Page 7 of Ghost Hunted

Time crushes you. Time drives you to your knees.

But time also makes it easier to learn to hide your pain.

When I speak again, there’s no sign of that emotion in my voice. There hardly ever is, anyway.

“If I hear you’ve had even a drop of alcohol, young lady, I’m flying over to Oregon to ground you.”

I pause, waiting for her reaction. My lips are already twisting into a smirk, imagining her eye roll. But instead, when she speaks again, she sounds nervous.

“We-e-ell… here’s the thing.”

“The thing,” I echo.

“Yeah, the thing. The thing is… uhm… I’m not in Oregon anymore.”

“You’re not…” I interrupt myself, suddenly growing very cold. “Piper. Please tell me that’s a joke.”

“Uhm, it’s not. Don’t be mad at me. But how could I stay in Oregon when my mom called me?”

“Piper! She’s not your mom!”

Again, my voice sounds far too harsh. I love my daughter to pieces, but fuck, how can she possibly be so oblivious? Doesn’t she realize how much danger she’s putting herself in by leaving her safe house?

I start stalking around the room, panic making me walk in circles. I do my best to try to smooth over the harshness in my voice that I know terrifies her. “Piper, I’m not losing you…”

“Don’t worry,” she tries to reassure me, though her shaky voice makes me want to reassure her. “It’s not like I’m in any danger. Coltello’s dead, and you told me the mobsters that remain are like a joke, now… I don’t know why I have to be in hiding anyway. I’m sick of it. I mean, I love the place in Oregon, but I don’t want to be stuck there for the rest of my life. What’s the big deal? Besides, it was my mom on the phone. I just know it was.”

“You silly girl…” I bite my tongue, not wanting to yell at my daughter, let alone call her names. She reminds me of her mother. Is she truly so thoughtless, or does some part of her want to provoke me? “Piper, where are you? I’m going to get a plane and send you right back—”

“So, I’m downstairs, actually. On the ground floor of Devil Tower. The receptionist won’t let me up without a visitor badge. I told her I’m your daughter, but she doesn’t believe me.”

It takes a huge amount of self-control to keep myself from throwing my phone across the room. I’ve tried so hard to protect my daughter by giving her a new identity and sending her far away from Astley, and then she waltzes right back and shouts her real name from the rooftops.

“You should come down quickly, by the way,” she adds, “because Quill’s got his gun out and he’s two seconds away from shooting the receptionist, if she doesn’t let us up.”

“Quill,” I repeat in disbelief. I’m aware my daughter’s thoughtless, but I had higher hopes for her psychopath boyfriend. “Alright, Piper, pass him the phone. Let me have a word with the idiot.”

“Don’t call him an idiot…”

“I’ll call him a lot worse, if you don’t pass him the phone. In fact, I’ll call him a lot worse, period.”

She lets out an exasperated sigh, and then I hear static as she passes the phone to him.

“Yeah—”

“Hey, you fucking piece of shit, what the fuck are you thinking, bringing my daughter back to Astley? Have you gone fucking insane? I knew I shouldn’t have trusted you with her. Fuck!”

I let out all my rage on him, spewing a string of insults that would leave anyone else quaking. But I know it won’t have the slightest effect on him.

“Are you finished?” he says coldly, once I’ve run out of swear words. “We’re downstairs. Can you send us up?”

“I’m about to send you down. Six feet down in the ground, to be specific.”

I slam shut the door to my office and walk down the carpeted hallway toward the elevator. I’ve grown used to it, but ever since I reconnected with Piper, all the old thoughts have come hurtling back. I see everything I built from the perspective of the power-hungry teenager who had nothing. But that hadn’t stopped me, back then, from believing I was on top of the world.

And I was pretty close to getting there. It took just one night of bloodshed to win the fight for power. While I’d been in hiding with Lia, Damien had been busy bringing as many people to our side as possible. It took one night to win, and a few years to solidify our power. We left the slums of Oakley behind and founded our empire in the neighboring wealthy town of Astley.

As soon as the elevator dings and the doors open, I march out into the large downstairs space, where a receptionist sits in the middle of the room behind a thick desk. Three men are standing around, probably waiting for meetings, but their eyes are all fixed on one point. On Piper and Quill, who are standing in the very center of the room. On Quill especially, because he’s got his gun fixed to the receptionist’s head.