Page 14 of Graveyard Girls (Hollows Grove #1)

Instead of bundling leaves, I strolled over to my own grave.

The one I’d woken up at and found Lunette.

There it was, Shiloh Solair crudely hammered into stone.

My headstone wasn’t as reflective and large as Alaric Benjamin Lonesome’s.

His stupid full-page obituary mocked my two sentence one.

It wasn’t the mortality confirmation of seeing my name in the dead people section of the paper that startled me, though.

Nor did seeing my headstone or even really learning I had died.

I mean, it happens to all of us eventually, right?

Surely, I wasn’t the first person to not see their untimely end coming.

No, it was the pieces that lie around me like fallen October leaves.

Alaric had died the same day as me. Murdered.

Someone else had died on the same day.

Someone I’d spoken to already.

A ghost.

Wind chilled against my back as I made my way to the willow tree that covered her grave. I brushed dirt off the surface of the rough stone. “Cora Marjorie Devue,” I read aloud. “C.M.D.”

Her ghost hummed behind me, and I turned to meet her. A ghastly, strange looking thing she’d become in death. “That is my name,” she answered, swaying like the willow branches.

“You were Alaric’s mistress, weren’t you?

You died the same night he and I did.” Something about her looked more unhinged than the last time I’d seen her.

The paleness of her features, the way her arms hung at her sides, and her chin slumped forward.

I wasn’t sure if I was technically immortal or what, but everything in me screamed to get away from this ghost. But I couldn’t, not when I was this close to figuring this twisted puzzle out.

“ Not mistress ,” she hissed in a low echo. “He was mine first.”

“Is that why you’re killing people and covering them in sapphires, Cora? Do you think it’ll bring him back?”

She didn’t answer.

“Can you tell me what happened the night we all died?”

I highly doubted she could. It seemed an effort to string together a few words, much less recall a story, but I thought I’d push my luck and ask anyway.

To my complete surprise, Cora nodded and floated closer, running a shadowy palm over her headstone.

For a moment, she looked like any girl in a graveyard.

“I threatened him. I threatened to tell her. Lunette, the white witch. It didn’t feel right anymore.

He’d only proposed because she has fortunes, and his fortune was gambled away.

He promised that he’d divorce her swiftly, and we’d take her manor and money.

At first, I thought it a fine plan… after time…

I felt I could not bear to watch him marry another. I’d rather be poor than do that.”

“Go on,” I urged, though rage built in my chest at a plan to use the girl I loved.

“We were fighting in the middle of town, and Alaric was afraid we’d be spotted.

So he brought me here to this very graveyard to try to calm me down.

At least, that’s what it seemed. He gave me a beautiful locket that he had designed for only me.

Though, when he went to put it around my neck… that’s when he strangled me.”

“What a bastard,” I swore.

“That’s what you called him then, too. You see, you were here working and saw him.

You tried to intervene but were a hair too late.

In the commotion, my spirit stayed to watch what happened, I suppose.

You punched him and took the necklace off my neck, stuffing it in your pocket as you tried to revive me.

Alaric pulled a pistol from his coat, but you tackled him, wrenching the gun from his hold.

Alaric grabbed you, slamming you into a headstone, but just as he did, you fired a shot—one that killed him as he killed you. ”

“Well, at least I went down swinging and took that asshole with me,” I murmured as I crossed my arms. “That’s not something my obituary mentioned, unfortunately.”

“He won’t even come out. His soul hasn’t moved on, just like mine and yours, but he stays in his grave. You know, he watches Lunette every night and doesn’t come forward. Alaric doesn’t want her. He never loved her.”

“What is it you want? Why are you killing people, Cora?”

The ghost let out a wicked screech that sounded a bit like the pain of a dying bird.

“The killing, the killing, I didn’t want the killing.

I just wanted my necklace. It was the only fine thing I’d ever been given, and I only wore it as a weapon of my own death.

Something fine was only mine for such a short time…

Oh, I should add that to my song of the sea.

The sea, you see, like sapphires. Al knew I loved the ocean and the color blue. Blue, blue, blue.”

Awesome, she was nuts, a killer-ghost, and I was alone with her. Then again, if she went after others tied to Alaric, she’d go after Lune next. “If I happen to give you what you want, will you move on and stop killing? Will you promise to leave Lunette alone?”

Cora cocked her head at an unnatural angle that sent a shiver down my spine. “I’ve already seen the white witch tonight.”

My breath froze in my lungs.

Cora smiled a horrible smile. “She is here. Don’t worry.”

“Here, alive or dead?” I dared ask.

Cora extended her bony, translucent palm. “Give it to me if you have it.”

I fished the locket out of my pocket and dropped it into her hand. With a laugh that would haunt my nightmares for an eternity, Cora evaporated into gray smoke—and she was gone. The air wasn’t as cold anymore. Even so, my heart pounded in my chest as I raced over to Alaric’s grave.

A woman in white swayed but didn’t chant. She looked up and met my gaze. Lunette. A very alive Lunette. I ran over, not waiting for permission, and took her into my arms. “You can magic-shock-collar me again if you want, but I’m not letting you go.”

She buried her head in my chest. “I’m sorry,” she muffled.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Did a creepy ass ghost visit you tonight?”

Lunette furrowed her brow as if it were something commonplace she needed to search her mind for. “Oh, yes. Poor soul, so lost, so confused. I sent her back here. Have you seen her? Cora, I believe she said was her name.”

“She didn’t hurt you?”

Lunette smiled and gripped my hands. “Darling, she couldn’t if she tried.”

“God, you’re hot,” I breathed. “But now, I need to do something for you.” Letting go of her, I took a step back onto Alaric’s grave. “He’s here, and I can talk to him for you. I’m dead, he’s dead, he’s here, I’m here.”

Her eyes widened. “You—you can do that?”

“Yes, and if I can trade places with him and… bring him back to you… ” My heart wrenched in my chest, screaming at me not to do this. “Then I will.”

“Shiloh—“ Lunette reached out, but it was too late—I touched Alaric’s headstone, and everything went dark.

I was beneath the cemetery. No idea how I knew that, but somehow I knew that’s where I was.

It wasn’t like being buried in dirt, it was just a big, empty, dark room.

A man stepped forward, illuminated by a small light as if only one lightbulb were lit from some above source.

“It’s you,” he sneered. “What do you want? Back for more?”

“Trust me dude, I am so fucking tired of dealing with you.”

Alaric tapped his foot and checked his watch.

Even in death, he wore a suit and checked the time as if he had some place to be.

“You can tell Lunette to stop with the nonsense. Really, the wedding dress, the babbling of a love ballad each night. I’m not coming out to be, what, a ghost ? Such a thing is beneath me.”

“How could you be so impossibly blind to all you had right in front of you? You never deserved her. You deserve nothing but this.” I crossed my arms and let out an exhale. “However… if you want her, and you promised to treat her well… I could help you go back to her.”

Alaric pinched his mustache. “Tempting… tempting… Lunette is eccentric, to be sure, but easy on the eyes and very wealthy.” He considered his options.

“But no, from what I’ve heard, more gold and finery exists beyond some pearly gates—or whatever the hell the afterlife is. I believe I’d like to go there.”

I wished it were possible to kill a man twice—because I would have killed him then and there.

“You think a place with pearly gates allows men who murder and use women in? You sure do think highly of yourself, don’t you? But fine, stay here for all I care. Good riddance.”

With a tap above me, I was back in front of Lunette, who grabbed me as if I were her life raft in the middle of a storming ocean.

She was crying, sobbing, actually. Gripping her tightly, I tilted her chin.

“What’s wrong, beautiful? I spoke with Alaric…

he sends his love… but says he wants to move on to the afterlife. ”

Still crying, Lunette shook her head. “Shiloh, I thought I’d never see you again, and I have to tell you… I have to tell you that I hoped it would be you rising from this grave. Not Alaric, but you. I want you, Shiloh Solair. I love you. There’s no one else for me.”

I swallowed my emotion. “I love you, Lunette Selene.”

We kissed then. We kissed like two people in love. Our mouths exploring each other’s like it was the first time. Suddenly, Lunette pulled back, her eyes wide. “My spell… it worked.”

Confused, I asked. “What do you mean?”

Taking a step back, Lunette put her hands over her heart and recited a familiar spell. “Bring back the love of my life, bring back my love. Right the wrongs. Bring to me my true love. Let not death hold back my love from me.”

My lips parted in awe. “It was me.”

“You,” she breathed. “It was always you.”

Arm in arm, one in suspenders, the other in a wedding dress, we walked an aisle of graves into our dark happily ever after… well, until I stopped her at my headstone.