Louis nudged York’s shoulder. “Read it.”
York did—and then tensed. “Daughter of socialites Barton and Muffy Dumont has been missing for two months and if the rumors are to be believed, she’s dead. Morgan Dumont was last seen… Hold up. Morgan, as in our Morgan?”
“Boy ain’t the sharpest tool in the toolshed, is he?” asked Petey, looking to Louis. “You suck up all them brain cells in the womb?”
York ignored the dig and fixated on the photograph of Morgan. She was even more attractive than he’d imagined. Far more.
He wasn’t sure how long he’d run his thumb over the picture of her before he realized his brother and Petey were staring at him. He cleared his throat and came back to his senses. “She’s an heiress?”
Louis pulled out other clippings. “Not just any. Look.”
Several of them showed photos of Morgan’s grieving parents sitting on a sofa in their home being interviewed about the disappearance of their daughter. Morgan’s mother had a poodle on her lap that was baring its teeth at the photographer. It took York a minute to realize what Louis was trying to point out to him.
In the background of the photos were items sitting on a side table. Having been raised around magical artifacts, and being a trained hunter, York knew demonic knickknacks when he saw them, and he knew the telltale signs of the Collective. “No! She’s not part of that! She can’t be!”
“I don’t know what to make of it all. We should ask her,” said Louis, tapping the photo. “Her family is part of the Collective. Think Luc knows?”
“Of course not!” shouted York as he stood quickly. “No way would he permit her to be around if he knew she was working for the enemy.”
“Hold up there,” said Petey, waving a hand in the air. “I don’t think she is. She’s a good girl.”
“Petey, that clock you see in the background on the table? It’s one given to the highest-ranking members of the Collective. Think of it as a prize for being incredibly loyal,” said Louis, shaking his head. “I can’t believe she’s been lying to us all these years. We trusted her. Why would she help us as children to stand against the Collective, and why help Virginia eight months ago?”
York thought back to when his sister had nearly been taken by a high-ranking Collective member. Morgan had fought the man, helping to protect Virginia until help could arrive. It didn’t make sense.
His stomach dropped. “Dead Rising Day is almost here, and Daddy said Luc is missing some item that can bring the dead back to life. What if Morgan has been leading us all on for years, making us trust her, all so she could get her hands on whatever item Luc has and use Dead Rising Day to come back to life for good?”
“You’re saying she’s been playing a long con on everyone?” asked Petey, shaking his head. “No way. She’s my friend. I trust her.”
York couldn’t stop the irrational mix of emotions that welled in him. Confusion. Betrayal. Lust. They swirled around deep in his gut before bubbling up and over. His anger won out. “I don’t. She hasn’t shown herself to me once in all these years. Why? Because she had something to hide?”
“We’re getting ahead of ourselves here,” said Louis, rising to his feet, holding the box of clippings. “We should talk with Luc about what we found.”
“Darn straight,” roared York. His response was a knee-jerk one. His shark side pushed upward quickly, clouding his better judgment. “He has a right to know she’s been taking advantage of him for years, and I don’t want to think of what she’s capable of. Louis, where is the ghost extermination kit Daddy used to keep here?”
As the words left his mouth, he wanted them back. He was overreacting in a big way, and he knew it, yet as irrational as it was, he couldn’t stop himself. His emotions were all over the place when it came to her.
There was a loud thump from just outside of the open door to the vault. A quick glance in that direction showed no one was there, and York’s temper was too riled to focus on much beyond the possibility that Morgan had been playing them all for fools for years.
Petey gasped and shot forward. “Ain’t nobody ghost-busting my friend. Any streams get crossed and you’ll have me to deal with.”
Louis moved toward York, the box still in his hands. “Calm down. You’re taking this very personally.”
Yes. Because it was personal. He felt something for her. A whole lot of somethings, and all along she’d been toying with them—with him.
Louis worked the clippings and information from York’s grip and gave him a stern look. “This is one of those times Momma would tell you that you’re putting the cart before the horse. We don’t have the facts. We don’t know the truth of the matter. Stop inventing one. You’ll feel like a fool if you’re wrong.”
Petey gave York the stink eye. “And have a whole lot of crow to eat with Morgan if she finds out you were running your mouth the way you were. That girl ain’t done nothing but look out for you and yours for years. She’s given you no reason to stop trusting. Shame on you, New York.”
It took some doing, but York’s hurt and anger over the discovery that Morgan had connections to the Collective began to wane. He exhaled a shaky breath. “Why didn’t she tell us her family is part of the Collective?”
Petey rolled his eyes. “That something you’d want on a billboard if your family was part of it?”
No.
York wouldn’t want anyone to know he was related to evil zealots. He shook his head.
Petey grunted again. “Got more brawn than brain.”
Louis snorted. “Yes. He does.”
“You look just like me,” warned York.
Louis smirked. “But I’m smart enough to know not to think the absolute worst about someone we call a friend.”
York took a moment to really soak in the number of boxes before them. It had to be an entire wardrobe there, not to mention countless personal items. “Where did this all come from?”
“It was on the morning delivery truck,” said Louis, setting down the clippings and picking up a small black handbag. He opened it and withdrew the small billfold within. “I don’t think any of this has been touched since she went missing.”
“You mean died,” corrected Petey. “She wasn’t missing. She was dead. We know that now.”
York’s throat constricted. “D-does it say anywhere how she died or where they found her body?”
His brother locked gazes with him. “That’s just it. From what I was reading through here, they never did find her body. She was finally declared dead years after she went missing. And if I’m reading this all right, her parents insisted the search for her be called off far sooner than the authorities wanted to. But they had friends in high places, so they got what they wanted.”
“You’re joking, right?” demanded York, his ire rising again but this time over Morgan’s parents. They didn’t want their daughter found? What kind of parents were they?
“There you are,” said Luc, appearing in the doorway. He glanced around, his brows drawing together at the sight of the boxes. “What’s going on? How did you get all of this?”
“Arrived this morning,” said Louis, shoving the billfold at York, who absently put it in his back pocket as Luc hurried into the room with them.
“This was all at my New York brownstone,” said Luc as he bent and lifted a black teddy bear from one of the boxes. “None of this should be here.”
“Why did you have it all?” asked Louis. “Were you storing it for Morgan?”
Luc lowered his gaze, his shoulders slumping. “She doesn’t know I have it. I did my best to keep the fact her parents had her belongings packed within three days of her death from her.”
Petey propped an elbow on one of the many shelving units in the vault, the one where the crystal balls were stored. Every hunter’s relic facility had a similar section. “So the minute they finally had her declared dead and gone, they boxed up all her stuff?”
It was hard to miss the sorrow in the old man’s voice.
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Luc stood slowly. “No. I mean three days after they gave her as an offering to the Collective, to be killed and have her soul captured, they boxed up everything that reminded them of her and put it out at the curb for trash pickup. I saw to it that it was all stored somewhere safe.”
York mulled over everything he’d just heard and clenched his fists. “They gave her to the Collective as a sacrifice?”
“Yes,” said Luc evenly. “And before you think the worst of her, Morgan had no idea her family was part of the Collective. She didn’t know anything about the supernatural until she died, and I opened her eyes to it all. Before that, she was just the only child of wealthy absentee parents who cared more about money and power than they did their daughter.”
Louis and Petey both set their attention on York.
His face heated. He’d done just as Petey had claimed. He’d thought the worst of her without knowing the whole truth.
Chapter Six
“Louis?” called out Morgan as she stood inside Enchanted Collectibles & Antiques. The shop had large front windows to showcase its offerings with hand-painted lettering on them, announcing the store’s hours. The displays set up in the windows changed often. Currently, they were dedicated to vintage medical equipment. To Morgan, it mostly looked macabre and like torture devices.
Curiosity got the better of her, and she went toward a collection of antique prosthetics. Next to the limbs were three anatomically correct dolls carved from wood that looked a lot like they were set up for an autopsy. She understood they’d been used in a teaching capacity, or at least that was what she hoped.
She lifted out the carved intestines of one of the dolls and held it up, wondering who would want to own something like that. Then she remembered where she was: Hedgewitch Cove. The grotesque item would have a home before long. If Betty saw them, she’d want the collection of dolls for herself.
“To each their own,” she said with a shake of her head before continuing her quest to locate Louis. She popped in and out of the multitude of rooms in the main portion of the shop. There was no sign of Louis or Leo. That was strange. They didn’t generally leave the store open and unattended.
Morgan reappeared in the main section of the shop, near the front windows, and glanced out, spotting York’s truck in a parking space. Obviously, they were here, which meant they were more than likely downstairs in the vault area.
She headed for the back stairs and the minute she began her descent, she heard voices. At first, they were muffled—but when they became clear, she froze on the stairs, unable to believe her ears.
“Dead Rising Day is almost here, and Daddy said Luc is missing some item that can bring the dead back to life. What if Morgan has been leading us all on for years, making us trust her, all so she could get her hands on whatever item Luc has and use Dead Rising Day to come back to life for good?” asked York, his deep voice booming through the hall.
His words pierced her heart. Why would he think she was leading them on or that she had designs on Dead Rising Day?
“You’re saying she’s been playing a long con on everyone?” Petey asked, and it was easy to hear he didn’t agree with whatever the topic was. “No way. She’s my friend. I trust her.”
At least Petey had her back.
“I don’t,” snapped York.
Morgan leaned against the wall of the staircase and tried to keep from crying. It didn’t work.
He kept saying horrible things about her. Things that were simply untrue.
The shouting continued, and the second she heard York demanding to know where the ghost extermination kit was, she was in a full-blown emotional meltdown, sobbing silently as she shook her head, unsure what had prompted the rage coming from York.
The overpowering need to be anywhere other than near York hit her hard. From the mix of tears, frustration, and bewilderment, she didn’t stop to think of merely popping away and back to the inn. She used a mode of transportation she rarely used in death.
Her legs.
Morgan turned so fast that she thumped the wall and tripped up the stairs in her urge to escape the scrutiny she was being subjected to. She made it to the main level of the shop but was in such a blind panic that she didn’t pay attention to where she was going. She just ran, and ended up crashing into one of the front displays. In the next breath, she found herself on the floor of the shop in a mass of wooden body parts, creepy dolls, and other artifacts, all strewn around her.
Morgan rolled onto her side, and something jabbed her in the knee. Without thought, she reached down—and found the exact box that Luc had sent her to the shop to ask about. It was popped open, with shiny gold coins spilling out of it.
Not just any coins either.
No.
Ones she’d seen a version of before.
They looked just like the enchanted coins from Blackbeard’s treasure. The coins that had been swept up in Marie-Claire Caillat’s spell to help her grandchildren find their mates. The coins that were, in effect, cursed.
Did that mean it was Louis’s turn to find his mate? That the curse had selected him as the next Peugeot destined to cross paths with their chosen one—the person they’d end up spending their lives with?
It made sense. After all, Louis ran the shop.
As she focused on the box, the one Luc had been anxious to find, she couldn’t stop the urge to make contact with it. Her fingers slid over the wood and to the burned-in symbols of crescent moons, stars, and a pentagram.
Her mind raced, and it struck her then that she’d seen that very combination of symbols before when she’d been alive. It had been on a few small items her father had in his home office, along with a clock that sat on the table behind the sofa in the formal living room of her parents’ home.
What did the symbol mean, and why did they have it on things?
Moreover, what did Luc want with it now? And what did it all have to do with Louis and his mate?
Absently, she lifted a gold coin while still lying on the floor of the shop. As her fingers connected with the coin, they heated. Something that hadn’t happened since she’d been dead.
With a gasp, she dropped the coin and it landed in a way that showed the same symbol that was carved into the top of the box. The compulsion to touch the coin again hit her with such a force that denying it wasn’t possible.
She flipped the coin over, feeling the same warmth as before, and couldn’t rip her gaze from what was on the other side of the coin.
It was the outline of the state of New York, along with an embossed outline of the statue of liberty.
Her breath caught.
The curse had selected York? It was his turn to find his special someone?
As much as she wanted to be happy for him, it was impossible not to feel a pang of jealousy. She wasn’t sure why it happened. The man thought she was working for the enemy. That she was part of the Collective. Why on earth should she care if he found his mate or not?
“Oh, there you are, dear,” said Betty, suddenly standing near Morgan in the center of the shop.
The older woman hadn’t been there only a second prior, and Morgan had never heard the door to the shop ding to indicate someone was entering. As far as Morgan knew, Betty didn’t possess the ability to vanish and reappear out of thin air, much like Morgan could do.
Yet, there she was, plain as day.
Morgan pushed to her feet slowly, doing her best not to fall over all of the mess she’d made. “Betty, I thought you were napping. What are you doing over here?”
“I followed Luc,” she said, standing perfectly still, the slightest of smiles touching her lips.
“Luc is here? I didn’t pass him,” Morgan stated, feeling a bit like she’d fallen down a rabbit hole.
“Because it’s begun,” returned Betty, as if that explained everything. She held out her hand to Morgan. In it was the brooch she cherished. “Take this, dear. You’ll need it for safe passage.”
“Safe passage?” questi
oned Morgan, reaching out and taking the brooch.
Betty’s grin widened as another coin appeared out of thin air next to the older woman. She snatched it with cat-like reflexes, plunking it down into Morgan’s palm with the brooch. As she did, the pin of the brooch stuck Morgan’s palm. It hurt, which surprised Morgan.
What shocked her even more was the sight of blood pooling on her palm.
She was a ghost.
She didn’t bleed.
“Betty?”
Before she could ask any more questions, the room began to swirl at a rapid rate. Dizzy and disoriented, Morgan stumbled and tripped over the mess on the floor once again. But when she fell, the floor didn’t catch her.
Nothing did.
She simply tumbled through blackness, her hand wrapped around the brooch and coin for dear life. Something slammed into her, feeling as if it was moving through her, or rather, she was moving through it. The next she knew, she struck something hard and stopped moving.
Morgan groaned and opened her eyes to find herself staring up at the underside of an old rusty fire escape that was hooked to a brick building. Graffiti covered the brick, and it instantly reminded her of the ’80s and the tagging art that she used to see in various areas of New York.
As she took a deep breath in and smelled garbage and Chinese takeout, she couldn’t help but instantly feel a pang and longing for home—the city she’d not been in since her death.
Moreover, she felt positive she was not in Hedgewitch Cove any longer.
Disoriented, Morgan propped herself up on her elbows, wondering where she was and how she’d gotten there. A quick glance down at herself revealed that her clothing had changed. What she was currently in wasn’t something from her closet.
In fact, she’d not seen the outfit in thirty years.
Since the night of her death.
Why was she dressed in what she’d been wearing when she died? Had the rules of the afterlife up and changed on her all of a sudden? Would she be stuck in a mini-skirt and shirt that announced her love of New York?
She really hoped not.
Do You Really Want to Haunt Me: A Happily Everlasting World Novel (Bewitchingly Ever After Book 3) Page 6