Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 89572 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 448(@200wpm)___ 358(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89572 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 448(@200wpm)___ 358(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
So why did she go?
Dreading the answers, I take the letter out of my pocket, drop down on the couch, and carefully open it.
Declan,
I’m not very good at saying goodbye.
Thank you for everything you did for me while I was here. I know you weren’t thrilled about me poking at the town’s past, but you never made me feel foolish for asking questions or wanting answers.
I need some distance to sort through what I learned, without either of us feeling pushed toward decisions we wouldn’t choose under normal circumstances.
None of this erases what we shared. You matter to me more than I know how to say.
You’ve carried weight that never should have been yours. Your future is yours now. I hope whatever you choose to do next feels like it’s one hundred percent your choice.
Take care of yourself.
Emery
I read it straight through once. Sounds like Emery. A little wordy but thoughtful. Kind.
She went through a lot here. Arrived in Crowsbridge Hollow as a skeptic. Then received an up close and personal education on the supernatural.
She needs some distance or time. That’s okay. It doesn’t have to be the end of us, does it?
I fold the letter and stuff it back into my pocket.
By the time I get downstairs to open the shop, irritation has crawled under my skin and burrowed deep.
Work usually settles me. Today, nothing cures my restlessness. For the first time in years, nothing extra hums under my skin. No awareness of anything watching my every move. Like the Rider and the curse my family lived under for generations never existed.
In the mirror, I catch sight of my ink-free neck and pull my collar aside. The Rider’s marks really are all gone. As if they’d never lived in my skin. I’m free to replace them with anything I want. Or nothing at all. It should be a relief, so why do I feel like something was torn out of my soul, leaving a void?
I sit at my desk with my sketchbook for some pen-to-paper therapy.
All I end up drawing is a crow perched on a branch.
Still restless and annoyed, I pull Emery’s letter out and read it slower this time.
It still doesn’t answer my biggest question. Why’d she feel the need to say goodbye at all?
The bell over the door jingles and I hurry to see who it is.
Lucy.
I wipe the disappointment from my expression. Who the fuck’d I think it was? Emery? Returning to tell me she made a mistake and she wants…what?
“Jesus, you look like shit, Big D,” Lucy says.
“Thanks,” I grumble. “So glad you’re here.”
She doesn’t laugh or zing me with a snarky comment. I really must look like shit.
Lucy steps farther into the shop, her gaze scanning the space like she’s searching for burglars. She slowly walks around the front desk and drops her bag on the chair.
“Thought you’d be snuggled up with your girl all day, helping her edit her video since you cracked the curse last night.”
That was my preference. Emery apparently felt otherwise.
I grunt at Lucy in response.
Her brows knit together. “Is she okay?”
“Don’t know.” I wave the letter in my hand. “She went home. Left this for me at the inn.”
She hurries around the side of the desk, hand outstretched. “Ooo, what’s it say?”
“Never mind.” I stuff the letter in my pocket, the last place Lucy would venture. “Basically, thanks for a good time, you’re free now, have a nice life,” I summarize.
Lucy shrugs. “Not like she’s the first tourist to—”
“Don’t,” I warn her. “It’s not like that at all.”
Her forehead wrinkles in a pitying expression that agitates me even more. “Maybe she’s embarrassed? She came here to prove the legends were fake, then got jacked by a sadistic ghost and his horse.”
Lucy’s ability to distill major events into a few absurd words never stops surprising me. Today, her talent isn’t as amusing.
“Maybe she doesn’t want to do a long-distance relationship?” Lucy shrugs.
No, that doesn’t feel right, either.
Your future is yours now. What does that even mean? My future’s always been mine. I never expected it to feel this empty without her.
Lucy’s still watching me, arms crossed like she’s waiting for a big revelation. “Maybe she’s handing you an out? If she thought it was just a fling—”
“It wasn’t a fling,” I snap. I grab my keys off the desk. “And if that’s what she thinks, she can say it to my face.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Emery
Ah, nothing like the familiar, comforting scent of burnt coffee and warm electronics to welcome me home. It’s a few days after I left Crowsbridge Hollow and Wren and I are back in the studio, editing my videos. The big screen in front of her shows footage from my camera, paused on the cemetery gates caught in early-morning light.
A crow flying through the gray sky.
“These are great shots,” Wren murmurs as she flicks the controller back and forth, searching for the perfect place to trim the footage to insert a photo.