Betrayal (20 page)

“I know,” he said.

I ran my hand down his chest and he gasped with pain. I pulled away and said, “I'm sorry!”

He smiled, a little sadly. “Me, too.”

I blinked back my tears and didn't say anything else. I knew what he meant. We couldn't be together, not yet. Not until this finally ended, one way or the other.

21

Two weeks later, I still hadn't stopped crying. Every morning I'd wake and the tears would trail down my cheeks until a sob escaped. It took only one week before Natalie stopped knocking on my door, trying to comfort me. She finally understood there was no controlling the flow—those tears were the only thing that got me out of bed in the morning.

I sleepwalked through the final weeks of the semester, hoping that my grades in Latin and Trig would keep my GPA from disaster. I still wanted to go to college, after all—even if that seemed like an impossible dream, with the Knell failing and Neos still living in the Beyond.

On the last day of school before winter vacation, Sara invited me and Natalie to her house to celebrate. Lukas was standing with us at the gates, and Sara got a shy expression on her face before saying, “It's cool if you want to come, too. Though my surprise is for Emma.”

“A surprise,” I said, flatly. When Natalie poked me in the ribs, I added, “Can't wait.”

“Wow,” Sara said. “Get a grip on your enthusiasm, Emma.”

I followed them to the car while Natalie explained about Bennett. I should've been mortified that my friends were discussing how devastated I was about a guy, but with Bennett it didn't matter. It was the truth and I didn't care who knew it.

We gossiped about school and vacation as we drove to the Neck. Sara's house was the perfect sea cottage, with views of the harbor and the village—if by cottage you meant five thousand square feet of polished wood floors, contemporary kitchen, and modern art. We grabbed sodas and chips in the kitchen, then headed upstairs to Sara's suite, where we found the surprise.

Harry sprawled over Sara's yellow satin sofa, looking like a boy with a great deal of experience in sprawling across sofas.

I smiled for the first time in weeks, and jumped into his lap. “I'm so happy to see you!”

“Then why are you crying?” he asked, wiping a tear from my cheek.

“Dude,” Lukas said. “She does that now.”

“What's wrong?” Harry asked. “Tell Uncle Harry everything.”

“Bennett,” Natalie explained.

“I knew you liked him,” Harry said. “Ever since he tied your tie.”

I started weeping again. “I hate you.”

“Then why are you in my lap?” He grinned.

“Oh please,” Natalie said. “As if you don't love having a pretty girl snuggle in your lap.”

“Without paying for it,” Sara added slyly.

“Ignore them.” I stood and kissed him on the cheek. “I'm glad you're you again.”

He turned serious for a moment. “Thank you, Emma. For everything.”

Then Natalie popped her head into Sara's closet. “What can I borrow?”

“Anything,” Sara said. “Oh, there's a leather jacket that'd be perfect for you. Now, where did I put that?”

Something rang false in her tone, and I eyed her curiously.

“Harry,” Sara said, still stagy and forced. “Have you seen my leather jacket?”

He furrowed his brow. “I'll admit to keeping a close eye on your underthings, but your jacket? No.”

“If only there was some way to find it,” she said.

Then a short gray leather jacket with three-quarter sleeves floated into the room. Well, that's how it must've looked to Sara and Harry—but Lukas, Natalie, and I all saw Coby waving it back and forth in a ghostly fashion.

Coby!
I said.
Where have you been?

Here, mostly
, he said with a grin.
After I reattached my limbs. Man, that Neos is nasty.

You could've told me you were okay. I was worried.

He looked contrite.
Well, you wouldn't understand what it's like to need time to heal and mourn and cry. And cry, and cry, and cry …

I couldn't help myself. I laughed.

“What's he saying?” Sara asked.

So I told them. Apparently the three of them had been hanging out at Sara's house—almost like old times.

“Watch this.” Harry pulled a beer can from beside the sofa.

“Harry!” Natalie scolded.

“It's empty. But watch. You know AA has twelve steps?”

He reached for the beer, and Coby snatched it away.

“He's like the thirteenth step!” Lukas said.

Harry beamed. “Exactly.”

I spent the next couple of hours relaying messages back and forth, and felt better than I had in weeks. When Coby said he wanted to see me turn into a ghost again, I demurred, but he said I owed him.

Fine
, I finally gave in.
But only because you're dead.

That struck him as funny, and for the first time since I'd summoned him, I saw him laugh.

I excused myself to the bathroom, pulled Emma's ring from the chain around my neck, and slipped it on my finger. I slid through the door and flew up to sit beside Coby, where he was perched atop Sara's bookcase. I landed sort of awkwardly.

You need to practice that
, he said.

I know, it's just so … weird.

You get used to it
, Coby said resignedly.

I turned to look at him, still wearing the suit he'd worn for Homecoming, even more crazy good looking in death than in life.
Are you really okay? Even with Neos still out there?

You kicked his bony ass, Em.

But he's still alive and you betrayed him. He'll come after you.

Probably. And he'll try to kill you, too.
Coby took my hand, and he didn't burn me because we were both ghosts.
But you're a hero in the Beyond, Emma. Maybe he's not gone forever, but you beat him. Nobody thought that was possible. We were staring into the abyss, and you stopped him.

I guess.

Stop guessing.
He showed me one of his old charming grins.
Maybe you still gotta sweat the play-offs, but you know what? You won the game.

We
won the game
, I said, and leaned against him.

Lukas glanced up at me, and I waved, but he ignored me, too interested in what Sara was saying. Though I noticed him glance at Natalie flirting with Harry, almost like he was jealous.

Which one is he into?
Coby said.
Sara or Natalie?

Sara, I think. I mean, he and Natalie …
My voice trailed off. What if he and Natalie really were falling for each other?
Well, they're both ghostkeepers, so that'll never work. Anyway, Sara's still missing you, Coby. We all are.

Yeah. But you know what? I think it's all going to be okay.

We sat there and watched our friends talking and laughing, and I started to think maybe he was right.

That night after dinner, I slunk into the kitchen and found Celeste scrubbing pans and Anatole putting the finishing touches on a homemade chai milk shake for me. I'd found solace in the two of them lately, maybe because they were the only ones who really understood how I felt about Nicholas.

I'd failed him. I knew that he'd betrayed us, that he'd almost killed us all. And I knew that Bennett did what was necessary to protect me—to protect
everything
—but I still missed the little urchin, with his big eyes and his annoying
mum
s.

I helped Celeste dry the pots, then sat in the nook and indulged in my milk shake. After a time, Celeste perched on the bench across from me and did her sewing, then Anatole huffed down beside me to engage in some menu planning, which involved a surprising amount of gesticulating and muttering.

After a while, I started feeling better. Sometimes just sitting quietly was all I needed. I washed my milk-shake glass and said good night to Anatole and Celeste. I'd hardly said two words, but they knew I loved them.

Upstairs, I stepped into my room—then froze. A strange shape sat on my bed. My powers flared before I realized: “Bennett!”

His blue eyes were sunken and his black button-down and tattered jeans hung on his sinewy frame, but his smile was perfect.
“
Don't ask what I'm doing here.”

So of course I said, “What are you doing here?”

“I couldn't waste another day.”

“What does that mean?”

“You know what it means. Any day I don't spend with you is a day wasted.”

My heart lifted. “Do the others know you're here?”

“No, I snuck in.” He shot me a naughty grin. “I have a secret drainpipe.”

He looked like hell, but all the charm and mystery I'd fallen in love with were still there. Just being in the same room with him made me feel more alive. “And what makes you think I'd collude with your sneakiness? There is an Englishman downstairs who'd like a word with you.”

“The only one I want words with is you.” He somehow made that sound sexy, and my body tingled—for once not because of ghosts. “I was wrong, Emma. We belong together.”

“You don't think you'll …”

“Lose my powers?” He shrugged. “If I keep taking the Asarum, I'll be okay.”

My stomach dropped. “Bennett, no. Please, stop. You're killing yourself.”

“I can't stop.” His eyes pleaded with me. “And I can't stay away from you.”

I was quiet, not sure what to do. I couldn't stand what he was doing to himself, but the thought of him leaving made me shake.

“Then don't go.” I pulled him close. He was right. We had to be together. To love each other, no matter what the cost.

He smiled as he ran his hands over me in the moonlight and kissed me. As my eyes closed, I realized he was beginning to feel like someone else. Not the boy I'd spent a night with in New York. He smelled different, looked different, felt different.

And I wondered … could I love this Bennett just as much?

Acknowledgments

Thanks to my agents, Nancy Coffey and Joanna Stampfel-Volpe, their assistant, Deirdre Sprague-Rice, and everyone at Bloomsbury, especially my fantastic editor, Caroline Abbey, and publicists, Deb Shapiro, Kate Lied, and Rachel Wasdyke. And thanks to Melissa Senate, who listens to every complaint along the way.

About the Author

Lee Nichols
was raised in Santa Barbara, California—the setting of her adult novels
Tales of a Drama Queen, Hand-Me-Down
, and
True Lies of a Drama Queen
. The first Haunting Emma novel,
Deception
, was her YA debut. She attended Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts, where she studied history and psychology. She now lives in Maine and is married to novelist Joel Naftali.

www.leenicholsbooks.com

This ghostly mystery is not over yet.

Read on for a sneak peek at the next
Haunting Emma book:

Surrender

I've never liked bad boys. On TV shows, when the girl is torn between her sweet best guy friend—who is not-so-secretly in love with her—and the standoffish bad boy, I always root for the best friend.

But standing in Bennett's attic room, my arms twined around him, I finally saw the appeal. I shouldn't have been there. Shouldn't have let Bennett's drug-stained fingers stroke my neck, shouldn't have lied to Simon about him. And I definitely shouldn't have been kissing him when I was supposed to be downstairs with the rest of the team, trying to figure out Neos's next move.

Yet I barely protested when Bennett nibbled my neck. “I—I should—oh—”

He pinned me with his piercing blue eyes. “Yes?”

“Um …” I licked my lips. “I forgot what I was going to say.”

“You don't have to say anything. Just keep making those little noises.”

I let out a sound I didn't recognize as he traced my spine with his finger.

“Yeah, like that,” he whispered.

Oh my God.
How could I have been so wrong about bad boys? Forget the best friend, I wanted
this
—the unpredictable charm, the danger, and the heat. Did anything else matter? I closed my eyes and ran my fingers through his hair in the spinning darkness—then stopped when I heard a cough from the doorway.

My eyes snapped open and I caught a glimpse of someone standing at the top of the attic stairs. It was Simon, peering inside.

“Simon!” Bennett and I sprang apart. “Go away!”

“Emma …,” he said. And there was something weird in his tone, something more than just
I've caught you with your drug-addled boyfriend who shouldn't be living here.

“What?” I asked. “What's happened?”

Before he answered, two people stepped into the room. Well-dressed, familiar, and completely unamused.

And Bennett said, “Mom … Dad?”

I've always had moments when I wished I could yell “Freeze!” and the world would stop, giving me a chance to think of a great comeback line, retake a test, or cancel the inane grin I just flashed the guy I was crushing on. This was the
queen
of all those moments.

What were they doing here? Well, yes, it was their house, but did they have to show up this very minute? Why not an hour from now when I'd be done with Bennett? Okay, I'd never be done with Bennett, but at least I might've been fully dressed. Instead I was wearing a lacy white tank top, which no parent would deem modest.

As I struggled to put on a sweater, my hand brushed against Emma's ring on its chain around my neck. I considered whipping it on and disappearing in a cloud of ghostly embarrassment. On the plus side, it would end this terrifying encounter; on the minus side, I'd be deserting Bennett, which seemed really cowardly. And maybe turning into a ghost wasn't the best way to impress his parents. I mean, as much as I could impress them, given the whole making-out-with-their-son thing.

“I want you to meet Emma,” he told them, as though there were nothing awkward happening. “You've probably heard a lot about her.”

“Hi,” I squeaked.

“It's all true,” he said, with an easy grin.

His parents didn't smile back. They just stood there, radiating disapproval, which gave me ample time to discover that Bennett got his looks from his mom, who was dark-haired and beautiful. She had on a long asymmetrical burgundy sweater over black fitted pants and low boots and wore her long hair slicked back in a ponytail. Carefully made up, her pursed lips caused the only apparent wrinkles. Bennett's eyes, though, came from his dad, who, aside from the blue marbles of brilliance under his furrowed brow, was almost completely gray, from his hair to his dress shirt and pants.

“The Sterns just got back from Europe,” Simon said into the silence. “They arrived late last night.”

Mr. Stern took a step toward Bennett. “What have you done to yourself?”

Mrs. Stern's gaze flicked from Bennett to me and back again. “This is worse than I thought. Much worse.”

“So your flight was good?” Bennett said.

“You look like a”—his mother made a choking sound—“a ghost.”

“A
junkie
,” his father said.

“And these are my parents,” Bennett told me. “John and Alexandra. They're very pleased to meet you.”

Simon took pity on me. He motioned me toward him and said, “Emma, let's give the Sterns a few minutes alone.”

Bennett squeezed my hand tightly before letting me go. I crossed the room and Simon slipped me a twenty and said, “Go into town and get yourself a chai.”

I turned back toward Bennett, unsure whether I should leave him. But he wouldn't look at me. His body was rigid with anger and I decided I wasn't helping things by being there. I took the twenty and fled.

The walk back to the museum from the café was freezing, despite the half hour I spent warming up with the fire and the hot chai. Maybe I was just anticipating the inevitable cold front from Bennett's parents. I stomped through the pockets of ice on the museum drive, wondering why they had suddenly returned.

Because they knew Bennett was hooked on Asarum? Because I was living in their house? If they kicked me out, where would I go? Would Natalie come with me?

Inside, I shed my coat and went straight up to Bennett's attic room. “It's me,” I called, climbing the steps.

He met me at the top and took my hand. “Are you all right?”

“I'm fine. I mean, I'm slightly embarrassed, but …” I stopped at the look in his eyes. “What? What happened?”

He dropped my hand and turned away, and I took in the state of the room. His drawers were ajar and a suitcase lay open on the bed. I recognized the pale blues and grays of his wardrobe, messily folded and stuffed in his bag.

“No,” I said. “
No
. You can't go.”

He sat on the edge of the bed. “C'mere.”

I crossed the room and stood between his legs, looking down at him. I still felt a nervous shiver just being close to him, like the first time a guy you like kisses you. Maybe I'd never get over that feeling with Bennett.

He traced a finger down my arm. “It's hard to think when you're this close.”

“Then stop thinking.”

“We need to talk.”

“No, we don't,” I said, and kissed him. I just wanted to go back to before his parents interrupted us, before he'd started packing. I didn't care that we might get caught again, I needed to recapture the feeling that we could be together. That everything would be all right.

I kissed him and he pulled me onto the bed, shoving his suitcase to the floor, running his hands over my body. He made me feel beautiful, he made me feel like I was the only thing he ever dreamed about. But I couldn't stop thinking about that suitcase, and I pulled away.

“I'm going to miss that,” he said.

“Then why are you leaving me again?”

“They kicked me out, Em.”

“Your parents?”

A shadow of regret darkened his smile. “They told me to get off Asarum or leave.”

“So get off it!” As beautiful as his smile was, it would've been so much better if he was off that herb that stained his fingers and killed his appetite. Plus, I wasn't convinced he ever slept anymore.

“I can't. Not yet. Not until Neos is dead.”

I sat up on the bed. There was nothing to say about that; we'd already had the argument a dozen times. “How much do your parents hate me?”

His grin returned. “A lot.”

“Then why are you smiling?”

“Because they're pissing me off. And I want them to be unhappy, at least for a while.”

“Bennett, I don't want them to hate me.”

He rolled over. “They don't know you, Emma. Once they do, they'll fall in love—like I did.”

“But until then?”

He kissed me. “Just let me enjoy it.”

We repacked his suitcase together. I never liked packing, but folding Bennett's worn shirts and fraying khakis felt intimate, meaningful. I promised myself I'd never start wearing an apron with heels and packing his lunch, but I wanted to help—to stay with him as long as I could.

“Where are you going?” I asked. “Back to your dorm?” I could live with that. His room at Harvard was only forty minutes away.

“No, I'm still on leave. You know they want Simon in charge of the Knell? Well, he asked me to go along, to protect him.”

“God knows he needs protecting.” Simon's powers had never been strong, but what he lacked in strength, he made up for in knowledge. I couldn't help thinking that Simon might persuade Bennett to kick the Asarum while they were both at the Knell—in fact, I wondered if that wasn't part of his plan. I knew better than to mention it, though. “Who put Simon in charge?”

“The few ghostkeepers who survived Neos's massacre.”

I paused, midfold. “How were all those deaths explained? Neos's wraiths must have killed twenty people.”

“There are ghostkeepers everywhere, Emma. The Knell's been sending low-powered ghostkeepers into police departments and the FBI for generations. The official report says that a gas line exploded.”

“They've got an answer for everything,” I said bitterly. “Maybe they should've come up with a way to stop Neos before any of this happened.”

I was devastated by the deaths of my aunt Rachel and all those other ghostkeepers, but I still wasn't ready to forgive the way the Knell had treated me or my family. And it made me sick sometimes, how everyone who worked for them was so devoted. Including Bennett and Simon.

Bennett tossed a pair of socks into his suitcase and watched me silently. He'd grown up with the Knell; he'd always be loyal to them. It was an old argument he clearly didn't want to reopen.

“It doesn't matter,” I said. “Everything will change with Simon in charge. He deserves your protection. I'm glad it's you.”

I tucked the last T-shirt into his suitcase, and he flipped the lid closed, then rested one drug-stained hand on the back of my neck. “I don't want to leave you,” he said.

I kissed his gaunt, beautiful face, not liking that I was getting used to the way his looks and scent had changed since he started taking Asarum. “I know,” I said. “But it's not forever.”

“No,” he said, “it's not forever.”

And I repeated it to myself: he wouldn't have to be like this forever. But with Simon's warnings about Asarum ringing in my head, I just hoped I was right.

Simon was waiting downstairs, his suitcase packed. He was dressed in the camel hair coat he'd first shown up in, and the sight of it made my heart break. I hadn't known him long, but he'd been an amazing guardian. Like the nerdy but cool, young uncle you always wished you had. I couldn't believe I was losing him along with Bennett. I threw myself at his chest, hugging him hard.

“I'm going to miss you so much. And I don't think I've ever said thank you.”

“Bloody hell, Emma.” He grinned at me. “Stop before you make me cry.”

Natalie stormed into the foyer. “Bloody hell is right. What the fu—”

“Natalie!” I said, cutting her off. Not that I minded her swearing, but I knew the Sterns were around and didn't want them thinking any worse of us.

She strode to the front door and leaned against it, crossing her arms. “You can't go. Neither of you. I won't let you.”

“Natalie—” Bennett started.

“We're a team,” she interrupted. “We need to stay together. You're letting them break us up.”

“I
am
them now,” Simon said. “I'm only doing—”

“Emma needs you both,” she said. “You know Neos is coming back, and every time he comes back, he comes back stronger. I can't protect her—I can't even protect myself!—and I'll be damned if she gets hurt because she's worried about me, so no, you're not leaving. You're not going anywhere.”