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What. The. Actual. Fuck?
“My father would approve of this plan,” Edward says.
“That’s exactly why it’s not an option,” I growl. “I’m not going to throw anyone to this monster, and I’m not going to sit around and wait for the Ripper to tear me to pieces. So if you want me alive to resurrect you, you’d better come up with something better than this.”
Abberline shrugs. “There’s a priest at All Souls Church. It’s just around the corner. I catch up with him for a chat sometimes. He’s the one who told me about the Order. He hosts a weekly ghost circle where all the local spirits go to talk about things that bother us.”
“Tell me more about this ghost circle.” Edward raises his hand. “I have many grievances that I wish to air—”
“You think we should talk to a priest?” I shake my head. “No, thank you. I’ve had enough of the clergy trying to murder me.”
“This priest is different. He hates the Order. And he’s…well, he’s a bit odd. Always quoting poetry.” Abberline shrugs again. “You just have to meet him.”
“Why didn’t you say so?” Edward tries to shove me out of my seat. “A man after my own heart. Let us go and see this troublesome poet-priest.”
22
Bree
Iwant to run over to that church right now, but it’s already late and we need to return to our hotel. We have another appointment to keep.
We wave goodbye to Abberline, who goes back to yelling about historical inaccuracies as more people crowd the street in front of Aldgate Tower to join the Ripper tours.
Midway through cursing out a jovial American tourist who unintentionally walked through him, Edward disappears. The moldavite in my pocket must have finally stopped working. I look at Pax, squeeze Ambrose’s hand, and breathe a sigh of relief. “Okay, he’s gone. Let’s get this show over with.”
“I was beginning to think he’d never leave.” Ambrose’s eyes sparkle with joy. “I really hope this works, Bree. I want to do this for him. I want to give him the incredible gift of being able to touch you.”
That’s because you’re impossibly kind, and none of us deserve you.
Pax has become distracted by a display of souvenir Ripper knives, but I pull him away and we get back on the tube.
A couple of stops later, we alight and – after a brief detour to a fish and chip shop to pick up some dinner – walk a block to our hotel, a crumbling old Tudor building that had once been a grand estate. It was now a cheap hotel – cheap by London standards, which meant that I had to empty my savings account to afford the Imperial King Suite. But it’s vital we stay in that particular suite.
I duck under the low sign that proclaims the building ‘The Most Haunted Hotel In London,’ and fumble in my purse for the old-fashioned key to the door. The lady behind the front desk frowns at me as she watches me and my burly warrior and chatty gentleman carrying our greasy takeaways up to the room, but who is she to judge?
Gilded portraits of the building’s most famous resident line the staircase, between framed newspaper clippings describing hauntings in the building, including sightings of a woman in a white gown peering into guests’ bathtubs and tipping them out of the very bed I’m sleeping in.
I turn the second heavy key in the door, and the three of us crowd into the King Suite, which isn’t exactly what I’d call fit for a king. Edward would certainly turn up his spectral nose at it. But that’s what you get when you’re on a budget in London.
The three of us crowd around the tiny TV table to eat our dinner. Ambrose is too excited to sit still. With every drip of the pipes or creak of the old building, he practically leaps out of his chair. “Is that her? Has she arrived yet?”
“Calm down and eat your chip butty. I’ll tell you when I see her.”
Once we are satiated, Pax picks up his sword and paces the room, checking under the bed and in the closet. Ambrose sits beside me as I dump out the contents of Dani’s ‘ghost attraction’ bag on the lumpy bed.
A slow smile plays across my face as I finger the carefully chosen objects. An elegant lace handkerchief. A little silver hair comb. A vial of floral perfume. A small bottle of absinthe I sent Dani as a joke present from my trip to Prague. I grab my phone and whip off a quick text to Dani.
Bree: You’re amazing. You thought of everything.
Dani: Years of you retelling Edward’s stories of his time with the countess have imprinted in me an indelible image of her.
Bree: You’re still amazing.
Dani: Hey, I’m almost as excited as you are to meet the poet prince in the flesh. Go get your man, girl!
I toss my phone aside and arrange the objects on the bed. I take the perfume and spritz it around the place, then light the candles, and wait.
And wait.
