Page 48 of Grim

Well, I might not have rope, but I do have strength. In one swift motion, I dig my hands more firmly into hers, press into my heels, and spin her around. Before she can open her eyes, I have her hands above her head, her back pressed to the wall. She crashes against the wood with a thud and a small gasp.

With a predatory gleam in my eyes, I ask, “Did I hurt you?” My voice is low, ragged, and foreign to me.

“No,” she whispers in reply, her chest rising and falling with her increased breaths.

“Good. Please do me the honor of returning that favor,” I beg.

Crashing my mouth to hers, I take Rue in a kiss that could only happen when the elements of hundreds of years of repression ignite with a single lifetime of longing and passion that has yet to find its release.

Combustion.

Our mouths move desperately between us. Decorum is set aside for desperation, risk over rationality. Time stands still, and I realize I could gladly stay here for the next several centuries.

Using my free hand, I hold the side of her face, tilting her to deepen the kiss. Her tongue is so soft against mine, and the needy whimper that I consume from her—if I had any resolve left, that noise stole it.

I’m about to lift her up to wrap her around my waist—desperately missing the feel of her in my arms from back at the plot. But our connection is severed by a tiny voice that pulls us from this moment of reckless passion. His high-pitched gasp rips Rue and me away from each other and has us staring directly into the eyes of the house ghost.

He looks at us and exclaims, “The plot thickens.”

What’sinaName

“Hello.” The house ghost continues speaking as he waves innocently at the two of us.

I flinch so hard that I nearly fall backward into Kane’s very solid, very annoyingly silent form. My hand shoots out on instinct, grabbing his arm for balance. Evidently, that is a mistake because the moment I touch him, the warmth returns. Not the gentle,oh, he’s wearing cashmerewarmth, but the kind that seeps under the skin, coils around my ribs, and whispers,Stay.

He tenses immediately—as if I were fire and he were dry tinder.

He pulls away from me so fast that you’d think I’d slapped him. His face is blank, but his green eyes flicker just for a second.

I bite the inside of my cheek, keeping the rush of disappointment from leaking out.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this,” I mutter, mostly to myself. My heart’s still skipping around like I forgot to take my medication. I tell myself it’s because of the pint-sized ghost, but my body knows better.

“Um …” Kane stammers like a man who just woke from a dream and hasn’t decided if it was a nightmare or a fantasy. Probably the former. He clears his throat. “Well, lucky for you, you only have days left, so getting used to anything is frivolous at this point.”

What a romantic.

“You are such an asshole,” I snap, brushing past him. My shoulder hits his as I go, and, damn it, there it is again—that low flicker of heat curling in my gut. I hate that it’s there almost as much as I hate that I like it.

And I really hate that he pulled away as if he felt it, too, and didn’t want it.

“Do you two not like each other?” the spirit asks a little too brightly.

“We’re growing on each other,” Kane says suggestively.

“Like bacteria,” I bite back immediately.

“The petri dish was invented in 1887 at Berlin University by an assistant to Dr. Robert Koch,” the diminutive spirit spouts out.

I blink. He’s standing in the kitchen doorway, hair messy, soot-smudged cheeks.

“Okay …” I draw the word out to fill the silence. I’m unsure how else to respond to that random comment.

“And how would you know that?” Kane asks.

The boy shrugs his small shoulders. “They have this invention called a tel-e-vision. Be surprised what facts you pick up on when it’s running.”

Despite myself, my heart clenches. This child has been terrorizing this home for as long as my family has lived here. Flashbacks of terrified moments and pulse-pounding scares race through my mind. Those adrenaline spikes aren’t ideal for me. I rub at my chest mindlessly. I’ve spent countless hours over the past years cursing this specter that I can now see clear as day. His pale skin peeks out from behind his charcoaled face, which also makes his innocent blue eyes pop even more brightly.