The Ringmaster (Harrow Faire #4) - Kathryn Ann Kingsley Page 0,2

but the “why” was the important part. So it wasn’t a lie. Not entirely, anyway.

“Uh-huh. Sure.” Aaron leaned against the doorjamb, looking off thoughtfully. He didn’t seem to care in the slightest that all he was wearing was unflattering underwear. The man truly had no shame. “Well. I hope it helps. I…she’s a good kid, Simon. I don’t know if you’re capable of this—but try not to screw this up. If there’s any bit of compassion left inside that black heart of yours…try to protect her. Try to be good to her.”

“What else do you think sent me here to you of all people?” Simon lifted his eyebrow. “Please. Think before you speak. It’s embarrassing.” He turned and walked away, heading down the stairs. He’d return to Cora’s boxcar and waggle the foul substance in the flask underneath her nose in an attempt to rouse her. If it didn’t work, he wasn’t sure what else to try. Perhaps pour it down her throat or up her nose?

He paused. Something nagged at the back of his mind. It needled him. He sighed. He turned his head to look back at the Barker, who still stood in his doorway, leaning against it, eyeing him scrupulously.

He tapped his fingers on the flask, feeling the liquid slosh about inside the metal container. The muscle in his jaw and his neck twitched involuntarily. He felt ill and wished his sudden nausea were due to the lingering stinging odor in his nose.

It wasn’t.

It was the words that wanted to boil forth from his stomach like bile. Maybe it was like poison—once purged, the sickness would clear. Keeping it down would only make it worse.

So he said them.

Even if he really, really didn’t want to.

“Thank you, Barker.”

Cora was getting really sick of having visions. They really weren’t her thing. They usually meant trouble. Okay, sure, fine, that one dream she had with Simon’s shadow was sexy and enjoyable, but the rest of them generally wound up with her covered in blood and screaming.

In this one, she was sitting on the bench of an old-fashioned wagon. It had wood-framed sides and a canvas-covered roof, like something an eighteenth-century trader might use. She could hear the wheels quietly grinding as they trundled down the dirt road. Trees surrounded them, and the sky was overcast. It smelled like it had recently rained. Birds in the trees were peacefully chirping away.

She couldn’t see any powerlines, buildings, or anything else. The trenches in the dirt road didn’t look like tire tracks, but the grooves caused by wood wheels. She was beginning to suspect she shouldn’t just ask where she was—but when.

There were two horses in front of her. One was black with a white mane and tail, and the other was white with black. Perfect inversions of each other.

She let out a long, beleaguered sigh. She knew how this was going to go. This wasn’t going to be a sexy dream, was it?

Someone was sitting next to her, holding the reins of the horses. It took her a solid second of taking in her surroundings before she noticed they were there. That was odd. Usually that was what came first.

The man’s bald head was dotted with a light stubble that revealed he hadn’t shaved it in a few days. He was balding, and likely shaved to make it less noticeable. It looked fine on him, all the same.

He might have been old. He might have been young. He had one of those faces that was hard to tell. Bags under his eyes and creases at the corners told her that he had done as much smiling as he had done fretting in his life. Clearly, he’d seen a great deal in his years.

He was dressed in clothing that she recognized thanks to a trip she took to Sturbridge Village when she was a kid. Whenever she was, it was pre-Victorian. Colonial. Great. Always wondered what it would be like to get shot by a musket.

Blue eyes flicked to hers, and he winked at her. He smiled, lopsided and friendly. His expressions came fast, but unlike Simon’s mania, they seemed to be genuine. “Hello, Cora.”

She recognized his expression before she did his voice. She was used to seeing him with all the face paint. “Clown?”

“Mmm.” He looked off into the woods for a second. “No. Not really. I’m dead now. Finally.” He chuckled. “Took long enough.”

“Then…how?”

“Because all we are in the end are our memories. We’re what we leave behind. And my memories