Page 14 of Ghoul Me, Maybe
“You’re a hallucination. Stress. Repressed trauma. Maybe I licked mold. I don’t know.”
“If I’m a hallucination, you should really reconsider your subconscious. It’s got a thing for brooding seafarers.”
She bristles. “Okay, no. Nope. I am not flirting with a ghost.”
I smirk. “You just did.”
Lightning cracks somewhere offshore, and she backs off the beam like the wreck just growled.
“This is a dream,” she mutters. “I’ll wake up in my bed and laugh about how I made out with a cursed relic in a foggy-ass town and?—”
“You haven’t made out with anyone yet,” I say, stepping closer. “And trust me, if you had, you wouldn’t be confused about it.”
Her nostrils flare. “God, you’re insufferable.”
“Thank you.”
“Not a compliment.”
“I know.”
She rubs her hands over her face. “Okay. Fine. Let’s say you’re real. What do you want?”
I stop just shy of touching distance. Her presence is a fire I shouldn’t get too close to, but I can’t help myself.
“I want answers,” I say. “Same as you.”
Her laugh is brittle. “Oh yeah? You gonna read my tarot next? Tell me my aura’s stressed?”
“No. I’m going to tell you your father wasn’t just chasing ghosts—he was running from something. And now that something’s chasingyou.”
She goes still.
“You knew him?” she asks, quiet now.
I nod. “Jonas Vale. He came here years ago. Carried a map. Talked to the wreck like it had a voice.”
“It does,” she mutters.
“I know,” I say. “I’ve heard it scream.”
She meets my gaze then, the sarcasm bleeding out of her expression. She’s scared. Angry. And underneath all that—curious. That’s the part that’ll get her hurt.
“Whoareyou?” she finally asks.
“Captain Elias Thorn. Or what's left of him.”
Her mouth moves like she’s tasting the name. She’s heard it. Probably in some dusty journal or a bedtime ghost story.
“That ship,” she says. “It was yours.”
“Still is. In a way.”
“Then what the hell happened to you?”
I pause. The memory’s like smoke—there and gone.
“I was betrayed. Hired to smuggle a relic I didn’t understand. My crew turned on me for it. Blood on the deck, a storm rolling in, and then... nothing. Just the sea. And this wreck.”
