25
ADDIE
The price tag on the scarf made me cringe, but I needed something—anything—to help me block out the voices. After this, I would put a snapback cap on my carabiner clip like a damn keychain, just so I would have a hat on me at all times.
After swiping my card at the register, I yanked off the tags and furiously tied the scarf around my head. I was a little rusty at it since I preferred hats these days. The messy headwrap worked, though.
Already, the voices around me dimmed to a low murmur. I exhaled, relieved as my shoulders slumped now that the tension was slipping away. Of course, that made the cashier behind the counter give me an odd look as they handed the receipt over to me.
I gave a shy smile and slipped out with my purchase, passing under scaffolding attached to the outside of the building in the process. While the town wasn’t unfamiliar, I was acutely aware that I was hours away from home without a car. This was Maddox’s stomping grounds, the territory that he watched over as a homicide detective.
The shallow peaks of the Adirondacks graced the horizon. They called my name, but I had no means of camping out for the night unless I wanted to visit an overpriced store and buy a brand-new tent…then carry it all the way out to the mountains. And the cold wind shoving its way through town told me that there would be a horrible storm coming in soon.
I put a hand over my scarf to keep the wind from ripping it away from me. Bits of trash, plucked free from the bins by the wind, rolled down the street. The sky overhead began to darken as angry clouds slipped over the sun.
“Not a chance,” I muttered to myself.
On the sidewalk, I rocked on my heels while trying to decide what to do with myself. I could go find Maddox, but I was still mad at him. He’d been an asshole earlier. Whatever happened to him, he deserved it.
I still couldn’t believe that he’d ignored my pain in favor of his own anger. The pedestal that I’d put him on had crumbled to dust in an instant. Men were a big pain in the ass, alive and dead.
A shout grabbed my attention. My head snapped up, and I noticed someone across the street. They were pointing at me. No, not at me.
A creak above me made adrenaline hit my system. Cold, I jumped out of the way just as the scaffolding came down where I’d been standing. The crash rocked through my bones. That could have been me. I stared at the place where I’d been and swam in the cold adrenaline still pumping through my veins.
My chest heaved in terror. I looked up, expecting the killer to be above me, but no one was there. The scaffolding simply came undone in the winds. Heart racing, I backed away—and right into a solid wall.
Jerking in fright, I spun. A tall lumber-jack of a man with a sports cap gave me a nod.
“Didn’t mean to frighten you there,” he said. His brow furrowed when he noticed the fallen scaffolding. “Seems like you’re having a bit of a day. No need to worry about that anymore. Maddox Green gave me a call and asked me to come look after you.”
Taken aback, I stared up at this stranger. “You know Maddox…Wait, wait. That asshole asked you to look out for me?”
He chuckled, a deep rumbling sound that told me that this man understood.
“Maddox can be a handful, can’t he?”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “You’re telling me.”
My annoyance slowly receded, as did the adrenaline of nearly dying under a scaffolding collapse. As I looked over my shoulder at the recent near-death experience, my thoughts started tumbling one after another.
“How do you know Maddox?” I asked as I turned back to the tall man.
“We’ve known each other for years,” he assured me.
That didn’t quite assuage my fears, though. I’d asked a question, and he’d found a way to skirt around it. Maybe the guy just didn’t understand what I was asking. He did seem like the big and dumb type—head full of good intentions, not thoughts.
However, Maddox claimed that the killer worked with him. I wouldn’t trust anyone with a badge right now, as strange as that sounded.
When I reached out with my arcana and brushed him with a skeletal finger, he shuddered.
“Getting cold out here, isn’t it?” He glanced up at the dark sky. “Looks like a storm is rolling in. We should get you out of here before the skies break open. No use in being wet when you can be warm. Am I right?”
I laughed softly in nervous agreement. Pressing my palm to my chest, I felt for the rosary hidden beneath my shirt. I’d taken to wearing it around my neck rather than keeping it in my pocket. The closer it was to my skin, the better I felt, even if I suspected that there were souls trapped in some of the beads.
My family wouldn’t trap people against their will, would they? I liked to think otherwise. We were good people. My mother had been a kind woman who treated everyone with gentleness. She’d asked me to keep the rosary safe and promised that it would become important in my future.
We wouldn’t do what the killer had been doing. While he forced souls into his rosary in order to bolster his power, I wanted to think that my ancestors had given up their souls in order to protect future generations.