake or something else had. I managed the headache, as I had become an expert at now, and peeked open one eye.

  The flashlight still hung on the ceiling, and in front of me, everyone remained asleep. The dark corners also hadn’t changed, but I didn’t see anyone else standing, nor did I see Wayde.

  “You’re awake,” a deep voice stated.

  I gasped and scooted back on my butt along the cement ground, trying to think of a way to kick Wayde’s ass and save mine. But when I took in who had been standing behind me, I froze. “Sammy?”

  The sight of the ghost that had lived at the Animus headquarters stuttered my brain. Was a ghost behind Alexander’s murder? Did he do a magical spell that knocked us all out? I couldn’t see any of that as plausible, since Sammy was a ghost and had no physical power now. At this point, I was so damn confused I didn’t know much of anything.

  “What?” was all that could possibly form out of my mouth.

  Sammy smiled, crinkling his soft brown eyes. “Hi.”

  With his sweet smile, I knew, without a doubt, that I had nothing to fear from him. As he’d been since I met him, he seemed kind and extremely patient, considering he only tried a couple times to get my help before he stayed silent.

  I took a quick look around, paying a little more attention to the details, regardless that my head still throbbed. Max snored, as did Dane, and deep breaths from everyone else surrounded me, especially from Zach at the staircase. Even Eddie looked sound asleep, although he was a quieter sleeper.

  A moment of relief washed through me that no one had been murdered. With my friends all in the clear, I finally looked to Sammy. “Why am I awake and they’re not?”

  His gaze swept over my friends before he turned to me again. “No idea. Something changed in the energy around you just before you woke up.” He hesitated, nibbled his lip, and then shrugged. “But I can’t explain why you’re the only one awake.”

  “Okay, weird.” It did creep me out to see everyone still under the spell, but I wondered if Nettie had somehow broken the spell on me. I focused away from the ice lacing my veins. Something else was more important. “Have you seen the man named Wayde that stays at the house with you?”

  Sammy shook his head with strangely sad eyes. “No.”

  Even weirder—why would Wayde not be here after he cast the spell to knock us all out?

  Regardless of the confusing bits, happiness at what had happened in the Netherworld warmed the chill in my blood. Right now, it appeared we all were safe. Could the one thing I’d hoped for finally been achieved?

  Had Kipp been saved?

  Only one sure way to find out. Call Kipp’s brother, Brandon, and see if he’d woken up.

  With total urgency and a hammering heart, and not thinking about Sammy or my unconscious friends, I reached into my pocket and dug out my cell phone. Perhaps part of me had a hard time believing we had found the answer to save Kipp. After all we’d been through, maybe it seemed unreachable.

  I hurried through my list of contacts and found Brandon’s name. After I hit the call button and raised the phone to my ear, nothing happened. I tried to call two more times for good measure.

  When I only heard a dead line, I cursed at my phone. “Of course, there’s no service. Why would I expect otherwise?” Maybe Wayde had used magic to disrupt the signal when he placed the magic on the Lux.

  Apparently, the lunatic was one step ahead of us all, which made us simply fucked!

  A scary thought indeed, considering all my friends were still in the basement and I had no idea what to do now. Especially since I didn’t know what kind of magic Wayde had placed on them. What would happen if I left the basement? Could it kill them or something?

  After one more try on my cell phone, that resulted in another failed attempt, I heaved a sigh and placed my phone back in my pocket. I turned to Sammy to understand what had happened while I’d been unconscious. “How did you know we were down here?”

  He ran a hand through his brown hair. His arms were incredibly skinny. “After what happened at the house earlier, I really needed to talk to you. So, I followed you here.” He gave me a slow once-over. “Besides, you glow and it tends to show up extremely well at night. I don’t think it would’ve been all that hard to find you.”

  Lovely.

  However, while he irritated me before, since I didn’t have time to help any others ghosts, having Sammy with me came as a blessing. Right now, as the only other conscious one, he had answers I didn’t. “Do you know what happened to us?”

  Sammy studied me with a frown. “Not really. I was waiting outside for you.” His head lowered, shoulders slumped, and then he peeked up at me through his thick eyelashes. “I’ve been trying to give you the space you asked for, but when I felt a shift in the energy, I decided to check in. I thought something was wrong.” He glanced at all the sleeping bodies, and then gave me a long look. “Clearly, I wasn’t wrong.”

  “You came down a couple minutes after you felt the shift in energy?” At his nod, I pondered, since that meant he’d come in immediately after the spell had knocked us out. “How long have you been waiting around?”

  “Around a half-an-hour. I came in through that way.” He pointed at the far basement wall. “When I entered, all I found was you all sleeping. No one else sho
wed up or woke up, until you did.” He gave a small smile. “And that brings us to now.”

  So, where did that get us?

  Nowhere special, I thought. And definitely not any closer to understanding why Wayde had done this, or what he planned to do in the future. I prayed it wasn’t anything that would hurt anyone in this room, including myself.

  After another quick scan of the basement, I listened hard to hear any noise from upstairs. The house was eerily silent. While part of me wanted to lose myself in panic, I wouldn’t go down the dangerous road of what Wayde planned to do…just yet.

  I rubbed the side of my temple again as a piercing pain rushed behind my eyeballs. I wondered if, before, it developed again because of stress, but now had become intense due to fear.

  Giving my temple a deep pressure massage, which did nothing to ease the ache, I lowered my hand as Sammy said, “You know you could have avoided all this if you only let me talk to you.”

  I dropped my hand, centered the pain to think straight, and regarded Sammy. He’d taken a couple steps to close in on me. I stared into his warm eyes, as what he said made no sense at all. “By that you mean?”

  He slowly lifted his finger with twisted features, and then he pointed over my shoulder. “That’s me.”

  I spun on the cement, and discovered he pointed at the open trunk. I jerked my head to him again, gaped for a good few seconds, and wished I didn’t understand what he meant. “You, as in your bones?”

  He nodded. “I’m Wayde Sammy Hagen.”

  While this new development stumped me in the ‘what the fuck’ kind of way, it also pissed me off. “Oh. My. God,” I bit off. “This whole time you knew this and said…nothing?”

  “No, I didn’t say nothing.” He scowled. “I tried—a few times—to talk to you and you kept forcing me away. You never let me have long enough to be able to say anything, and always cut me off.”

  I gritted my teeth, not to send this ghost to heaven’s gates myself. Then, I inhaled, slow and long, and said calmly, “Next time, you say, ‘Wayde killed me’. That’s the first thing that should come out of your mouth. Nothing else.”

  Frustration nearly swallowed me whole. Through all of this, I kept pushing Sammy away, thinking he was only going to ask me to help him cross over, when this ghost was the one that had all the answers.

  Now, understanding that part also brought the realization that Wayde had been stealing someone’s identity had been correct—he’d stolen Sammy’s, even if he used his middle name instead of first name. “Did he kill you for your identity?”

  Sammy shook his head slowly, his gaze glossy, as if lost in a horrible memory. “No, it wasn’t his original intention. But I think he took the opportunity once he realized he could.”

  I glanced at the cement I sat upon, and crossed my legs. That ruled out one assumption and led me to believe that maybe the murder had been more personal. Looking to Sammy again, I asked, “Did you know Wayde?” I raised my hand to stop him from answering, knowing that wasn’t quite right. “Or whoever he is.”

  Sammy drew in a long breath before his eyes darkened. “We were orphans, Jacob and I—”

  “Jacob?”

  “Yeah.” Sammy dropped down in front of me, crossing his legs, too. “That’s his name, Jacob Larsen. We grew up together from the age of five-years-old. After we turned eighteen, we got jobs and moved out together.” He gave his sweet smile, but on ghosts, as it usually did, it looked incredibly sad. “Best buds type of thing.”

  I snorted, seeing that Jacob’s definition of a best friend had been obviously warped. “Clearly, your relationship changed.”

  Sammy looked toward the trunk and the unfathomable pain in his eyes hurt to witness. Yeah, this was the hard part of helping ghosts—watching the agony of dealing with their past hurts. “He started to feel things.”

  Now, I realized Wayde and I had similar pasts, and my heart skipped a beat as Sammy said, “Jacob told me he sensed ghosts.”

  Chapter Ten

  I held my breath, realizing where Sammy was going with this. I stayed quiet while he continued. “It all started a few months after we moved into our new apartment.” Sammy finally looked at me, and a frown marred his face. “Jacob told me he was sensing ghosts around him, and feeling things off them.”

  I gulped. “Did you believe him?”

  “I wasn’t sure what to think.” Sammy hesitated, gave a frustrated sigh, and then went on, “No, that’s not true. Back then, I didn’t believe him. I thought he was having mental problems and that he should get help.”

  Oh, god.

  I’d been there myself long ago and was so worried to tell anyone about my abilities for fear they’d have me committed. But I also sympathized with Sammy. Before the accident, if Caley had told me she could talk to ghosts—which was why I’d always been so grateful she believed me—I would’ve thought she’d gone crazy, too. “What happened after you told Jacob to get help?”

  “Everything got worse,” Sammy replied in a soft voice. “Jacob used to tell me things. Like he knew what ghosts were wanting around him, or he’d sense their emotions.” Tears welled in Sammy’s eyes. “I never had any experience with any of that. I was so worried about him.”

  The realization of why Sammy had died had hit me like a punch to the chest. There, in the depths of his eyes was misery so bare he didn’t need to tell me why, as I already knew. “You were going to force him to get help, weren’t you?”

  Sammy bowed his head and whispered, “Yes.”

  I shifted against the cool cement, glimpsed at his hands in his lap, and watched him wring his fingers. I craved to grab them, comfort him somehow, and hated that I had no power to do so. “I’m guessing Jacob didn’t take that well.”

  “He lost it.” Sammy finally lifted his head and his voice trembled. “You have to understand, we didn’t have it easy. We had a tough life, and always felt a little abandoned.”

  While I could understand Sammy’s point, the one thing I couldn’t was why ghosts always defended their murderer, if they knew them on a personal level. At first, they always did. I supposed it had to be the stages of grief setting in, because normally they all ended up angry by the end of it.

  Not to say I’d point that out to Sammy. I stayed silent as he continued, “We had seen kids from the orphanage go into the institution. They were taken away from the only thing we knew as home, by a doctor and two orderlies…” He hesitated, shut his eyes a moment, and when he opened them, desolation shone in their depths. “It was horrible.”

  I swallowed the lump in my throat. “So, Jacob was afraid that would happen to him?”

  Sammy gave a soft nod. “The more I pressed him to get help, the more afraid he became of what would happen to him.” He tilted his head, and his expression became measured. “More afraid of what was happening to him.”

  I considered what Sammy had told me, and now I understood a little more about Wayde. Still, I couldn’t quite grasp how that would lead to murder instead of just Wayde kicking Sammy out of his life. “Okay, but why did he kill you?”

  “It took me a long time to remember all the details of what happened. But slowly, throughout the years, more and more came back.”

  Sammy stared at me, and then his eyes glazed over again, lost in a memory. “One night, Jacob was crying and telling me he didn’t understand what was going on with him. It was awful, he was in total hysterics, and I was at my end. I told him that night I was going to tell someone the truth to get him help.”

  I nibbled my lip, waiting for him to continue, but when he didn’t, I gave him a gentle push and whispered, “Did that make him angry?”

  Sammy blinked and after a sigh, he said, “So angry—almost like he snapped. It all happened so quickly. I remember, suddenly I was on the floor with Jacob on top of me, and there was a pillow over my face.”

  At the sadness dripping off his voice, tears filled my eyes, and my chest tightened. Seeing Sammy sitting there, telling such a tragic story, wa
s unbearable. I wanted nothing more than to reach forward and hug him, ease the sorrow I could see and hear now, but I had no ability to achieve such a desire. Instead, I whispered, “I’m so sorry, Sammy.”

  Once again, he gave his small sweet smile. “I forgive Jacob. He had nothing. We had nothing. He was scared.”

  Yeah, and now I knew why Wayde was so concerned about my abilities. The motive to kill Alexander to keep me away that I couldn’t understand before now became clear-cut. I was the one person who could communicate with the ghost that could destroy Wayde’s life. “And you’ve stayed with him this whole time?”

  Sammy’s lip quivered before he controlled himself. He pulled his legs up and rested his chin on his knee. “Where else would I go? I only had Jacob.”

  I studied Sammy a moment, feeling a serious crying fit on the brink. Ghosts always returned to the one place they felt safe, because it comforted them. I thought it was so damn sad that the only place Sammy felt eased was in the presence of the man who had killed him. But I forced myself to hold it together. Right now, Sammy needed my strength, not my tears.

  Somehow, it made Wayde’s actions even worse because of Sammy’s loyalty. I realized Sammy had probably been a better person than I, because I wouldn’t be able to do what he had. “How can you forgive him so easily?”

  “It wasn’t easy.” Sammy snorted softly. “But when I died, a part of Jacob died, too. I saw it after I awoke to this life.” He waved his hands over himself. “I still see it now—he’s empty and dark. His happiness and soul died the night he killed me. Even though he still lives, he’s just as dead as I am.”

  Funny enough how I thought Wayde was only cold to me, but now that Sammy said it, I wondered what Wayde would’ve been like before he murdered Sammy. How different of a man was he? It also explained why he lived in this disgusting house. He didn’t care about anything anymore, except for hiding his secrets.

  I paused, collecting my thoughts and a thought rose, considering Wayde definitely had evil in his soul. “Do you know how Jacob projects a pure aura, then?”