Shadows (Bayou Magic 1)

I do enjoy having Cash around, and it’s not just for his tea-making skills or even the intense sex we have almost every day. It’s so much deeper than any of that.

There are times that I feel like he’s an extension of me, and vice versa. We haven’t talked about what will happen once his vacation time is over, and he has to go back to his life from before.

I don’t want to think about the possibility that he’ll leave, and that this will just be a fond, sexy memory mixed in with the scariest time of my life.

We’ve shared so much together over the past month. How in the world will I ever go back to being without him, as if he were never here?

I turn and get my hair wet, then reach for the shampoo, thinking it over.

I suppose I could ask Millie to make me a potion to forget he ever existed. But that seems even sadder than the thought of not seeing him anymore. At least, this way, I’ll have the memories of us, even if they make my heart hurt.

I don’t want him to go.

But I can’t go with him.

And I can’t make him stay if that’s not what he wants.

I don’t have any additional answers once my hair is rinsed of both shampoo and conditioner. One thing I do know is that he’s here now, and I’m going to enjoy every moment I have with him, no matter what.

I push back the curtain and reach for a towel to wipe my face and wrap it around my wet hair. Then I grab a second towel to dry my body as I step out of the shower. I wrap the terrycloth around me and frown when I see my necklace sitting on the lip of the sink.

It was on my pillow. I left it there earlier. I know I did.

Cash must have brought it in for me. He’s so thoughtful. I reach for it and pull the long chain over my head, then see movement on the fog-covered mirror.

A chill runs down my spine.

An invisible finger is marking up the fog on the glass.I’m still here. H.I back up and reach for the doorknob.

“What’s wrong?”

I hear Cash in the other room, and there’s pounding on the door now, but I can’t get the knob to turn.

“Brielle, what’s wrong in there?”

“I can’t open the door!”

“Let go of it.”

I do as he asks and glance back to see the writing still there. Cash gets the door open and rushes in.

“Why did you scream?”

“I screamed?”

“A blood-curdling one.”

I simply point to the mirror. “He’s still here, Cash.”

“He wrote that?”

I don’t have time to speak before another word is written on the glass.

Yes.Chapter Twenty-Four“I can’t stand a bitchy chick.”- Gerald StanoBurn it all down?

If he could hit her, Brielle would be lying in her own blood right now.

The rage is all-encompassing but stronger than it ever was when he was still alive. The emotions in the afterlife are intense.

Brielle, one of only three people he’s loved his whole life, just said that she’d like to burn down everything he worked for. And her sisters didn’t stand up for him. They didn’t even bat an eye!

How could they? How dare they? Don’t they know how hard he worked, day in and day out, to make something beautiful for them? It’s clear they’re nothing but three entitled, spoiled, horrible girls. He needs to teach them a lesson.

He won’t be making anything wonderful for them anymore. No, that time has passed. They’ve ruined that with their ugliness.

Instead, he’s going to punish them in ways they never imagined. The ways he killed his toys will pale in comparison to what he has planned for his daughters.

He didn’t raise them to be this way, did he?

If Ruth had given him the chance to discipline them more, maybe things would be different. Perhaps he would have had an opportunity to make it good for his girls.

But, no. She taunted him with them. Though that’s what women do, isn’t it? They tease, and they condemn, and they open their legs to get satisfied, and then they flick you off like an annoying fly.

Ruth.

Maybe he should make a trip to her house to punish her, as well. She deserves it.

They all do.

He wandered away from the girls after Brielle talked about burning his things. Not just his things, their things. Everything he did, he did for them.

But now that it’s theirs, they don’t want it.

He was so blinded by rage, he was able to spill the tea, but that wasn’t nearly satisfying enough.

He wishes he were at full strength so he could take care of matters correctly.

But he’s getting there.

He spilled the tea.

He moved the necklace several times.

And, tonight, he ran his fingers through Brielle’s glorious hair. It calmed him for a moment until she started speaking about him again.