Page 97 of Death and Do-Overs

“We ran,” Imogen said.

Since I didn’t see a butcher knife or machete on either of them, I assumed they’d left the weapon behind. Unfortunate. We could have used it.

“There were four of you standing around the target when he was hit,” Levi said.

“No one else was touched?”

Implying the shooter was skilled, that hitting someone amongst a crowd was easy for him or her. Another thought occurred to me.

“There were four of you,” I repeated to Greta. “If you and your clones weren’t afraid of death, why not go after this person? Why run?”

“I never said I didn’t fear death,” she answered.

“Could you not simply create more of us?” I asked. It seemed the obvious solution.

Greta didn’t answer.

As we stared at each other, I couldn’t understand how we could be the same person and so different. Maybe it was an unfair expectation. Had I been there, had I been able to create an army of us, maybe I would have run, too. But I didn’t think so.

When it became clear Greta had nothing further to say about the matter, I turned my attention back to Imogen. “This happened at the reaper’s house, did it not?”

Imogen sighed. “You don’t have to say it.”

“She’s the most likely suspect,” I said anyway. “She has been this entire time.”

“There’s a lot of weird going on in Nevermore,” Imogen said. “The suspect list seems pretty endless to me.”

“I’m going to assume you didn’t have time to check the alchemist’s face with the black light,” I said.

“We did,” Greta said. “He has the same curse as the others.”

“Did he know anything about the curse?” I asked Imogen.

Imogen shook her head. “Nope.”

If they’d fled right away, the serial killer wouldn’t have yet had a chance to leave a scarab in the mouth of the deceased.

“If there’s a scarab, it would suggest the same killer,” Greta said, as if reading my mind.

“If we don’t hurry, the goblins will take him,” I said.

“You want to go back?” Imogen blinked at me and then Greta.

“Now we have the petrification potions,” Greta said.

They hadn’t had those before. I’d had them. Aside from Imogen’s power, they hadn’t had any way to defend themselves against deadly darts, no matter how many Marnies there were.

Levi pushed off the wall and opened the door. “Let’s go.”

As we walked back to Bernadette’s house, Imogen kept complaining she was exhausted. She set our slow pace. Levi filled Imogen and Greta in on our day, including seeing a cat that was definitely not a fox, and finding a strange door. Whencompared to their day, ours seemed far less successful in terms of gathering information.

But the time alone, and our kiss, made it special to me.

We reached the reaper’s house. No lights were on.

Greta led us around the back of the house. She and Imogen split directions, looking beside the garage, around the sides of the house. A sinking feeling settled into my stomach, knowing they wouldn’t have to search if the dead guy was where they’d left him.

“He’s gone,” Greta said.

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