“I don’t wanna die.” I shook my head, tears streaming down my cheeks as Selene collapsed to her knees before me. I didn’t want to have her like this, only to leave her so soon. It wasn’t enough time. I needed more time. I needed to turn back the clock to spend every hour of every day with her.
“Jude, I know this is a ploy designed by a hateful spirit to make you feel unimaginable pain. But I, Selene, want you for my husband. To love you and spend the rest of my days being your wife. Will you do me the honor of marrying me?” Her hands cradled my face. Her eyes shown bright with love in them. Love and hope. I shook my head but my words were the opposite of my movements.
“Yeah.”
Her smile grew as she released my face to stand. Her hand stayed before me like a lifeline waiting to pull me from drowning. All I had to do was take her hand to enjoy the last bit of my life with her as mine. Even if that meant it was only for a few more minutes.
“How touching. Let’s get this moving along so we can have our final deathly act, shall we?”
I glared at Rudy, promising agonizing pain, ghost or no. Somehow, someway, I would deal out justice for this.
My hand grasped onto Selene’s, taking hold of the only feeling in the world that deserved my heart beating for. Love.
Madam Tully appeared next to a long rope with a noose tied at the end. I got where this was going and while I had my plan, I was also making peace with the fact that I would likely be dying no matter what tonight. Rudy had told me what he wanted from me in detail, and while I wanted to fight him, there were lives at stake. As if sensing my thoughts, he lifted a screen with the trapped Hero Society to prove a point.
“Your friends will die if you fight me, along with every innocent life in this mansion. You’re out of options. Oh, and I wouldn’t expect Lucy to help you with any of your plots to defeat me. I had her taken care of.”
Of course he had. I knew she couldn’t be injured because she was a ghost, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t detain her or make her part in our plan a struggle. Hopefully she would still be there to cut the rope as I fell to my death.
“Let’s get this over with, shall we?” Madam Tully rolled her eyes at Rudy, then held her hands out for Selene and I to take.
“Jude, my sweet boy. Do you take Selene to be your wife in life and death? To help her rise when there is too much on her shoulders? To love her and cherish her?” Madam Tully smiled at me without sadness on her face.
“I do.” I looked at my Selene while Rudy lifted the noose and tightened it around my neck.
“Selene, my brave girl. Do you take Jude to be your husband in life and death? To show him that life is worth living and not just existing in it? To love him and cherish him?”
Selene looked up at me with waiting tears of happiness for this moment. Despite what appeared to be an ending, this act was transformed into a beautiful beginning for us both.
“I do.” Her words trembled slightly as the emotions she’d been holding were released.
“I love you, Jude, come what may.”
“I love you, Selene, in life and death. My heart beats for you no matter what the coroner’s say.” I smiled at the sad attempt I’d given to make her laugh. It worked, and all I wanted was to kiss her just like that.
“I now bind you together in holy matrimony as husband and wife. You may kiss and seal the promise made on this sacred ground.” Madam Tully clapped her hands together in prayer.
I distinctly heard the music begin to build. Every note brought my life closer and closer to the cue of death. Only I wasn’t done living just yet. I had a wife to kiss.
Her hand reached up to touch my jaw, as my fingers laid over hers gently. Holding her touch against me if that’s what it would take to stay with her like this forever. Our gaze never wavered as our lips were drawn to each other for this last gift.
Her lips were soft and tasted like tears and sweet cherry with every press against mine. My wife. My reason for living.
“Great. Enjoy hell, Jude.”
Pain sliced into the hand holding Selene’s as Rudy’s strong hands pushed me away from her beckoning lips and I tumbled off the balcony toward a short fall and a snapped neck.
Chapter Thirty- Six
Selene
“Now!” I screamed and Trixie appeared behind Rudy with a murderous score to settle. He was her only unfinished business. When I asked for her help to take Rudy down, she came to the mansion with me and hid in the shadows until this moment. She wrapped her hands around him, trapping his spirit within her grip with the magical symbols we’d drawn on her shimmering skin. Now that he was contained for the moment, Madam Tully could work her spell that I’d found in the articles of my research from yesterday. Bind him from hurting anyone else until he could be dealt with.
There was no time to waste. Jude wouldn’t have much time left if I didn’t hurry. I had a plan, and even though it was crazy to leap after him and cut the rope, it was the only one I had.
Without thinking another thought, I gripped the small knife I’d hidden in my hand and trusted my crazy plan. On swift feet, I ran for the balcony’s edge, then jumped off with my arms wide. Hands caught me with a jerk of my body slamming against the sudden hold on my hands. My focus shifted from the cut rope hanging from the tower above with no Jude attached to the face of Lilith who’d caught me before I could fall to my death.
“I’ve always wanted to do trapeze and swing from a chandelier with ghosts. Very exciting party.” She giggled and released me into the air with a scream ripping from my lungs.
