Came Back Haunted (Experiment in Terror #10) - Karina Halle Page 0,75

don’t…succumb to destiny, as they say.”

“What kind of ritualistic way?” Dex asks.

“I came home from school one day and found my father spread out on the kitchen table, set up like an altar, cut up into different pieces.”

I nearly choke on my coffee, my hand shaking as I lower the mug.

Holy shit.

No wonder Atlas is so fucked up.

“I thought I had it bad,” Dex says, whistling under his breath.

“You still had it bad, Dex,” Atlas tells him, and I don’t bother asking how he knows that about Dex. I’m assuming he knows everything about us going forward. “Don’t let someone else’s horror story diminish that. Besides, I still had my mother.”

“Did your mom go to jail?” I ask.

He gives me a patient look. “When you know black magic, when you go that far, you can do anything. No, she didn’t go to jail. She was able to glamor her way out of things, tell people what they wanted to hear. No one liked Victor much anyway, so when she told them that he just up and left us, no one bothered to double-check and track him down.”

“So where does Harry come in?” Dex asks. “Because that man looked like he’d be terrified of Count Chocula.”

He gives a genuine, albeit close-mouthed, smile for once. “She married Harry because he was in love with her and he was the safest, most boring person she could imagine. She had him so glamored, so wrapped around her finger, that she could do anything. And it helped, since she was cursed. Or, is cursed. Still.”

“Cursed?” I repeat.

He nods. “Yes. This is the problem.”

I look at Dex again, who raises his brow.

This is a lot to take. First Atlas and his ever-changing eyes telling us how his violent father was murdered via ritualistic black magic (which might account for how Dex found his leg on the wall), and now that his mother is cursed.

“Please explain,” I say to Atlas, spinning the coffee cup around in my hands.

It doesn’t make me feel good to see a wash of trepidation come over him. I can’t imagine Atlas getting scared easily, especially when we’re sitting in this slice-of-Americana diner.

“It was her punishment,” he says carefully. “I don’t know from who. I don’t know if it’s a thing that just happens when you cross a line, when you evoke dark sources. But the curse isn’t just a concept. It’s a thing.”

“What kind of thing?” Dex frowns.

“A demon,” he says softly.

I’ve got ice water in my veins. My hand automatically goes to my chest.

“You’ve seen it?” Atlas asks me. Oh, he knows I’ve seen it.

I nod. “I think so.” My voice comes out squeaky.

“Terrifying thing, isn’t it?” he comments, sipping his tea. “So that’s what we both had to live with. It became attached to her by a leash, never letting her go. She was forever chained to it.”

“So she doesn’t keep it on a leash.”

A sad smirk. “No. It keeps her on a leash.”

“And Harry…” Dex prods.

“Harry couldn’t see it,” Atlas says. “But I could. And of course my mother could. So she tried to live with it until she couldn’t. She killed herself in the bathtub, with a razor blade, hoping it would drown the curse with her but…” He sighs, putting the mug down, staring into it, eyes searching the water like he’s watching something in it. “Now she’s bound to the house. With the curse. Forever.”

That almost sounds sad, except for the fact that she keeps trying to kill me.

“So you wanted us to free her,” Dex says. “Is that it?”

“Harry did. Harry was compelled by her after death. Obsessed with her. It was all her own doing, all in her control. She knew she would be free if you could do it, so she made Harry contact you. Give you money. Give you anything.”

“But you want us to free her, too,” I tell him.

His smile is strained as he looks up at me, his eyes wavering between grey and green. I’m suddenly very aware of his pain. “I do and I don’t. I do because she’s my mother and I love her and I’m still in so many ways compelled to do this, and I don’t because she’s cursed and she’ll hurt people and I’m fucking afraid of her. Black magic never leaves you. It changes you, corrupts you, ruins you.”

“She’s compelling you?” Dex asks quietly after a minute.

His eyes close. “I don’t think I’ve slept in years. She’s always there, in my mind, telling me