24

A little before midnight—about half an hour after he heard his parents' bedroom door close for the night—Miles snuck downstairs.

Charlee was waiting for him in the living room, her black clothes and bright hair making her a flame-topped silhouette. She inspected his new jacket, but didn't comment.

Going into the office, Miles switched on the lamp in the corner. His mom's desk was covered in a mess of supplies, but there was an order to the chaos, one he knew well.

It took him less than a minute to find everything on his crumpled list, his backpack bulging by the time he was done. He carefully closed the desk drawers and switched the lamp back off—with any luck, his mom wouldn't even notice anything was missing.

"Okay, let's go," he told Charlee.

It was windy outside, blowing Charlee's loose curls around wildly as she locked the door behind them. She started her car, the engine unbearably loud in the quiet night air. He watched his parents' window, half expecting their light to turn on, but it stayed dark.

He kept lookout as Charlee pulled away from the curb and onto the street, until they took a corner and his house disappeared from sight.

"I think they'd be proud of you if they knew what was actually going on," Charlee said.

"They'd know if they'd bothered to listen to me."

He'd hidden away in his room all night and refused to come down to dinner. He couldn't stand hearing it all over again from his dad.

Being an empath meant that other people were constantly on his mind, pushing their emotions onto him. Miles would sense someone's sadness and feel obligated to try to cheer them up. Sense someone's joy and be struck by how that feeling was missing from his own life. Sense frustration and feel driven to give that person a safe outlet to vent. Sense loneliness and feel it echoing inside his own. He was a side character in everyone else's story.

And now it was painfully clear that for the last few years, all he'd let himself want was the bare minimum: hide his sexuality until he was ready, pass his classes and keep his grades acceptable, manage his anxiety enough that he could function. Do whatever he could to make his parents proud, to keep the peace within his family and be an easy, good son.

He didn't think he wanted the bare minimum anymore.

"What happens," Charlee asked, "if everything goes well tonight? If you stop Gabriel's death premonition from coming true?"

"It's not the end of it." The curse, the grimoire, the darkness inside of Gabriel. "We still have more to do."

"And then?" she prompted. "After that?"

That question had wiggled itself to the forefront of his thoughts too many times already—what would happen when this was all over, when Gabriel no longer needed his help.

"I don't know," he admitted.

"What if he wants to stay besties?"

"Then I'll invite him over just to watch Mom lose her mind."

Charlee snickered. "And what if he doesn't? You'd be okay with that?"

He turned to watch the streetlights flash past. Her question made him ache, a tender bruise pressed against his ribs.

"Yes." The word was sour on his tongue.

Jocelyn had said it—they were all helpless to the whims of fate, and fate was cruel. Fate had made their families enemies, bound by death and tragedy. As surely as it had placed Gabriel in Miles's path, it would take him away. One way or another.

But Miles was feeling selfish tonight, letting himself consider the things he wanted. For a moment, he allowed himself to wander to the frightening and dangerous possibility: what if?

Charlee's voice softened into something close to pity. "I don't have to use my gift to know you're lying."

"Can we not talk about this right now?" If he did everything right and banished Florence, Gabriel would be saved. That was the only thing that mattered.

"Okay." She turned onto the main road that led out of town. "Promise me you'll be careful tonight. I have a bad feeling about this."

"Florence is pretty nasty," Miles agreed, remembering the feeling of Gabriel's fingers wrapped around his throat, the glossy oil-slick blackness of his eyes. "But I have everything I need, and I know what to do. I'll be okay."

"Still, you've never done this alone before."

Miles gazed out the window into the night. "I won't be alone."

***

When they pulled up to the Hawthorne gate, Gabriel was waiting for them, leaning casually against the wrought iron.

Charlee parked, her headlights illuminating the dense trees beyond them. Miles saw a flash of yellow orbs before she turned her car off and everything went black again. Overhead, the moon was a milky sickle, poised to slice open the night sky.

"Keep your phone on you," she commanded. "Double-check everything before you summon her. And banish her the second you start to get worried. Don't try to be a show-off, just do it right."

"Yes, Mom."

"I'm serious." It was hard to make out her freckled features in the half-light, but her voice was tense. "And if anything goes wrong, hightail it back here."

"It'll be fine." Miles didn't know which of them he was trying to convince. "I'll try to be quick."

He opened his door, the rush of crisp air raising goosebumps on his arms. He saw Charlee pull her headphones out of her pocket—nothing like music to distract yourself from the worry that your cousin might be getting killed by a murderous, century-old ghost.

"Is she not coming?" Gabriel asked. He had the iron box containing Florence's ring tucked under one arm.

"Nah." Miles slung his bag over his shoulder. "The more people we involve in this, the more opportunities there are for someone to make a mistake. She's on lookout and getaway car duty."

Behind them, the window squeaked as Charlee cranked it down.

"Hey, Hawthorne." Her voice wasn't loud, but it carried. "If anything happens to him, I'll make your life a living hell. Consider this your one and only warning."

She rolled it back up before either of them could respond.

"Sorry," Miles apologized. "She's enjoying playing the over-protective mom too much."

"It's fine." Gabriel opened the door set into the fence a few feet away from the gate, gesturing for Miles to go first. "She cares about you. You seem close."

"We are." The grass was slick under Miles's boots. "She's more like my sister, really. Her parents didn't have another kid, and Jenna and Amy didn't come along until years later, so we were all each other had for a while."

He wondered if Gabriel had any idea of what he meant when he said that—sweltering summers spent chasing each other through the sprinkler, lazy afternoons with ice cream and cartoons, pointless fights over who got to be in charge of the remote, crying on each other's shoulders. Childhood memories they would share for the rest of his life, a bond that ran thicker than blood.

"Why does she live with you?" Gabriel inquired. Ahead, Miles could make out the vague shape of hedges. They were getting close to the mansion.

"Her dad died. And her mom, my aunt… she's had a hard time with it. With the guilt." Understatement of the year, but it was too invasive to explain how hard a time she'd had in detail. "My parents invited them to live with us when it was clear she wasn't getting better. To keep a close watch on them both, I guess."

"Was your aunt responsible? You said she feels guilt—"

"Nothing like that," Miles hurried to say. "She's a seer and she foresaw the accident, but he'd already gotten in the car…" He remembered Charlee banging on the door, pale and frightened, telling them that something was wrong, that her mom wouldn't stop screaming. They'd run the two blocks back to her house. Aunt Robin's anguish had been so strong that Miles couldn't go inside, barbed wire wrapping tighter and tighter, stabbing him with thorny spikes. He could remember the metallic taste of blood filling his mouth when he bit his tongue.

It was too dark to make out Gabriel's expression. "That must have been very difficult."

Miles wasn't sure if he was talking about what Aunt Robin went through, or if he'd picked up a stray thought from Miles.

"I can't imagine how hard it is to lose someone you care about when you're given a chance to stop it."

Gabriel didn't say anything for the rest of the walk.

Instead of going straight to the house, he led Miles off to the left, skirting around the broad driveway to another small path that cut through the trees, similar to the one they'd taken to the lake. This was significantly shorter, leading them to a small, fenced-in cemetery. Behind it, a building loomed, a specter in the night, the Hawthorne family crest visible against the white stone.

"The mausoleum."

"That's where Florence was buried?"

"Entombed… but yes." Gabriel shifted the iron box in his hands. "I wonder if she can feel that we're close. If she knows what we're doing."

The possibility filled Miles with vindictive satisfaction. He hoped she was worried. "It serves her right if she can."

Gabriel made that thoughtful hum low in his throat. "I followed a hunch earlier and found a copy of our family tree. I'm the first second son born into my family since her death. The first opportunity she's had to resurrect herself."

"The first and the last."

"Because of you."

That pulled a laugh from Miles. "I'll be sure and mention that a few times before I banish her, really rub it in that a lowly Warren is the reason for her demise. Make it sting."

He dropped his bag, looking around. The cemetery was small, but it had a good amount of open space. They were close enough to Florence's remains out here, and the rituals would work better under the light of the moon. Plus, he didn't want to go into that dusty old mausoleum. Gabriel said it didn't match the place from his vision, but Miles wasn't going to chance it.

"We'll set up out here," he told Gabriel, unzipping his backpack.

Time to get to work.