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“What?”

“Obviously I don’t speak Latin, but souls taken before their sun was destined to set?” Grant swallowed thickly. “Cut out the poetic nonsense, and it’s talking about people who died before their time. Unnatural deaths, right? Huck and Mrs. Charles died from accidents, Precipitation was murdered, and I think it’s safe to assume that Rebecca’s death would be considered too soon no matter how she actually died because she was so young.”

“Okay?” Aurora shrugged. “What are you saying?”

“That the Thing has its four souls.”

“But the people the cult leader killed would also technically count as unnatural.”

“Ah, but the Thing wasn’t directly involved in their deaths, but he was for the ghosts here.” Grant spread the papers back over the desk. “Think about what you found out about the wood and splinters. I bet that’s key somehow, and the cultists missed it because their Latin sucks. Now all the Thing needs is whatever anitorsoul is and it can get out.”

“So, we just make sure it doesn’t get one of those.”

“Yeah, sure.” Grant pinched the bridge of his nose. “We’ll stop the ancient Aztec spirit from getting the final human soul it needs to escape its thousand-year-old prison except we don’t know what kind of soul it is or any idea how to stop it from happening even if we did.”

“Pessimism is not cute on you.” Aurora snorted. “But hey!” She perked up. “Could be worse.”

“How?” Grant demanded. “How could this be worse?”

“Oh. I dunno. I just thought it might make you feel better if I said that.”

Grant sighed.

That feeling of aching dread was back, and he was struck by the unavoidable sense that something bad was going to happen soon. He didn’t know if he was being paranoid or perhaps he was being driven slowly insane by the damn Thing’s constant rhythmic pulse thumping in the back of his mind…

Shit.

He hoped Huck was having a better day than he was, but at least he had tonight to look forward to. With a little bit of luck, Grant was going to pull off the most amazing date in the history of ever to celebrate their one month anniversary.

Oh, and he needed a ladder.

A really big ladder.

CHAPTER10

Huck

Following Janice around for hours at a time might have possibly been the most boring thing in the entire universe—and that was saying a lot coming from a dead guy who could lose time staring at a wall.

Huck wanted to catch her in the act of doing something nefarious, but there wasn’t much except her babbling about television show work crap with the occasional sneer about Grant.

She never went near the Eastern Stairs, never said anything about inhuman spirits, not a single mention about human sacrifice or the cult, and well…

Janice was pretty damn lame.

She watched reruns of soap operas, played on her phone a lot, and she didn’t seem to have much of a life outside her job. She never had any personal phone calls, there was zero mention of friends or lovers, and she didn’t leave the hotel much. Considering Myrna was her mother, they barely even spoke to each other, and Huck never heard them mention how they were related.

Nothing else seemed out of place except for these random moments she’d freeze, stop whatever she was doing, and then cock her head up at the ceiling. It did not happen often, and Huck wondered if she was listening to something.

Or maybesomeone—like the Thing in the Eastern Stairs.

Huck told Grant about this, but it was hard to say exactly what it was. If it was the Thing communicating with Janice, there was no way to know what it was saying.

Murder? Kill? Pull people off ladders?

Huck had really been hoping that he’d find some awesome clue to help Grant figure out what was going on, but he’d come up with absolutely zilch so far.

On the brighter side of things, Huck was enjoying his blossoming romance with Grant immensely. They were now spending every night together, bingingWalking Deaduntil Huck was now almost caught up to the current season. He’d also asked Grant to bring him some random chunks of wood, including a big piece that was pretty much a giant stump, up to the Captain’s Quarters so he could keep practicing his sculpture and perfect his ghosting skills.

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