Free The Ravaging in Between (The Reanimation Files Book 3) by A. J. Locke Page A

quiet for an unnerving amount of time, his face half hidden behind his steepled fingers. His eyes narrowed into slits as he stared at me, and his body was tight with tension. Finally, he lowered his hands and I braced myself for his verbal explosion. But to my surprise, he was calm when he spoke. Which just put me more on edge.
    “My brother does not exist anymore. Not as a human, nor a ghost at peace on the other side. He simply…does not exist. That’s a very interesting truth to have to accept, Ms. Vanream.”
    “I know…” I said shakily. His demeanor and the tone of his voice were making me want to get up and run as far away from this building as possible.
    “You know, my brother and I had not been very close these past few years. After my father gave Affairs of the Dead to him instead of me, it cast a sour note in our relationship. Recently, it had been getting better. And when I had to deal with his death and subsequent existence as an anchored ghost, you can imagine how difficult that must have been. On the one hand, my brother was dead. On the other hand, his ghost was still around and would be permanently. Or so I thought. Now you bring me a story of an obsessed ghost who took drastic, unheard-of measures just to claim you as his own. What is it about you, Ms. Vanream, that drove my brother to such a place?”
    I wasn’t sure he actually wanted an answer so I remained quiet. My brow was damp with sweat and I felt a bead of it slip down my back.
    “Now my brother is gone. No longer can we work on mending our relationship. The company our father spent decades building, and Andrew spent the past few years making even stronger, is just about ruined. I came here to try and save it, but as I’m sure you’ve gathered, there’s not much to save. My family’s company, our legacy, is forever tarnished. All because of you.”
    “Mr. McNabb, I understand all of that, I just really don’t know what to say.”
    “Save your words,” he said, voice low. “There is nothing you can say. Did I mention that even my sister-in-law is dead because of you? But of course you already knew that. The way Andrew treated Cecelia because of you was despicable. I thought if I met you in person I could see some spark of what he saw in you, but I’ll admit I fail to.”
    I let the insult slide. Jacob was in a lot of pain, but it was high time I got out of here. I knew no good could come from this meeting.
    I rose from my chair and was thankful that Jacob didn’t snap at me to sit back down. “Mr. McNabb, you aren’t a fan of me and you shouldn’t be. I can’t apologize enough for what I’ve inflicted on you and the McNabb name. I know it won’t change anything, but apologies are all I have. And now…” I started to edge away from the chair. “I think that I should probably go.”
    “Yes.” Jacob stood up and buttoned his blazer. He moved around the desk and I backed up even further. “It was very enlightening speaking to you, Ms. Vanream.”
    I did not like the utter calmness in his tone.
    “It put a lot of questions that I had to rest.”
    “Um, great. That’s good…I’m glad. Have a…great day.”
    “Same to you, Ms. Vanream.”
    I left that office as quickly as I could. The tone of Jacob’s voice could not have conveyed more how much he detested me.
    I released the breath I’d been holding and hightailed it out of there with my box of crap. I barely said good-bye to Amy and didn’t feel better until I was sitting in my car. I did not want another face-to-face encounter with Jacob McNabb again. I could not stand the weight of emotions coming from a man who blamed me for his family’s downfall.
    After I took a few moments to shake that meeting off, I switched my focus to something more important. Finding Ethan. Ethan could be halfway across the world at this point, but it would give me a small amount of ease to do something to find him. If Ethan was still here and trying to hide out, it was likely that he