I didn’t need to ask her motivations for figuring it out with me. She was determined to Scooby Doo everything that was going around Carvell. And I’d just handed her the biggest scoop imaginable.
Sweeping the duvet cover off me, I said, ‘Here. You should have your bed back. I’ll take the floor.’
Lottie scoffed, pulling a black wool coat up to her shoulders. It was one of my coats, I realised, and she was hugging it to her chest for warmth. ‘Like hell you will,’ she said. ‘You’re hurt.’
‘Okay, well the least you can do is bunk up next to me.’ The words were out of my mouth before I considered the intimacy of them. Hastily I added, ‘You must be freezing on the floor, and I really don’t need to add “roommate developed frostbite because of me” to the list of things I currently feel guilty about.’
As Lottie chewed her lip with indecision, I found that my heart was fluttering against my ribcage like bat wings. I wasn’t sure whether it was because I was embarrassed for suggesting it, or because deep down I really wanted the comfort of someone lying next to me. I hadn’t shared a bed since Noémie left.
After what felt like an eternity, she mumbled, ‘Fine, but I’ll take the side nearest the edge. I don’t trust you not to go allExorciston me. Please try not to scuttle backwards down the steps like a possessed spider.’
A smile tugged at my lips. ‘Are you really taking the piss out of me right now?’
She nodded sagely. ‘A little bit, yes.’
The treacherous flurry in my chest only intensified when she climbed up bedside me, the mattress sinking under her weight. I pressed myself against the wall, biting my lip to keep from groaning in pain. My stomachhurt.
We didn’t touch. She immediately faced herself away from me, balling a corner of the duvet up in her fist and yanking it mostly off me, but the bed felt instantly warmer for having her in it. Something vulnerable and childlike at the very heart of me glowed, and I had to fight the urge to nestle into her back. Iachedfor it.
Her breath was always so soft and steady that it was difficult to tell whether or not she’d fallen asleep, but after there had been a few minutes of silence, I allowed my tense muscles to relax. I didn’t think I’d be able to sleep through the hot stripes across my abdomen – would it have killed her to find me some codeine? – and so I finally forced myself to look at the terrifying question that loomed in my mind:
Could the ritual be undone?
And then:
What would happen if not?
The thought of spending the rest of my life cycling between the extremes of good and evil was more frightening than I could comprehend. Was this why the ritual fell out of favour not long after it was discovered? Was that what the missing pages in the library book detailed?
Or did they detail the cure?
And either way . . . why would those pages be missing? Who had torn them out, and what possible motivations did they have for doing so?
‘Lottie?’ I semi-croaked.
Her voice was muffled and soft with sleep. ‘Yeah?’
‘I’m really, really scared.’