Shire Bottom Chronicles

Chapter Seven

Rose shot awake to a pounding on her front door. If it was Cat, she would have just let herself in, and if it was a delivery man, they would only have knocked once. Whoever this was had no sense of boundaries. She glanced at her phone, noting it was a little after six p.m. Groggily she stretched, climbed out of bed, and walked to the front door. She inwardly groaned, seeing her obnoxious brunette friend through the peephole. Of course, it was Allie.

She sighed. Even twelve hours of sleep wasn't enough to deal with her talk about Jessica and whatever the Cat story of the day was, but obviously, Allie wasn't leaving. Rose took a deep breath before opening the door. Maybe she should just let Allie look around. What could it hurt?

"You won't believe the day I've had!" Allie barged into the apartment and flopped down onto the couch without so much as a hello. "Jesse and I went to lunch at Chinatown and Rory was there for a work meeting, and she invited us to sit with them. Turns out, Komazzi and Bane are planning a restoration project at the Hellborne House. If they start messing with the ruins, they're going to disturb the spirits of all those people Catherine Kaliwse so viciously murdered!"

"What? Rory invited you to her work lunch?" Rose didn't buy that for a minute. Rory couldn't stand Allie any more than Rose, there's no way she would allow Allie to interfere with her job.

Rose walked into the kitchen and pressed the start button on the coffeemaker. While the coffee brewed, she sat on a barstool at the island and unwrapped a double chocolate chip muffin. She had bought a dozen muffins from the local bakery and they were so good. The owner, Todd Pillsbury, was always coming up with new recipes.

"Well, she didn't try to stop us so she might as well have." Allie shrugged. "Anyway, I practically had to save her life when she had an insulin reaction. She fainted and nobody else knew what to do, but luckily Bo Gibbs was there and I ran and got him. Jesse and I left right after that because Jesse needed to go back to work. Later, I drove out to the Gibbs' property, and I had to call Josh to help me since Jesse won't answer my calls. I have no clue what's up with him."

"Why were you at the Gibbs' place?" Rose asked. "I thought you worked until 4:30." She poured the steaming coffee into a mug and added milk and sugar. She made a mental note to call Rory later and confirm Allie's story because you never knew when she was fabricating things or not.

Allie joined Rose at the counter and helped herself to a blueberry muffin. "Dr. Valentine took the week off for a golf tournament. Don't tell anyone, but I snuck into Bo's house and I discovered a bunch of weird stuff!" Allie whispered, despite the fact they were the only ones in the apartment besides Cerberus, and he obviously wasn't going to tell anyone. "Books written in an unknown language, and really old photographs of Bo's grandfather and a man and woman who look exactly like Cat and Bane." Allie brought the photos up on her iPhone photo gallery and slid the phone across the table for Rose to see.

Rose scrolled through the photos Allie had taken. The lighting was dim, but if she zoomed in, she could see a striking resemblance to Cat and Bane. "Allie...I can't explain these photos, but you know trespassing is illegal, right? What if someone had caught you? I don't have the money to bail you out of jail and I don't think your parents would be too thrilled about it either, with having to help Earl and Lydia raise their daughter."

Bzzz. Bzzz. Allie's phone vibrated, and Rose couldn't help but read the message.

Josh 6:20 p.m: Hey, we still on for pizza? I'm starving!

"Is that Jesse?" Allie grabbed the phone from Rose and was disappointed to see it was just a text from Josh. Jesse currently worked the day shift at Evermart, and he should have gotten off work at five, but he wasn't at home when she got back at five-thirty. Her mom thought he might have picked up an extra shift, but when she called Evermart, he wasn't there. It wasn't like Jesse to go this long without contacting her. Something was wrong. She sent a quick text to Josh.