Starfire (Grim Gate 2)

“You’re not,” I say, feeling like I’m under a microscope from her expectant glare. From the outside looking in, it’s fucking weird that someone I don’t remember left me everything. Though, if anyone saw me with Aunt Estelle—like my own brother—they kept their memories.

“What school was it? I don’t think it was anything around here.”

“I’m not sure,” I say, fiddling with a loose string on my dress. “She worked there when I was just a kid.”

“Is this a bad time?” Donna asks, and her audacity almost impresses me, though annoyance overrules anything. “I don’t want to impose, but I did tell you I’d be back to tell you all about our book club. Selena saw you buying a whole armload of books at Novel Grounds a few days ago, so we think you’d love to join. You can even suggest the next book!” She cups her hand around the side of her mouth, stage-whispering. “We love dirty romance novels.”

Well, fuck, I do too. But I’d rather read them on my own, not with a group of nosey women. “I do like paranormal romance.”

Both women’s faces go slack. “We won’t read anything with vampires in it,” Donna says sternly. I won’t bring up the fact that vampire romance has been carefully avoided since vampires came out of the coffin, since most vampire lore isn’t really lore anymore. And those who took the creative license and didn’t get their facts right are looked down upon now.

“Zombies,” I say, mind going to the last series I read. “I’m really into post-apocalyptic right now.”

“Oh, I do love a good end of the world love story.” Donna waggles her eyebrows. “What about you?” she asks Ethan, shedding out of her cast. “What do you like to read?”

“I prefer the classics,” he says without missing a beat. I know for a fact the last thing Ethan read was a video game magazine, but he knows his audience and he knows exactly how to play them.

Which is how we end up in the kitchen only a few minutes later with four glasses of red wine in front of us. I ate not that long ago, having stuffed myself on chips and salsa before starting my cheese enchiladas, but take a small plate just to be polite.

“Unfortunately, I didn’t get the chance to meet Anora’s great-aunt,” Ethan starts, taking a sip of wine. “Though the stories are legendary. I keep saying they can’t all be true.”

Both Donna and Selena lean in, hanging on his every word. I’ve been shooting him silent looks this whole time, mostly impressed with how well he’s able to play these women. If I didn’t trust him so damn much, it would almost be unnerving to see how easy this is for him.

“She was an interesting woman, that’s for sure.” Selena picks up her wineglass. “I always felt safe when she was around, as crazy as that sounds.”

“What do you mean?” I ask, sinking my fork into the lasagna. It’s good, but my stomach can only hold so much.

“I didn’t grow up in Thorne Hill,” she tells us. “I married my Edgar at the young age of eighteen, moving up north from Tennessee. Things were…they were odd. There were an alarming amount of animal attacks, which I wasn’t expecting. I grew up in the backwoods and I didn’t see that many people go missing or wind up mauled.” She turns her head, looking out the window. “We’ve lived in the same house since the day of our wedding, and when your great-aunt was home for the summers, the animal attacks lessened.” Her cheeks redden a bit, knowing how crazy it sounds. “I don’t know what she did to keep the animals at bay, though some people say it was that big black horse of hers.”

“My aunt had horses?” I rush out, unable to help myself.

“Just the one. Biggest draft horse I’d ever seen. She’d ride it up and down the streets right at twilight and some mornings at dawn. My kids were young, and they loved seeing her cantering down the road.” She smiles at the memory. “I told them the sound of the hoofbeats kept the rogue bears or rabid coyotes away. It’s silly,” she says with a chuckle. “But you tell your kids what you have to.”

My phone is in the living room, and I’m already dying to call Harrison and ask if he remembers Aunt Estelle having horses, or specifically, one horse. Though, I know if she did—and he remembered it—he would have mentioned it. Nothing would jog my memory more than horses. Which means this horse was one thing and one thing only.

It was Aunt Estelle’s familiar.

I rub my hands together, breath clouding around me. Narrowing my eyes, I try to discern what’s in front of me, but it’s so freaking dark in the attic that I can’t see more than a few feet past the circle of light the single bulb gives off.