Page 75 of The Dearly Departed

No … I realized then that Dean cared about Analise. Deeply. As a friend, I assumed. Maybe even a sister.

He feels for her the way I felt about Anna.

And just like that, I turned toward that elusive woman standing up above and wondered if she could be that girl I’d once known and lost.

But … no, that would be impossible, wouldn’t it? Because Anna—my Anna—was supposed to be in a better place. She was supposed to be okay, and if she was here … well …

I didn’t know much about Seint Manor, but from what I did know, there was nothing okay about it, and I refused to believe Anna could end up here.

"Gerald's not going to be happy if he catches you making friends. You know that," he warned gently, raising a brow.

"Gerald isn't my boss," she fired back, cocking a hip and planting a hand against it.

"No, just your father."

"Stepfather," she corrected him.

Dean shook his head. "Disappear, Lisey. Before someone sees you."

Lisey.

The nickname struck a memory, causing my heart to skip a beat as I kept my unblinking eyes on the woman above.

I had been younger, somewhere in my twenties. I saw a woman who I thought could be Anna while I was driving—a woman with long black hair—and I ran from the old truck, like a psychopath on a mission, just to catch a glimpse of that woman’s eyes. They were dark, just like Anna’s—and Analise’s too—but the person she was with had called her by that name.

Lisey.

Was it possible that I had seen this woman before?

What are the chances?

I choked on nothing, remembering that, if this was the same woman I’d run across years ago, she had seen my face.

Would she recognize me if she saw me now? Would it matter if she did?

Dean glanced at me as Analise asked, "Are you okay?"

I cleared my throat, then again, before replying, "I'm fine."

And I would be.

Because I had to remember it had been an insignificant, inconsequential sort of moment. I had hardly recalled it myself until Dean mentioned the nickname, and surely, if she was the same woman, she wouldn’t remember it either.

The muffled sound of a door closing above reverberated through the foyer, and Dean clenched his square jaw and said, "Go."

Analise looked to me, her gaze lingering and expressing a longing I couldn’t make sense of, before she turned without another word and hurried down the same hallway that led to Gerald’s office.

I assumed her bedroom was in that same direction, and I imagined going upstairs, forgetting all about the things I needed to say to my father and instead finding that sacred door. I imagined slipping inside undetected and locking it behind me, only to discover that she—that otherworldly enigma I had no business wanting—was waiting for me, lying naked on a bed, like a lavish banquet that deserved to be appreciated first by sight before being devoured slowly but deliberately, like the most succulent meal to ever be tasted.

The thoughts were foreign to me, and yet, somehow, they felt right.

"She's off-limits, sir."

Not only was Dean a good little soldier, but a mind reader … apparently.

I turned my attention toward him to find him looking back with a knowing but disapproving expression on his face, but I said nothing in reply.

"You might want to get rid of the hard-on before Mr. Crowley notices," he added, dropping his gaze to my crotch momentarily before looking away.