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Nope.
I didn’t do haunted.
I shuddered abruptly and shook my head, rubbing my chilled arms as I glanced around suspiciously at everyone walking past on the quad. I hated even thetopicof ghosts. It was like talking about spiders, and then suddenly, you felt things crawling all over you.
I currently felt a million dead eyes juststaringat me.
And Jay was merely shrugging as if it was nothing. “Truth be told, it didn’t even cross my mind until now. Because I don’t believe in that shit. You know this.”
Mouth dropping open with incredulous outrage, I lifted my hands. “Well, then why are you bringing it upnow? Just to freak me the fuck out?”
She rolled her eyes. “Come on. It’s not reallyhaunted. But what if itisthe place that everyone talks about, where that college chick was killed? Who knows what kind oflivingspooks you could get loitering around and peeking in the windows in the hopes of catching some kind of freaky, paranormal activity? That doesn’t sound safe at all.”
My mouth dropped open as I gaped at her.
For the longest moment, I couldn’t breathe or even think past such a horrifying thought that the very roof I slept so peacefully and soundly under each night could be the epicenter of a grisly murder scene that still haunted my boyfriend to this day.
But then, reality returned, and I snorted. “Wait. No. This isn’t even possible. Damien would’vesaidsomething. Hell,Thaliawouldn’t even be staying there if it was true. I mean, why…why would she? Whowouldbe able to live where their aunt was brutally murdered? And aren’t landlords legallyrequiredto reveal unexplained activity in a place they rent out to prospective tenants?”
Jay shrugged, looking confused. “Why? The ghost part is just an urban legend. Though, you’d think lover boy would’ve at least given you the common courtesy of telling you if someone had been freakingmurderedthere. And that the killer had never been caught. Gah.” She shuddered. “I hope they changed the locks.” Shaking her finger at me, she added, “See. I told you he wasn’t trustworthy.”
“That just…” I blew out a long breath and hugged myself. “No. Nope. No one died in my apartment. I absolutely refuse to believe that. The place is just too…”
It was too good to be true.
Ah, shit. Itwastoo good to be true.
I swallowed thickly, feeling suddenly unwell.
“It’s the nicest place I’ve ever lived in,” I finished weakly, wincing at Jaylani.
“Yeah…” She made a regretful, sympathetic face. “Probably because they had to remodel afterward…especially if the blood splatters were too—”
“Good Lord, please stop,” I begged. “It can’t be true. It just…can’t.” Shaking my head insistently, I deduced, “You said it was acollegegirl, right? From tenyearsago? Well, that would make this girl—what—somewhere between twenty-eight and thirty-two today. That sounds way too young to be Damien’s aunt. So yeah…no. Your haunted house story has to be about someone else, in someotherapartment.”
Jaylani lifted her eyebrows as if telling me to wake up and smell the flowers. “You do know my aunt, Shaniece, is only two years older than me, right?”
“Shut up,” I muttered, hating her logic.
Because it totally destroyed my theory that there was no way on earth the haunted brownstone wasmyapartment.
But Jay wasn’t finished. “And why is your rent so cheap, anyway, huh?”
My shoulders slumped. I couldn’t think of another answer for that.
Whimpering out my defeat, I hugged myself and glanced at my best friend.
I really needed to find out who in Damien’s family had died, andwhereshe’d been murdered.
For my own peace of mind.
28
OAKLYNN
When I returned home after classes and work, I pulled into the parking spot behind the brownstone and took a minute to simply stare up at the back of the building, studying it for any sign of otherworldly anomalies.
But it looked perfectly normal. It was just an apartment, like all the other apartments around it.
