Page 11 of My Sweetest Agony

What is going on with you, Camden Usher?

Something tells me finding out the truth will be almost as hard as figuring out what to do with that.

My eyes land on the box, and I push myself to my feet and slowly make my way over to it. I trail my fingers across the damp cardboard, my throat tightening.

“What should I do?”

Drew was always my sounding board.

No matter what was bothering me—issues at the shop with employees or stock, bridezillas who made my days so much harder, even my occasional spats with Marlo over trivial things.

He was the only person who ever got all of me.

I sink back to my knees in front of the fireplace where I was before Marlo called and Cam showed up. It’s the closest I can get to him without pulling the urn from that box, and I don’t have it in me to do that right now.

Not when I just saw his ghost.

4

CAM

Heavy thumping bass vibrates the old, worn wooden planks under my bare feet.

Radiates up my legs.

Through my stomach.

Across my chest.

Down my arms.

My fingers twitch.

I tighten them around the brush in my hand.

The music flooding the studio throbs in my ears, pulsates through my blood, the deep melodic chords urging me to concentrate on it and what I’m doing, rather than the demons plaguing me tonight. Old ones that threaten to drag me back where I’ve fought so hard to get away from.

Tilting my head, I examine the massive blank canvas laid out on the floor in front of me.

Flawless.

Pristine.

Too. Damn. Perfect.

The image materializes in my mind.

A quick flash of exactly what it’s meant to be.

I thrust the brush into the black paint…

And give in to what it demands.

5

IVY

ONE WEEK LATER