The Kingdom

“I already told you…my house is out of her way,” Sidra said.

“I really don’t mind.” It wasn’t like I had a clock to punch or someone to go home to. Besides, the company of two teenagers might be just the thing to dilute the bad taste left by my visit to the police station. “Hop in.”

“Merci beaucoup.” The dark-haired girl sent me a treacly smile as she strode around the car and climbed into the front. Sidra reluctantly got into the back, and as I slid behind the wheel, I glanced in the rearview mirror, hoping a smile would reassure her that a lift wasn’t a problem. But she’d turned to the window and sat motionless, making me wonder yet again if she could see something outside that I couldn’t.

I started the ignition. “I’ll need directions.”

“Head north, take a right at the first intersection and then keep going until I tell you to stop,” the dark-haired girl instructed. “I’m Ivy, by the way.”

“Amelia.”

“I know who you are.” She turned to give me a frank assessment between narrowed lids. “Sid says you work in graveyards or something.”

“I’m a cemetery restorer.”

“Sounds…interesting.”

I smiled politely. “It is to me.”

“You don’t get spooked?”

“Sometimes. But mostly I find cemeteries peaceful. Some of the really old churchyards were built on hallowed ground.” I shot a look in the mirror to gauge Sidra’s reaction, but her eyes were still riveted on the window.

“Thorngate isn’t,” Ivy said. “Built on hallowed ground, I mean.”

“How do you know?”

“Because it’s built on Asher ground and everything that family touches is cursed.”

“Ivy.”

The warning note in Sidra’s voice startled me, but Ivy just shrugged.

I gave her an uneasy glance. “What do you mean by cursed?”

She waved a hand toward the window. “Look around you. See all the boarded-up buildings? All those caved-in roofs? And that stink in the air? That’s the smell of the damned,” she said with calculated nonchalance as she unzipped one of her boots to examine what appeared to be a fresh tattoo on her ankle.

When she saw that I’d noticed—which I had a feeling was her intent—her smile turned smug. “You don’t know what that is, do you?”

“I can’t really see it from here.”

“It’s one of the symbols carved into the cliff at the falls. No one knows where they came from or what they mean, but I think this one makes a pretty cool tat, don’t you?”

She didn’t give me a chance to respond.

“I had to sneak over to Greenville to get it. Mother would have a cow if she knew. Which is so hypocritical since she has one herself. But she thinks I’m too young and I think she’s too old.” She admired the ink for a moment longer before rezipping her boot.

I glanced in the mirror, startled to find Sidra staring back at me this time. What was she thinking? I wondered. And why had she tried to silence Ivy about the Ashers?

Ivy fell back against the seat. “Personally, I find the whole idea of hallowed ground laughable.”

It took me a moment to redirect my train of thought. “Why?”

“How can a place be sacred just because people died there or because some priest sprinkled a little holy water over it? If you’re really into spiritual places, you should go up to the falls.”

“I hear it’s really beautiful up there.”

“It’s more than beautiful. People say it’s a thin place.”

I turned in surprise. “A thin place?”

“Don’t tell me you don’t know what that is, either.”

She seemed to enjoy her superiority, so I allowed her to keep it. “Why don’t you tell me?”

She lowered her voice. “It’s where the living world and the dead world connect. It’s where…well, never mind. Anyway, people used to go up there because they hoped to catch a glimpse of heaven. Now they stay away because they’re afraid of—” She broke off and turned to glance at Sidra in the backseat. I watched the girl in the mirror and saw her shake her head.

“They’re afraid of what?” I pressed.

“Nothing. Speak of the devil,” Ivy muttered as she sat up in the seat.

I followed her gaze to Thane Asher’s car parked at the curb. He was hunkered in front of the rear wheel well changing a flat tire, and my mind shot back to the library. I could still hear those animalistic moans in some back recess of my mind.

“We should stop,” Ivy said.

“I thought you said the Ashers were cursed.”

She slanted me a withering look as she lowered the window and called out to him. When he glanced over his shoulder, there was nothing I could do but pull up beside him and stop.

He rose and came over to the car, bending slightly to glance in the window. He wore a dark green shirt that deepened his eyes to moss and a brown leather jacket that had cracked and faded over the years. His car also showed signs of wear and tear that I hadn’t noticed on the ferry. Looking past the dazzle of metallic paint, I could see a dent here and there and the odd speck of rust.

“Hello,” he said.

“Hello,” I responded with a noncommittal smile.

Ivy gaped at him. I suspected she had a crush, which explained why she’d so easily tossed aside the notion of a curse. I could empathize. Hadn’t I done the same thing with Devlin? Thrown caution aside for passion? And Thane Asher did look ridiculously attractive in that leather jacket. Not darkly handsome like Devlin, of course, but there was something about him that I could appreciate. For one thing, he didn’t have ghosts hovering nearby. That was a definite plus. But then I reminded myself that I couldn’t know whether or not he was haunted until I saw him after twilight.

“Having car trouble?” Ivy drawled.

“A flat. Must have picked up a nail somewhere.”

“We thought you might need a ride.”

“Thanks, but I’ll have it changed in no time.”

Ivy tossed her hair over her shoulder and gazed up at him through those thick, curly lashes. “Are you sure you don’t need help with the lug nuts? They’re always so hard to get off.”

I didn’t know how she managed to pack so much sexual innuendo into two simple sentences, but she did.