Ghoul Friend Read online

  Ghoul Friend

  Meredith Spies

  Copyright 2021 by Meredith Spies.

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  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without the prior written permission of the copyright owner, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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  This is a work of fiction and any resemblance to people, places, or situations, present or past, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and unintentional.

  Contents

  Author’s Note

  Additional Credits

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  16. Epilogue

  Comin Soon

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  About the Author

  Author’s Note

  Potential Triggers in this book include mentions of murder, descriptions of death and dying, acts of violence, and passing mentions of homophobia, both internalized and external. While most of these acts occur off-page, many are described and may be triggering for some people.

  Additional Credits

  Editing and Proofing by Cate Ryan

  Beta Reading by Kirk Waites with LesCourt Author Services

  Cover and Promotional Art by Samantha Santana with Amai Designs

  Acknowledgments

  THANK YOU!

  Thank you so much to Cate Ryan, who has dragged this into shape and helped make this into something wonderful.

  And Jennifer Conklin, keep going. I love you frond.

  And Alec and Spawn: Thank you for laughing at my bad jokes and not laughing at the weird hair. At least not where I could hear you.

  Chapter 1

  Julian

  “Come on! It’ll be fun!” CeCe said, pushing the razor-thin laptop towards the other side of her desk, where I sat with Ezra and Oscar. “Just look at it.”

  “I’m having flashbacks to the night I lost my virginity to Devon Crenshaw,” Ezra muttered. Oscar snorted beside me. “If she tells me to ‘just take it,’ I’m leaving.”

  “That’s more like the night I lost my virginity to Devon Crenshaw,” Oscar sighed.

  CeCe snorted. I was overcome with a weird, unwelcome pang of envy for something that happened before I even knew Oscar existed. He slid a glance my way and reached out to pat my knee, giving it a little squeeze. “Don’t worry—it wasn’t even as good as it sounds.”

  “Anyway,” I muttered, warmth suffusing my face as his fingers lingered a moment longer than appropriate considering we were at work, “what are you trying to pressure us into?”

  “That’s exactly what I said when Devon Crenshaw popped ‘round for some Xbox and said he had an idea,” Ezra whispered loudly.

  CeCe barely hid her smirk. “Definitely nothing as outré as that. No, I just think it’d be a lot of fun if y’all filmed the road trip.”

  “Wait, road trip?” I leaned forward. “You know how I feel about road trips, Cec.”

  She rolled her eyes. “He thinks they’re inefficient and a waste of time and resources. But really, he just gets carsick because he insists on reading while someone else drives, so the best way to avoid that is make him do the driving.”

  “It’d be for the best,” Oscar said solemnly, though his eyes crinkled in amusement. “I still try to turn into the wrong lane here.”

  “Seriously? You’ve been here for months and you still turn in to the wrong—”

  “He’s fucking with you,” Ezra interrupted my growing disbelief. “He just hates driving.”

  “It’s boring,” Oscar agreed. “Especially in a new place. I’d much rather be the human Labrador and stick my head out the window to see the new sights.”

  “And smell the new smells,” Ezra intoned. “Sniff all the butts.”

  “This just took a turn for the disturbing again,” I muttered, sinking back into my seat. A few months ago, I’d have laughed myself sick if anyone had suggested this would be something I was doing—sitting in my sister’s production office while discussing the upcoming filming of a paranormal investigation show I was part of. No, I was a respectable professor of cultural anthropology at a small but progressive college in Louisiana! I was published, I had a growing presence in my field, I… fucked up and had a fling with my head of department’s boyfriend and ended up getting sacked and my name blacklisted across academia and had to get a low-paying job as a substitute teacher at a tony prep school.

  And got pressured into taking an insanely well-paying gig as the ‘professional skeptic’ on my then brother-in-law’s show when that didn’t pan out. We were only one episode in to the series and it had been an unmitigated disaster, except for one thing. Between the poisonings, the arrests, the attempted murders, I’d managed to become kind of, sort of, involved with (in)famous medium and honest-to-God believer in things that go bump in the night, Oscar Fellowes. I was the Scully to his Mulder, and it was my job to find the real-world explanations. So far, I’d been able to find plausible reasons for almost everything he’d come across.

  Almost.

  “Who pissed on your pant leg?” CeCe asked.

  “Huh? Oh, sorry. Mind was wandering.”

  “The way you were staring at Oscar, I kind of figured,” she teased.

  Beside me, Oscar cleared his throat, his cheeks a little pink. “I was saying that a road trip does sound fun. We’ve never been to Texas, and the concept sounds interesting.”

  “The concept of Texas?” I asked, making a face. “As a native Texan and long-time resident, I can say that the concept is interesting, but it often lacks in its execution.”

  “No, you twat.” He laughed, turning the now-open laptop to face me. “We film little vlog episodes between here and Denver.”

  “I picked out a few routes for y’all,” CeCe added. “Several stops along each at sites of historic interest, most reputed to be haunted, and also some lesser-known locations. Y’all feel free to look up some others if you’d like—I want y’all to be excited about this!”

  Ezra was beaming at me with a shade of wickedness. “Oh, I bet Julian’s all kinds of excited, aren’t you? He seems the enthusiastic sort!”

  “Keep it up, and next time we have a horror movie marathon I’m slipping in Veggie Tales.”

  He made a face. “You monster!”

  Oscar and CeCe watched us volleying back and forth, and CeCe broke into a huge smile. “This is exactly what we need on the show, y’all. Bring this energy to the next episode! And this,” she tapped the laptop’s screen, “is gonna help. It’s exactly why I want y’all to do this.”

  “Because you enjoy watching them snark?” Oscar asked, one brow creeping upwards. “I don’t think you need a road trip for that.”

  CeCe’s smile wavered and she sighed. “Look, here’s the problem. Well, one of them. The channel’s been great about all the changes and has been on board with me taking over with my production company, new as it is. Frankly, I think they feel the morbidly curious will tune in to the first episode as the news about Jacob and Mark’s trials gets out. But they’re worried about the chemistry between you. All of you,” she added. “Julian…” she trailed off.

  “Let me guess,” I sighed. “I’m too stiff? Boring?”

  “Rude,” she muttered. “They don’t like how you’re a bit brittle with Oscar and Ezra. I assured them it was nerves and not, you know, you.”

>   Shame and annoyance washed through me even as Oscar squeezed my knee and said, “I don’t think you’re rude. Well, not to me anyway. Then again, I’m English and have a different perspective on what constitutes rude.”

  “Don’t get fussy with me, Julian,” CeCe started, but I waved her off.

  “No, it’s fine. I get it. We need to be a cohesive unit on this, and if people don’t like what they’re seeing, they’ll either hate watch or turn it off. And hate watching only gets you through so many episodes.”

  Just ask several formerly popular Netflix series how hate-watching turned out for their viewership.

  CeCe nodded. “Exactly. I mean, I think you get it, but I still don’t trust you. So, consider this a team building exercise to find your groove before we film in Denver, and the vlogs are going to be a great promo tool. Stacia in PR thinks a revival of the whole vlog thing is right around the corner and has an early aughties kind of retro vibe to it.”

  A sharp knock fell on her door and CeCe smiled. “Harrison! Come on in!”

  Harrison Temple, who I’d jokingly called her pet lawyer over the past several years, was actually a junior partner at the firm CeCe had put on retainer shortly after coming into her inheritance. Harrison had stuck to her like glue when the other partners, junior or otherwise, had been dismissive of a young woman with big business ideas and unabashed enthusiasm for life. CeCe often said she was going to hire him away from the firm one day. He always politely demurred, but I was thinking maybe that wouldn’t last much longer. He definitely had a spark for Ezra, and Ezra seemed rather taken with him as well. Harrison took up a perch on the side of CeCe’s desk and gave Ezra a lingering look before clearing his throat and turning his attention to the rest of us.

  “Nice of you to join us,” CeCe said, her lips curving into a smile. Harrison turned a shade of pink I wasn’t aware was in his repertoire, the blush at odds with his professional appearance. “What’ve you got?”

  “All of the contracts and paperwork are in place for the shoot in Denver. I have some standard non-disclosure agreement forms for y’all to take on your road trip should you need them, and an official business credit card for necessities.” He paused, then added, “You’re all adults so I don’t think I need to give you the this is what a necessity is and is not speech, do I?”

  Oscar turned on the innocent charm. “I don’t know. I think maybe Ezra might have some needs that require a thorough explanation.”

  Ezra’s two-finger salute as he sank down in his chair made Oscar cackle. Harrison’s blush turned a concerning shade of red as he shuffled through the papers in his hand. “Well. Yes. Okay then. In the meantime, er. I do need to speak with Ezra, if you have a moment? You’re still running point for you and Oscar in terms of PR, correct?”

  Ezra straightened, all business now. “Yep. What’s up?”

  Harrison stood and motioned for Ezra to follow him. “Just a few things we need to clear up and have in place regarding the move from YouTube to UnReality.”

  CeCe managed not to do a little happy dance until they were both out of the room. “I knew it,” she whisper-shouted. “I bet they’re hooking up by the time y’all are done in Denver!”

  Oscar shrugged. “Maybe, but Ezra’s not one to jump in feet-first. He’s…” he trailed off. “Well. Ezra is Ezra, and that’s his business.” He darted me a glance. “Do you need us any longer today, CeCe?”

  She sat back in her chair and looked between us, her expression slipping back into serious business mode. “It’s not my business but I have to ask. You two gonna be okay with everything going on? I know, when we got back from New York, y’all were starting a thing but I wanted to be sure y’all were cool and we’re not gonna have any drama.”

  My face heated. Fucking Rey was going to haunt me forever, I thought bitterly. “CeCe—”

  “Nothing to do with Rey,” she said. Tapping her temple, she added, “Twin telepathy, brother mine.”

  “Or maybe I’m just predictable.”

  “Bit of both. But no, I just want to be sure we’re not going to have some massive fall out to cover, or the need to spin some awkward break up vibes into some narrative arc for the show so people won’t ask questions about why two of the stars are trying to avoid one another.” She pierced us with her direct, stern gaze. “So. Are you cool?”

  Oscar shifted uncomfortably beside me, his velvet pants dragging on the velvet fabric of CeCe’s office chairs and sounding incredibly loud in the quiet room. “As you said, it’s not your business. I understand why you feel you had to ask. Not only is Julian your brother but this,” he waved a finger around to take in not just her office but the entire enterprise we were involved in now, “is your reputation. Our reputation. And no matter what happens between Julian and I, we’re professionals. And we’re not going to ruin your show.”

  “So… her show?” I asked as the elevator creaked its way up to the third floor of the extended stay motel we’d taken rooms at. The sweltering heat of a Houston summer had managed to infiltrate even this far into the building, past the blasting AC, to settle into the un-air-conditioned elevator shaft and make us both sweat as we regretted our choice to skip the nerve-wracking concrete steps up to the rooms.

  “She was in boss mode,” he muttered. “She’s scary when she’s in boss mode.”

  I snorted. “Yeah, she’s had that mode since we were kids. I have stick up the ass mode, she has boss mode.”

  Oscar grinned softly, bumping me with his shoulder as the elevator finally shuddered to a halt on our floor. “Speaking up things up your arse…”

  “Oh my god!” I smacked at his arm as the doors slid open with surprising speed.

  “I’m sorry,” he laughed, throwing his hands up. “The heat’s ruined me! I used to be suave and charming and now listen to me!” We were walking towards my room, I noticed. The suite he shared with Ezra was at the other end of the corridor. Ezra had stayed behind ostensibly to go over paperwork with Harrison, meaning we had an hour or two before he returned and wanted to go to dinner or hang out.

  Ezra, bless his heart, was sometimes like the little brother I never wanted. But he and Oscar were a set, and if I wanted Oscar in my life, Ezra was a given.

  And, damn it, I was getting to rather like the guy.

  “So… And I feel like a damned teenager asking this, but do you want to come in and watch a movie or something?”

  “Or something,” Oscar agreed. I slid the key card to my door and as soon as the light turned green, we were inside. He had his hands on me, sliding up the back of my neck to pull me into a kiss as we kicked off shoes and I struggled to toe off my socks. Oscar laughed into my mouth and pulled away so I could divest myself of the damned things while he—far more gracefully—tugged his own off and tucked them neatly into his shoes by the door. The hotel room wasn’t very large, just a sitting area big enough for a squishy chair and a low wall that blocked off a small, euphemistically termed kitchen with a tiny fridge and a microwave that had such low wattage I was pretty sure it was in the negative digits. But the bed was very big and soft and was easy to find without much effort while kissing Oscar, both of us drawn together the moment we’d thrown our sweaty shirts aside.

  “Why do you always wear an undershirt in this weather?” I asked between kisses. “Aren’t you dying?”

  “Can we talk about my sartorial elegance later? Right now, I’m more focused on getting the clothes off than the choices that led them to be on our bodies.” His fingers plucked at the button on my trousers and I helped, pulling him down on top of me as we got to the bed. I wiggled out of the damn things while he did some complicated maneuvering to rid himself of the tight, velvet stovepipe trousers he’d been wearing. “Okay, so maybe I’ll cut back on the velvet until fall.” He didn’t give me a moment for a rejoinder, swooping in for another kiss as our sweaty bodies moved together on the bed. “Can I?” he asked when we came up for air again. His fingers moved down my side, barely enough pressure to be felt, an
d he reached my hip. “If you’d rather not, it’s fine,” he added. “But I’d really like to fuck you, be inside you this time.”

  My breath shuddered out in a rattling gasp. “Please. Yes, yes, I want that.”

  We’d had sex—quite a bit and quite good, actually—since Bettina, but between having privacy issues and both of us trying to find our footing with the other, we hadn’t made it past the hesitant stage into I know what you like and can read your body language well enough to just go for it stage.

  It took a few minutes to find what we needed—I had unpacked but couldn’t remember if I’d put the lube in the bathroom or kept it tucked in one of the drawers, and the condoms seemed to go invisible until Oscar threatened to go out and buy more, then I found them in a drawer we’d already looked in twice. Finally, finally, we were back on the bed. Oscar stretched out beside me, long and pale and smiling like some fantasy come to life, puckish grin and clever fingers teasing me without words. I was achingly hard, and so was he. I closed my eyes and tucked my chin down, pressing my forehead to his as he reached between us to take me in hand and start working me up more. His whispers beneath my chin were unintelligible but still sending tiny sparks of fire spinning through my veins. When his fingers moved lower, teasing the skin of my sac before dipping behind, finding the cleft of my ass and stroking me there, I breathed his name against his skin. His smile against my throat sent another little thrill of excitement chasing through my tired body. I can do anything, so long as that feeling never goes away, I thought. So long as I could feel Oscar’s smile on my skin, his breath against my ear, I could do anything.