Page 45 of Ghoul Me, Maybe
“A tether. A curse. A legend. But it’s more than that. It’s a key, yes—but not just to a vault. To a prison. To aforcefar older than your father understood.”
“Right,” I mutter. “And you’re here to help?”
“I’m here to warn you. Walk away now. Let it go. The dead deserve rest—and the living deserve peace.”
I laugh. Sharp. Bitter. “You think peace is on the table for me? After what I’ve seen?”
“I think wealth could be.”
He pulls a slim card from his coat—matte black, no name, just a number.
“I can make you disappear. Give you enough to start over somewhere far from here. No strings.”
“And in exchange?”
“Abandon the search. Leave the relic where it lies. Let us clean up your father’s mess.”
I stare at the card. Then at him.
And then I do something deeply unwise.
I smile.
“Tell you what. You take your creepy offer, fold it into a paper crane, and shove it where the ley lines don’t shine.”
His smile fades.
“You’ll regret that.”
“No,” I say, grabbing my coffee. “But you might.”
I leave the card on the table and walk out like I’m not shaking. Like I didn’t just make a choice that’ll echo through every cursed heartbeat left in this town.
The fog outside swallows me up.
And I swear—for just a second—I hear him say,
“Tick, tock, Ms. Vale.”
The next day, the universe cashes in on that threat.
It starts like any other apocalypse.
With a pigeon and an awkward breakfast burrito.
I’m unwrapping it on the hood of my beat-up Civic, parked by the cliffs, when somethingpops. Not loud. Not a bang. Just a subtleclick—like a car door lock from fifty feet away.
Then the engine compartmentbooms.
I don’t scream.
Imove.
Fast.
I hit the gravel just as the hood explodes upward in a geyser of smoke and heat and shrapnel. Glass rains down like angry confetti. My coffee goes flying. The burrito is toast.
Mycarisgone.
