I throw myself into his arms, hugging him tightly. “I already did,” I say. “I know the truth—I woke up on the side of the road, but my brother and father”—I start to whimper—“they’re still here, so I came back.” Elias’s body goes rigid, but I keep talking. “Then I saw Kenneth and I threatened him. Told him we were leaving. I was so stupid.”
“Shh . . .” Elias soothes me, murmuring that I need to calm down. He holds me until I quiet, my breathing settling into hiccuped gasps. Elias slips his fingers into my hair, cradling me as he rests his cheek on the top of my head. His embrace is comfort. It’s misery and grief. “This isn’t your fault,” he murmurs. “Lourdes lashed out, and now her punishment is to exist how she really is. It’s painful, but she’s already healing.” Elias holds me closer, and I’m trying to comprehend his statement. “You’re still going home, Audrey.”
I furrow my brow, wondering what he means by “how she really is.” Slowly I pull back and lift my eyes to his. He’s been crying, and I can see he’s scared. Scared for Lourdes and me, scared of Kenneth. But a new question has formed, one that goes back to the first day we met. “Elias,” I ask, stepping out of his arms. “How did you get here?”
He stares at me, the color fading from his complexion. Before he answers, a faint voice whispers my name from inside the room. It’s ragged and agonized, and I turn immediately, realizing it belongs to Lourdes.
“She’s awake,” Elias murmurs, and rushes into the room.
Awake? How is that possible? The burns were too horrific, she couldn’t . . . I let the reality fall over me. This is the Ruby. It’s all possible. It’s all terrifyingly possible.
My skin is tight from dried tears, my eyes ache from crying. Slowly I walk into Lourdes’s room and see her lying on the bed. Unmoved. Joshua is close by on a folding chair, and Catherine has taken up space against the wall. Tanya lies across the headboard with a washcloth, dabbing white ointment on the bits of Lourdes’s skin that are still intact.
I crouch on the floor, close to her. The acrid smell of burned flesh slips down my throat, and I close my mouth and put my fingers to my nose to try and block it out. Elias sits carefully on the edge of the bed. To my surprise, he picks up Lourdes’s charred hand and brings it to his lips, kissing it tenderly. “She’ll be okay,” he whispers, watching her. “Lourdes always pulls through.”
“Always?” I repeat.
“This wasn’t about you,” Catherine says, tipping off that she was listening to my conversation in the hallway. “You wanted to know why we obey Kenneth. This”—she motions around with her hands—“is what happens if we don’t. Eli’s deluding himself. Even when Lourdes recovers, Kenneth’s not finished. He’ll send her away again. There’s no limit to his cruelty.”
“Quiet,” Elias says simply, not taking his eyes from Lourdes. I follow his gaze, fighting the urge to scream again. Lourdes’s pupils slide in my direction, and sickness bubbles up in my stomach. She’s awake, and I can’t imagine the pain she feels, the absolute agony.
“Don’t cry,” she rasps. The soft sound of her voice fills me with a mix of relief and sorrow, and I wipe my cheeks where new tears have fallen. Despite her condition, I reach out to take her hand. It’s rough and brittle like a twig, and I’m careful not to squeeze too hard.
Elias stands and rights a chair from the floor, signaling for me to sit there. I do, and lean on the edge of the bed to comfort Lourdes. The staffers who were waiting in the hall tell Elias it’s time for the party, but he waves them away and shuts the door. He grabs another chair and sits next to me. The room is a funeral, weighted air filled with grief.
Braver, I look over Lourdes’s condition: the melted earlobes, the oozing flesh on her shoulder. I still. How she really is?
I shift my eyes to Tanya, remembering when I noticed the blood on her shirt that first day. My heart pounds against my ribs, and I turn to Elias. He’s trying to anticipate anything Lourdes might need. Attentive. And I’m starting to understand. I saw the crack in Daniel’s skull. Daniel, with that exact injury as he lay broken and lifeless on the side of the road. How he really is.
Oh, God. I know how Elias got here. Lourdes said that their group had been together for a long time, and Joshua said the party was in Elias’s honor. I couldn’t see it then. Wake the Dead at the fountain, the details of the fire, and the endless nights of parties he’s required to attend. Elias was in that ballroom fire in 1937. He’s dead. They’re all dead.
I carefully set Lourdes’s hand on the bed, overcome with the truth. These are the ghosts of the Hotel Ruby. They’ve been the ghosts all along, and I’m just a passerby who happened to get in an accident outside their gates, mine and my family’s souls coexisting with theirs.