“Please,” Max adds.
“As you wish,” I ground out, cold as the grave I crawled out of.
Nick could convince her to cut ties, to ward herself, to cast me out like the evil spirit he’s already decided I am. The thought hollows me. What if the trust between us erodes now that she has someone else to talk to? What if I was only ever a distractionshe used to pass the time? But she asked, so I force myself back, inch by inch, the space between us suddenly wider than it’s ever been.
Chapter 19
By the Spindle
MAX
After E leaves the room, Nick serves me a relieved, overly satisfied sigh. “Ah. Alone at last.”
“Dial it down. You’re acting like a prick.” I link my hands over my knee, trying to hide my jitters.
I have to disperse the tension, or these two idiots are going to posture themselves into a fistfight soon. If things go south between them, Nick is hot-headed enough to try something rash, something along the lines of the banishment spell I cast this morning—only far more violent.
And I really don’t want that.
“Anyone invisible and impervious to harm makes me nervous,” Nick fires back.
“He can’t help it. He’s a ghost.” I stand and walk over to the counter to pour myself another cup of tea.
“Ghosts aren’t to be trusted, sis. They’re souls that refused to meet their reaper. Given enough time, they all wither into something darker. Less human. We can’t trust him. For all we know, he might be working for the Mist King.”
I set the teapot down with a loudclink. “No he’s not.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve let down your guard around a ghost of all things.”
“Mabel knows him.” I dump a sugar cube in the cup and return to my seat. “And from the way she spoke, I’d swear E is family.”
Nick scoffs. “Family?”
I meet his incensed gaze head-on. “Yes.”
He freezes at that.
“He can get into the attic,” I add. “He’s a Bloodsinger. If not by name, then by blood. He canhelpus.”
Nick crosses his arms. “Or stab us in the back when we least expect it.”
He has every reason to be wary. I’ve always been drawn to eccentric, unusual people, but I have to admit, falling for a ghost is an entirely new level of crazy, even for me.
“He’s not a threat,” I repeat. Not to me at least. “But if you keep antagonizing him, who knows what might happen?”
Nick studies me with a troubled look. “Are youworriedabout him?”
I throw my hands up in the air. “I’m worried about you!”
His face darkens. “Because he’s dangerous?”
“Because you’re getting tied up in the wrong issue. E is not a problem for you to fix. Finding the spindle should be our priority.” I ground myself by curling my fists, forcing myself to stop gesturing
“Before you arrived, we’d decided to try to burn out the wards in the attic. Painting over them wouldn’t work, but fire should cleanse Mabel’s blood from the walls,” I add, tempting him with a juicier, longer-standing mystery. “We might finally be able to get in there.”
Nick leans back in his chair and raises a skeptical brow. “We as in you and me? Or am I expected to serve as the third wheel?”
I force a deep breath down my lungs and sidestep his subtle accusation altogether. “Tell me more about this golden spindle. Have you seen it before?”
