Ivan, Lennie’s former bodyguard, smiles up at me. He leans casually against the bus stop, hands in his pockets.
Goose bumps flush my skin.
Ren had opened the window and yelled down at him. Lennie had liked him. I knew him a little bit because I’d seen him around, unaware Elijah would send him in search of information.
Ivan smiles even wider, as if he knows I’m thinking of all the quick blips of time we came into contact.
Dead. Shot in the street.
A current runs between me and Ivan, the ghost acknowledging this ugly death, but he’s content with standing outside my flat.
I’m not so far gone that I wave at him, but I place my palm on the window, my fingers splayed in greeting.
I don’t think I was a suspicious kid. I had my quirks. Abe told me he thinks I’m neurodivergent.
Lately, all I ever see are ghosts.
“Perhaps, you’re a clairvoyant,”Sammie’s ghost jokes. I’m not in the mood for her pestering and turn away from the window.
Tristan stands in the living room. “What are you doing?”
“Nothing.”
His shirt is off again, his face worn. I didn’t mean to wake him.
“What are you doing?” he asks again.
I shrug, like a kid who doesn’t confirm or deny if they’ve been caught doing something bad.
Walking around the sofa, he brushes past me. It’s the slightest hint of skin contact, but my head swivels, following his every move. He checks out the window. I guess he can’t see Ivan’s ghost.
I think that’ll be the end of it. He’ll usher me off to bed.
He walks back around me, again brushing against the baggy shirt I’m wearing. I’m suddenly too aware I’m only wearing the oversized shirt. At least I’m wearing underwear.
“What did Hadrian say to you?”
I rub a dry eye. “What?”
“What did Hadrian Hallow say to you tonight? What did he do to upset you?”
Luis drove us back from Fujimori’s. Tristan said a few words to his cousin in Spanish but remained mostly quiet. The late hour meant we skipped the latest episode ofLove Island.
“Nothing,” I tell Tristan.
“Matheson, I sat there and watched that asshole upset you.” Tristan’s jaw is so tight I think his face will break.
He’s upset.
The realization hits me with a zap. I’m left freefalling for a second because I don’t understand why he would care.
“Tell me what he said,” Tristan demands, and I recognize the look in his eyes. They’re the same stormy but focused orbs he used to hide beneath the mask of the Ghost.
“He didn’t say anything,” I lie. It’s not worth it to get into it. Hadrian might be a stuck-up arsehole, but I guess I’m also dealing with some misguided loyalty myself. “I’ve got to go to bed.”
I try to step around him, but he reaches out before I can stop him.
The last time he touched me, he’d been picking me up off the floor after someone tried to shoot me.
