Page 1120 of One More Kiss

Questions bombarded my brain as more and more information assailed me. Knowledge I couldn’t precisely glean because I was stuck on my whole damn life being a lie.

I yanked at my wrist, wanting this whole thing to stop. When the rope of electricity failed to retract, I wrapped my fingers around it, trying to pry it from my flesh by sheer force of will.

I didn’t want to know any more, but I couldn’t make the flow of knowledge stop. I had to endure.

A man’s voice spoke to me, calling to me through the onslaught. I could almost swear it was Asa, whispering words of encouragement, even though I couldn’t make them out. His deep Southern drawl made me feel slightly less alone.

Slightly less betrayed.

His voice became clearer and clearer as the bombardment slowed. “You’re doing great, Sugar Plum. Just breathe through it. I know it hurts, but you’re going to make it.”

By the time my immersion was complete, I was a sweaty, sobbing mess on the attic floor. Had Jeff told me I would snot myself to death, I would have at least requested to do this shit alone. The absolute last thing I needed was an audience.

When I opened my eyes again, I found myself staring into a pair of golden ones. Jeff’s small blue-gray body was curled into me, his nose nearly touching mine. He then did something I’d only seen a real cat do. He tilted his head down and butted his forehead with mine in comfort.

That small gesture made me want to cuddle him to my chest and sob into his fur. I didn’t do anything of the sort, but I really wanted to. Where was a pillow when you needed one?

“I’m sorry, Jasper,” Jeff murmured, his comforting purr taking some of the sting out of his words. “Had there been another option, I would have had you do that. I’m sorry we were only left with the crash course.”

“Why?” I croaked, my voice clogged with the tears I still had left. “Why leave me to those people? Why didn’t she raise me? Why did she lie?”

Sitting up, I wiped at my face with little progress. I was a tear-stained, snotty mess.

“You were in danger here. She couldn’t take care of the library and you. Or at least that was what she said. I think there was more to it, but she wouldn’t say. From what I gleaned, though, you weren’t supposed to stay away forever. Just until you were eighteen. But…”

I tried to think of what happened at eighteen that would have kept me away from her, and then I remembered.

Mitchell happened.

“But I up and fell in love with a philandering idiot with a small penis and a fragile ego,” I muttered, irritated at myself. “As if I couldn’t hate that bastard any more than I already do.”

Peeling myself off the floor, I searched for a hanky or something to attack the mess of my face.

“What?” I asked. “Is there a law against letting humans know about us?”

But as I asked the question, the answer came to me. Yes and no. Mercy could have let me know, could have allowed me to tell Mitchell, but she didn’t trust him. She thought he would be a danger to this town and the library.

“She thought he would tell people,” I answered my own question. “And I loved him, so she didn’t have a choice.”

Jeff inclined his small head. “And by the time you two had split, it was too late. She didn’t have much time left.”

I wanted to crawl back in time and slap the shit out of myself. Then Jeff’s words hit me like a stack of bricks. “What do you mean ‘she didn’t have much time left’?”

Jeff’s eyes strayed to the side, his reluctance clear. “She was murdered, Jasper. Poisoned. No one knows by who, but…” he trailed off.

“But what?”

“It was something in the garden. Or at least, that’s what I figure. Mercy was loved in this town. There is no way someone would do something like that. The only one I don’t trust is Beatrice, and that’s because they’ve hated each other for years. But Beatrice didn’t have any access to her except for the grounds. There’s a reason the yard looks like something out of a Lovecraft novel. Two months ago, Mercy’s yard could win awards. Someone did this to her. I know it.”

Rage tinted my vision red for a split second. “And she had the gall to come knock on my door asking about The Beginner’s Guide to Landscape Architecture? Might as well rent out a billboard with ‘I killed Mercy’ on it.”

“She wants Mercy’s access to the St. James library, and I have a feeling she’ll stop playing nice soon enough.”

But why, though? If Jeff and Asa were to be believed, Asa had been here for sixty years. This library had been here for a lot longer than that. What happened to set this all in motion?

“I have a feeling I might know the answer to that,” Asa called, answering the question I hadn’t realized I’d asked aloud. “I wounded my father pretty good before he got his last lick in. I reckon he needed just as much time to heal as I did. Maybe a slight bit less. If he’s back in power, he had to have set this whole wheel turning. Either that or he’s gone, and his brother has decided to take over.” Asa’s mouth thinned. “Though, I’ve been out of the loop for a while.”

I could practically see the dominos fall. Ghoul King comes out of his coma or whatever, dispatches Beatrice. She then kills Mercy, trying to access the house, not realizing it wouldn’t fall to an uninherit. With my lack of urgency to get the outside of the house under control—and my staunch avoidance of the Georgia heat—she didn’t have access to me.

And she was running out of patience.

“Jeff, what do you think she’s going to do when she finally decides not to wait anymore?”

The look on his kitty face chilled me to the bone.

We were really, really screwed.

And it wasn’t until I heard the dull thumps on the roof, did I realize just how screwed we really were.

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