“No, they be maffickin’ in the streets, though.” He chomped on his dentures, then slammed his pen down before he rose to his feet. “I take the egg, Moonshine. C’mon Caspah, the old man needs a cat nap.”
My face twisted, eyes bulged as I watched Casper follow Gramps out of the kitchen toward his bedroom.
Alone again, I looked out the bay windows and into the backyard where the bony trees lost all their leaves, leaving them piled in the garage’s gutters and covering the back porch. Since I had no reason to go into work today, I spent some time cleaning up the kitchen, hand washing dishes. Doing anything to keep my mind occupied and off Julian.
It didn’t matter whether I was alone or surrounded by people, thoughts of him always open fired. I hadn’t seen him since the alleyway during the Fall Festival. He hadn’t shown up for the Town Hall meeting either. All I wanted was to see him.
I’d asked Jonah about him the other day. The only thing he could tell me was that Julian was okay. That had been it.Julian is okay. But I wasn’t okay, and it wasn’t fair.
My thoughts catapulted as I moved toward the living room, wiped down the bookshelves, the side table, and coffee table. I rearranged the books on the shelf because I couldn’t rearrange my thoughts.
Taking a moment, I sat at the edge of Gramps’ recliner and picked up King’s copy ofSong of Susannahwhen his bookmark teetered to the floor. An old photograph, a little distorted with the corners faded, touched my feet. I bent down to pick it up, and my heart jumped in my chest.
It was me, but it wasn’t.
It was my mother, and she looked just like me, but didn’t.
Her long hair stuck to her face as she laid with a baby in her arms. Withmein her arms. My breath held, and my fingers trembled. I’d never seen a picture of her before, and it was too much. This was too much. A tear escaped, and I tilted my head back for strength. Composure.
I’d never known her, but the absence of a mother, wondering all that I’d missed, filled me like a landslide of grief and all the things I never had. When I looked back down, my vision blurred, and I pulled my tee over my eyes.Why did she have to die?
I sucked in a breath, let it go, and looked down at the picture again.
I looked down at the way she was looking down at me.Did she know those were her last moments?
In the corner of the picture, Agatha Blackwell stood at her side with her hand on my mother’s shoulder, her other hand bracing my little head as if my mother weren’t strong enough to hold me. She was dying, and I was living, and it wasn’t fair.
I shoved the picture inside the book, slammed it shut, and dropped it back over the side table. I wasn’t ready. I wanted to know my mother, but I wasn’t ready. Would I ever be?
A knock sounded at the door, and I sucked in a breath to stand.
My eyes flicked over to the grandfather clock on the way to the door. It was only an hour before noon.
I opened the door.
“Fallon, hi, dear,” Carrie Driscoll greeted. She was wearing a yellow dress laced tight at the top and ruffled down to her hidden feet at the bottom. I stood taller, fixed my hair that laid messy on my head, straightened my long tee, feeling uncomfortable even though it was her that had come to my house.Myhouse, my mind repeated. Yes, this was my house.
“Hi,” I replied, but it came out child-like. I cleared my throat and tried again, “Hi, Carrie.” Her golden locks rippled over her shoulders and fanned around her breasts. A plastic container carrying a pie with Mina Mae’s logo cradled in her hands. She looked as if she stepped out of a storybook, so perfect and here, and… “Why are you here?”
“I’ve been thinking about you! Been trying to find the time to come and check on you, see how you were doing after the close call you had with the Heathen,” she insisted, a beautiful smile gracing her features. She lifted the pie higher as an offering. “It’s Mina’s Autumn harvest cobbler. The apples are home-grown from Goody Farms.”
“You really didn’t have to,” I said, awkwardly taking the cobbler and holding it out in front of me. “Just like I said in the meeting, it was a misunderstanding, my fault. I shouldn’t have been there. I thought I could take a short-cut through the alley. Wrong place and time and all.”
“I couldn’t imagine what could’ve happened if I weren’t there. I know you haven’t been here long, but you can never be too careful, Fallon. I’m just so happy you’re okay,” she continued, and as she went on, the more her dramatics over the situation were pissing me off. It may have been irrational of me, but all I could think about was how it was her fault I hadn’t seen Julian in almost a week. It was people like her who spread fear across the town, never getting to know him. They were only making it worse. And I held my tongue and nodded, forcing a smile as my thrashing emotion slid down the back of my throat. “The Pruitt’s are hosting their annual Samhain ball, will you be attending?”
“I haven’t heard anything about it,” I answered honestly. “But even if they sent me an invite, I couldn’t leave Benny here all alone.”
“Nonsense, you must go. You would be doing the Pruitt’s a disservice if Tobias Morgan’s daughter didn’t, at the very least, make an appearance.”
“Maybe.” It had not only been a week without Julian but also a week from steering clear of Kane and the rest of Sacred Sea. The only people I’d seen were Jonah, Monday, and Kioni. I had much doubt whether or not Kane was still eager to reel me into his coven after the blatant refusal during the Mabon bonfire. Especially after my obvious dodging methods to avoid him when in Town Square. It was crazy to think about how I’d always wanted to have friends and fit in, and now I was pushing people away. “We’ll have to see.”
“Very well, give Benny my best, Fallon. You take care of yourself.”
Once she left, a blast of air released from my lungs as I fell against the closed front door.
“Who was that?!” I heard Gramps call out from his bedroom.
“Carrie Driscoll,” I replied, scanning the pie to see if there was any evidence of the container being tampered with, finding some kind of proof of her poisoning it. There was none.
