that won’t leave no matter how many times I swat at it.”
“Rude,” I muttered, before peeking around him into the manor. “So, are you gonna let me in?”
Another sigh left his lips and he turned away from me, leaving the door open so I could follow behind him. Smiling, I walked into the house and went to shut the door but gasped when my hand went through a cold spot.
“Hello again,” the little ghost boy said, waving up at me. He had materialized in front of the door. “Sorry I made you hurt your head when we played.”
I rubbed at the spot on impulse. A scab was over it now. “Uh, it’s okay.”
He faded from sight, yet I heard his footsteps as he ran from the room and toward the hallway on the left side. Another laugh joined his, this one feminine.
“Still want to wander around in here?” Z asked, smirking. “There are many more who want to meet you.”
“You can’t scare me away that easy. You’re stuck with me.”
“Pity.”
“Okay, what’s your damn problem?” I asked. “You weren’t this big of an asshole when we fucked all over my house.”
That got a reaction out of him. The aloof attitude broke and his blue eyes flickered with shock. “Such a vulgar tongue you have. Men in my day had more class than that. Well, unless you were uncouth and uncivil. Men of any degree of respect would never utter such vulgarities aloud.”
“Men in your day, huh? I thought you didn’t remember your life from before,” I tested him.
His mouth closed. He knew he’d been caught. He spun around and headed for a corridor to his right.
With a grin plastered on my face, I followed him. My eyes had adjusted fairly well to the dark, but I was thankful when Z lit a candlestick and handed it to me. Light flickered on the walls as we moved down the long corridor. We walked straight for a while before veering to the left, then again to the right.
“Do you ever get lost in here?” I asked, already having forgotten the direction we’d come from.
“No.”
“Why is it like a maze?”
Z stopped beside a marble statue and turned to me. “I heard the original owner had the home specifically built to suit his tastes. He became bored much too easy and liked the challenge the winding corridors provided. There are countless hidden passageways in this mansion as well.”
“Dude, that got me excited. I’ve always wanted to find a hidden doorway or passage. Like the ones you can only find by pulling a fake book on a shelf or touching a secret spot on the wall. Then when you go in the room, you find, like, treasure or something else awesome.”
Humor danced in his eyes. “You are easily amused, aren’t you?”
“Is that your old-fashioned way of calling me simple minded?”
Z didn’t answer. He just smiled and continued walking.
Asshole.
“Yes. The mazelike corridors and hidden rooms are quite intriguing to an outsider, I’m sure,” Z said, his voice more solemn than before. “I feel his son believed otherwise, however. Rumor has it Arthur used to shove his son into one of the rooms and see if he could find his way out. Some rooms require a puzzle to unlock the door, you see. The boy would bang on the walls for hours, begging to be released, only to be met with silence.”
My heart sank. “Was that boy you?”
Z came to a stop. His shoulders tensed, and he turned his head to the side, giving me a view of his profile. God, he looked sad. “That is no concern of yours. Now, hasten your steps before you’re left behind.”
He took off again, quicker than before.
“Where are we going?” I asked, walking faster to catch up with him. While I wasn’t as scared of the mansion as I used to be, I still didn’t want to be wandering the corridors by myself at night.
“You said you wanted to know me. So, I’m showing you my favorite room.”
“Oh.”
Why did that make my stomach flutter?
After what felt like an endless loop of walking and turning sharp corners, we finally reached a closed door. Z passed right through it before I heard a soft click from the other side, then the door creaked open.
“I’m not certain how much you’ll be able to see in the dark,” Z said, as I entered the room. “You should come here during the day next time.”
At first, I could only see a bunch of shelves and the