Page 85 of With All My Haunted Heart

“Except when I really needed it! The help you were supposed to provide failed.”

I lose the battle against my own tears. “I didn’t fail. Willa didn’t want to stay. I couldn’t force her.”

“Pippa, please,” Elle says, and it’s such a different form of begging from last night. “Don’t make this harder than it needs to be. I can’t be worried about when I’ll get to see you and what weekends make sense for visits when all of this is happening. And you saw how Alex was tonight. There’s no point telling him about us. It isn’t worth the risk.”

“You mean I’m not worth the risk.”

Elle squeezes her eyes tight like she can’t bear the sight of me. “Can we skip the fighting and let this be a fun memory? We don’t have to ruin it by trying to make it something more.”

“Fine.” I slip on my shoes and brush past her, my heart shattering into a thousand jagged pieces. “I know better than to fight for someone who doesn’t want me. My family taught me that.”

The choke of her sob follows me down the driveway, and I’m forced to pass her family where they’re huddled together under the dark sky. My throat is too tight to say a proper goodbye. The promise of privacy waiting for me in my car is the only thing keeping me putting one foot in front of the other.

I start the car, trace a vitality sigil on my chest, and make the long drive back to Windsfell. Where my real life is waiting. My business. Dea. The empty apartment with nothing but a few plants that probably did better with Dea’s attention than mine anyway.

I’ve been alone most of my life. I can do it again.

It isn’t until I make it to my apartment and fall into bed that I let the grief wash over me.

Chapter

Twenty-Six

Saturday, I wallow.

I marathon all my favorite shows. Get all my favorite foods delivered to my apartment. Spend hours scrolling through photos of adoptable cats until I cave and put in an application. I even email the building manager to update my lease.

Xander calls a few times throughout the day, but I can’t bear to hear his voice. To explain that despite doing everything right, Willa won’t be moving into Midnight Manor. I’m sure Elle already told him. I’m sure he already knows.

Finally, I text Xander to say that I made it home fine and to focus his energy on Elle. She needs him more than I do right now. Even though she broke my heart, I know hers hurts worse. I won’t do anything—including stealing Xander’s attention—that could bring her additional pain.

I’ll be fine. I did what I set out to do at Midnight Manor. I created a safe, ethically haunted B&B. Whether or not Elle sends the rest of the money she owes me, I’ll find a way to save my business. If it means I have to teach, so be it. I’ll make sure Dea’s salary gets paid.

Falling in love never killed anyone, so on Sunday, I get back to work.

I unpack my bags and go through the old notes on the creativity spell I’d been working on. After a month away, it feels good to stretch my magic in directions that have nothing to do with ghosts. Progress comes in fits and starts, but I settle into my old routines, and by Monday, I’m ready to go back into the office.

The chimes greet me as I enter, the familiar sound drawing out a deep exhale. Brewing coffee fills the space with bittersweet tang as I expand my lungs. I don’t see Dea, but she’s probably in the little break room, waiting for the coffee to finish.

Before I can call out a greeting, I notice the banker’s box sitting in her desk chair, already half-filled with her personal items. The picture of her dog, Katya. The World’s Best Assistant mug I bought for her first work anniversary. The fingerless gloves she always wore in the winter to keep herself warm, since the office heat is controlled by the landlord.

The same landlord doubling our rent in January.

“Pippa?” Dea sounds startled, and I turn to find her coming out of the break room with one of the office’s generic mugs. “I thought you weren’t coming in until tomorrow?”

“What’s all this?” I point to the box in her chair. Her nearly empty desk.

Dea wraps her fingers around her cup and avoids my gaze, white teeth biting into her terra-cotta-colored lips. “I had planned to turn in my two weeks’ notice tomorrow.”

My heart plummets to the depths of my abdomen. I can’t possibly have heard her right. “You what?”

She shuffles across the room and sets her coffee on the desk. “I’ve loved working with you, Pippa. This business and its mission are incredible. I knew from the moment you banished that voyeur ghost from my apartment that your work would create something special. And it has. I’m proud I got to be part of it, but I got another job offer. I have to take it.”

“You—” I catch myself on the edge of her desk. It feels like the floor is dropping out beneath me, and the sensation is dizzying. “When did you apply somewhere else? How long have you been planning to leave?”

“A few months?” Dea moves the box off her chair and sits, waking up her computer. “But as soon as the first interview requests came in, I started automating everything I could. Look.” She clicks into a program I haven’t seen before. “This is your new scheduling system. And this…” She opens another window. “This billing system is phenomenal. You won’t even miss me. I promise.”

I sink into the chair opposite her. “It’s not your job to make things okay for me. It was my job to make sure you felt stable here.” My throat tightens until it’s hard to breathe, and I fight the chorus of disappointed voices in my head. Nanette Erikson kicking me out of the family. Elle telling me that I wasn’t worth keeping around.