Page 13 of All Ghosts Aren’t Dead (The Forgotten #1)

BLUE

“ B lue baby.”

Lips grazed the shell of my ear, followed by the slow drag of a thumb tracing the base of my skull in steady circles.

“You’re safe now, sweetheart,” he murmured.

Samuel.

My Daddy.

The word settled low in my chest, something I hadn’t meant to think, but couldn’t forget now that it was there.

His breath warmed the side of my face, anchoring me to the now.

To him.

The dream was still clinging to the corners of my mind, but it was fading, replaced by the steady pulse of his touch and the hum of something that felt dangerously close to… peace.

“What do you call it when the worst thing you’ve ever lived through won’t stop replaying in your sleep?”

Samuel didn’t answer right away. I felt his fingers tighten slightly at the base of my skull before sliding forward to cup the side of my face.

His thumb brushed the edge of my jaw like it was the most natural thing in the world.

“I call that survival,” he said softly. “And I call it cruel, but it’s not your fault.”

A beat passed.

“Come sit with me, baby.”

Hand in hand, he guided me across the room. The small couch groaned beneath our weight as we sank into it together, his body angled toward mine like he was ready to catch whatever I couldn’t carry anymore.

“I don’t…” My voice snagged in my throat, nausea curling deep in my belly. “I don’t want him to be gone.”

Samuel shifted beside me. “Who?”

“J—Jonah.” The name left my lips in a whisper, and all my bones started to ache.

Jonah.

Saying it hurt, but I think not saying it hurt more.

“My big brother. He… protected me. All the time. He lied to them to keep me safe, took extra punishment when I couldn’t stand up straight. When… when we both got locked in the prayer room, he would hold my hand and tell me stories.”

My fingers crept up to my ear without thinking—two soft tugs.

One for Jonah.

One for safety.

“They got rid of him when he became a man. They said he was too old to be saved, but they were wrong. Jonah was kind.” A tremor pulled through my chest. I blinked, and the tears came, hot and unrelenting. “He was my best friend, Daddy. And they took him away.”

Daddy .

The word slipped past my lips.

It changed something.

No.

It changed everything.

Strong veins lined the column of his neck, and I watched the way they pulsed.

One. Two. Three. Four.

Nostrils flaring, his eyes fell closed for the briefest of moments, and he released a breath so big, I worried there was nothing left in his lungs.

He moved then, arms wrapping around me, pulling me into the kind of hug that didn’t come with conditions. One hand slid into my hair, while the other pressed flat against my spine and held me there.

I inhaled… and then I did it again.

His shirt bunched in my fists, the fabric going taut as my chest began to shake. The tears came fast, blistering down my face before I could stop them.

“They were wrong, Blue baby,” he said into my hair, voice rough and full of something I didn’t know how to name. “Jonah wasn’t beyond saving, and neither are you.”

I made a noise and pressed my face tighter to his chest.

“Tell me about him,” he whispered. “Tell me who he was.”

“He could read. Everything. He used to sneak scraps of newspaper from the trash and teach me words under the blanket so the others wouldn’t hear.”

I swallowed, but the lump in my throat didn’t budge. It just sat there—thick and mean.

“Jonah was the only one who ever tried to show me what order the letters were supposed to go in. He… he said that smart didn’t have to look a certain way, and maybe if I believed in myself, I’d stop believing all the bullshit Father said.”

I curled into the crook of his neck, where his pulse was steady and close enough to count. My nose brushed the curve of his collarbone, and I breathed him in—clean cotton, warm skin, and something steady beneath it all—something that didn’t leave when I got too close.

Something very… Daddy.

Samuel’s hand slid up the back of my neck, fingers threading gently into my hair. His nails scratched a little at my scalp.

Ohmygod.

I didn’t mean to, but I made a sound—small, and a little broken.

“Jonah took care of you.” Samuel hummed. “I’m fucking grateful.”

Oh.

My heart rattled behind my ribs like it was trying to shake loose.

I didn’t know it mattered for someone to see Jonah the way I did. Not as a failure or a sinner or a ghost that got taken, but as the boy who held my hand in the dark and told me stories like they could save us.

“Th—thank you.”

It mattered. So much .

Daddy spoke Jonah’s name like it was something sacred instead of something ruined. Kind of like the way he said mine.

“Jonah had a birthmark.” I sniffled and dragged my sleeve across my face. “It started on his hip and stretched up across his waist. Father said it meant that he was marked—that the devil had branded him in the womb.”

Satan’s kiss.

“He hated his mark, but I thought it made him special. I used to trace it at night and pretend it was a map. He’d pretend with me sometimes and said that maybe it was a map, maybe it’d lead us somewhere better someday.”

I swallowed.

“He—he never made it, Daddy, and it’s not fair that I’m the one who gets to be here.

Somewhere better. They did horrible things to him.

Jonah’s punishments were always worse than mine, but I never saw him cry.

Not once. He was stronger than me. Braver, too.

Jonah would’ve been better here with you and the others. ”

Samuel stilled.

His hand slid from my hair to the side of my face, tipping my chin so I had no choice but to look at him.

His eyes were darker than I’d ever seen them—quiet fire smoldering low, deep, and endless.

“No. You don’t get to say that, Blue.”

My breath caught.

“You think Jonah deserved better?” His thumb swept across my cheek. “You’re fucking right he did, but so do you.”

Leaning in, he pressed his forehead to mine.

“You belong here, sweetheart, every broken part of you and all the pieces you’re learning to hold.”

My fingers curled against Samuel’s chest, right over his heart. I wanted to crawl inside the space between its beats and stay there.

“I just… I don’t know how to live when he didn’t.”

Samuel pulled me closer, draped himself over me like he was trying to keep me whole by sheer force of will. His breath was steady against my temple, but mine was breaking apart. I could feel it happening, this ache inside me unraveling like a frayed edge.

I think part of me always thought I was supposed to die there, because Jonah was the one who should’ve survived. If he didn’t, then what sort of chance did I have?

“Sometimes I think I took his place,” I whispered. “Not in a good way. Just… like maybe I wasn’t meant to be the one who lived. I think that’s why I did it. Killed them.”

Samuel didn’t move, but I felt the tension ripple down his spine.

“I didn’t plan it,” I said, words tripping over each other like they’d waited too long to be spoken. “I knew they were going to get rid of me the way they got rid of Jonah. I was getting older, and the rituals weren’t working. Ezekiel said the devil was nesting deeper.”

A single tear rolled down the side of my nose.

“Jonah always said I was stronger than I believed. He told me to fight and to run, so I believed him long enough to do it.”

“I didn’t even cry.” The confession scraped its way out, raw and uneven. “I thought I would. I thought… I don’t know, that maybe I’d feel guilty. Evil .”

My chest caved on a broken breath.

“But I didn’t feel evil. I felt—” I swallowed. “I felt calm. Controlled. I liked it . Not the dying, but the killing. The mess and the power.”

Samuel’s fingers drifted through my hair, slow and grounding. Not a flinch. Not a pause. Just the steady drag of his touch.

“Father always said God would come for them. The angels would carry their bodies away and leave their clothes behind like in the Rapture paintings. I brought their bodies to the bridge and waited. When the angels didn’t come, I thought maybe I’d run, or maybe the police would take me.”

A breath shivered out of me.

“But then you came.”

Daddy.

Samuel stilled, only for a moment, just long enough for me to feel the shift beneath his ribs.

“You looked at me,” I whispered, “and you didn’t look away. You didn’t ask what was wrong with me. You didn’t try to pray me better. You just… saw me.”

My next breath caught as the ache rose again, sharp and sudden. I pulled back enough to meet his eyes.

“And I… lied to you. My name—” I sniffled. “B-L-U-E. It was the first word I recognized on a piece of paper, the first word that didn’t try to run away from me. Jonah said it was perfect because bruises start out red and fade into blue. Blue is the color your body makes when it decides to live.”

“ Baby ,” he breathed, so fiercely I felt it across my jaw.

“J—Jonah said all the best things are blue. All the best things survived, and I… I just wanted to be something that lived.”

Samuel’s eyes didn’t waver.

Not once.

His gaze moved slowly across my features like he was memorizing the shape of me.

“Then Blue is yours.”

My breath caught.

“But Bailey…” he whispered the name softer than I’d ever heard it, like it was something fragile and sacred. “Bailey was just a little boy doing everything he could to survive hell. He didn’t fail. He endured .”

I stiffened.

“You… knew?” My voice cracked around the edges. “You weren’t mad I lied?”

“Bailey Blue,” he murmured, brushing a knuckle along my cheekbone. “I could never be mad at you. Not for living. Not for anything.”

Something splintered inside me. Something that had been holding out and holding on.

It gave way all at once, not breaking, but surrendering.

I looked at him. Really, truly looked.

The heat in his eyes. The way he was holding still, like it took everything in him not to move, like he was waiting for permission to devour me.

I didn’t give it.

I took it.

I surged forward, mouth crashing into his. He caught me—one hand tangling in my hair, the other gripping my waist hard enough to leave the kind of bruises that prove something happened.

That I was wanted .

Our teeth knocked. Our breath tangled. His tongue swept into my mouth like he owned me.

Maybe he did.

When he kissed me, I didn’t feel ruined.

I felt alive.

Samuel pulled me into his lap without breaking the kiss, his fingers digging into my thighs like he needed to ground himself in the feel of me. I let him . I let him have all of it—the ache, the want, and the parts of me I never thought were safe to give.

“Bailey Blue,” he whispered. “What the hell have you done to me?”