Another Reason to Believe

Chapter Twenty-Six

2012-02-10T07:00:00.000-05:00

They made it to the Historical Society in record time. The truck was barely stopped when Ang flew out of the vehicle. Keys in hand she ran for the front door. She flung the door open and raced to her desk. Richie shook his head at her retreating form, and stopped at the door to pull her keys from the knob. He ushered Marty in ahead of him, and closed the door. Ang was digging through her desk drawers, muttering to herself. Half a minute later, she came up with another small key. “Follow me!” she called as she flew up the stairs.

She went all the way to the third floor, and came to a skidding halt at a bolted door. A box of disposable, thin cotton gloves was mounted next to the door. With shaking hands, she unlocked the bolt and threw the door open; snagging a pair of gloves before rushing into the room. She pulled her gloves on as her eyes scanned the cabinets and tables in the space. With a smile, she crossed the room to an antique highboy dresser. She pulled out the third drawer from the top and peered inside. She exhaled sharply, glad that her memory hadn’t failed her.

“Angel Rose Summerlin,” Marty said, grabbing Ang’s shoulders and turning her around to face him. “Just what are we doing here? What are you looking for?”

“Not looking for,” Ang said, shaking him off and turning back to the dresser. “Found.” She held up a thin gold chain with a delicate oval locket suspended from it. “I can’t believe I didn’t make the connection before! This will help, I just know it.” She beckoned the men over to look inside. “This is James,” she said, indicating the boy. “And these girls are Hope and Joy.” She had tears in her eyes. “These are Kirstin’s children. My ancestors.”

“My God,” Marty said. “Wherever did you get this?”

She shrugged. “It was always here, at least as long as I’ve been here. I’ve always had a pull to this piece of jewelry, and I never knew why. Now I do.” Ang looped the gold chain around her neck and closed her eyes. “Kirstin,” she murmured, “we’re coming to help you.”

They left the Historical Society as quickly as they arrived, locking up as they went. When they turned into the driveway, Richie noticed that barely an hour has elapsed. As they approached the house, the sun was shining brightly, and it seemed that its rays were concentrated on the dormer window that was Kirstin’s study. When they stepped out of the car, the air was warm and clear. As soon as they crossed the threshold, however, things were different.

There was a coolness in the air; an unnatural breeze that caused gooseflesh to rise on their arms, and an uneasy energy that caused the fine hairs on the backs of their necks to stand on end. When they went back upstairs to the study, they were shocked to see that the sunlight, though from outside seemed to pour into the room, did nothing but reflect off the window. The study was in deep shadow.

“Holy Mother of God,” Marty intoned, crossing himself.

The men looked to Ang for guidance. She had her hand clasped around the locket so firmly Richie thought she would tear it from the chain. Her eyes were glazed over, unfocused, and Richie was afraid of what she was seeing.

The Past

When the hole was full, when there was no trace of Kirstin left, Jeremiah sat and wept. When dusk fell, he gathered the shovel and himself, and walked to the lake. He stared out over the water for long minutes. “You had no reason to treat her like that,” he said to his now-dead brother.

Turning from the lake, Jeremiah started down the path that would lead him home. He stuck close to the side of the lane, afraid he’d be seen if he walked down the center. Simple as he was, even Jeremiah knew that a bloodied up man carrying a shovel would be known to be guilty of something.

In his mind, his brother’s death was a necessity. It was not a sin to protect the innocent from the evil. He felt in his heart that his God would understand. He knew just as certainly that his father would not. Jeremiah would not be able to go back home once Isaiah was found missing. He sighed unhappily, prepared to leave the only home he ever knew.

Not too far from his father’s land, Jeremiah heard the voices. Men’s voices calling Kirstin’s name. He turned to look behind him, but nobody was following him. He moved off the path, standing under a great oak tree. There was no way he could get Kirstin’s ring to Geoffrey without being seen. Not now. He simply could not risk being caught. Nobody would believe that it was his brother who killed the sweet woman.

Jeremiah pulled Kirstin’s locket from his pocket and opened the clasp, adding the ring to the chain. He fastened it again, then looped the long gold links around his neck. He gripped it in his hand and said one more prayer for her soul.

Then he tucked the necklace into his shirt ran.

The Present

Ang stood there, her hand clasped around the locket for a long time. Her eyes were closed, and her mouth was moving slightly, as if she was saying something, but neither Marty nor Richie could tell what. Neither wanted to break the spell Angel Rose was under; they wanted this all just to be over. But Richie decided that if she didn’t come back to them soon, he was going to break into her fugue, and damn the consequences.

“What do you suppose she sees?” Marty asked quietly.

Richie just shook his head, unwilling to take his eyes off Angel Rose.

Angel Rose was deep in the rhododendron field, the sweet smell of the blooms nearly overpowering her. She was on some sort of path and was picking her way gently along; stepping over roots and stones. “Kirstin?” she called. “Are you here?”

“I am,” she answered.

Angel Rose whirled around, surprised to hear the voice coming from behind her. “This is yours, isn’t it?” She indicated the locket.

Kirstin’s eyes teared up. “It is,” she said softly, reaching for the locket. Angel Rose quickly took it from around her neck and opened it, holding it at arm’s length so Kirstin could see the photographs of her children. “It has been so long since I’ve seen my babies,” she said sadly. Looking up at Angel Rose, Kirstin said, “You are close to where I’ve been laid to rest,” she said. “Come with me, I will show you how to find the path.” She held out a hand, and waited for Angel Rose to take it.

“I’m afraid,” Angel Rose said shaking her head. “Afraid that if I take your hand, I won’t be able to let it go.”

Kirstin smiled sadly. “It will be so much easier for you to lead the men to this path if you allow me to guide them. I have walked this path a thousand-thousand times, and could lead them to it quickly.”

“As could I,” Angel rose answered softly, “if you could just show me the way.”

Kirstin sighed. “Follow me,” she said, and turned her back on Angel Rose.

Ang looped the locked around her neck again and followed the specter down the path and out of the field. She saw they were near the lake, almost exactly ninety degrees from the path that led back to the house. She turned around and looked behind her, fully expecting to see a path cut into the shrubbery. She saw nothing but a wall of green and purple.

“It’s overgrown,” Angel Rose said.

“Yes,” Kirstin agreed, “which is why you need me. You need me to show you where the entrance is. You need me to lead you to where I was buried.”

“Who buried you? Was it Jeremiah? I heard you call his name as you were struck. Is he the one who killed you?”

Kirstin just shook her head. “I cannot tell you these things, but I can show you. Take my hand,” she implored again. “I promise you that I will let you go once you find me.”

“I can’t; I’m afraid,” Angel Rose answered.

“You must,” Kirstin insisted.

Angel Rose watched Kirstin approach, and couldn’t seem to make her legs move.

Richie watched as a subtle change come over Angel Rose, her features relaxing, and her posture straightening. He thought back to that morning, when Ang was worried about Kirstin joining with her; and wondered if that was what was happening now. He hoped not. As he scanned Angel Rose’s face, however, he had a sinking feeling in his gut, and crossed the room to stand next to her. He touched her arm gently, and cringed at how cold her skin was “Angel?” he said, tentatively. “Angel Rose, talk to me. Please, sweetheart.”

Ang opened her eyes and smiled at Richie. This smile was different, more serene than he had seen it. Richie’s blood ran cold when he looked into the eyes of a woman he recognized, but didn’t know. “Kirstin?” he whispered softly.

“I am her, and she is me,” Angel Rose said in an inflectionless tone. She shook her head, and for a moment, Richie saw a glimpse of Ang, struggling to come to the surface. The hand on the locket loosened, and Ang’s voice came through, strong and clear. “We don’t have much time, Rich. If we can’t find her soon, very soon, I won’t be able to separate from her.”

“Where is she?”

“I am in the rhododendron fields,” Kirstin answered, her grip re-established on the locket. “I can show you the way.” She put a hand up to Richie’s cheek, and he violently flinched away from the icy coldness of her palm. “So warm,” she murmured. “It’s been so long since I felt something so warm. Oh Geoffrey!” she wailed, and tore herself away from Richie. She left the room sobbing.

“Sweet Baby Jesus,” Marty said, crossing himself again. “What do we do?”

“We grab the shovels, and we follow her. No way am I losing Angel Rose.”

The men hurried from the room and down the stairs. On the front porch, they paused only long enough to grab the shovels they had left there the night before. Angel Rose was walking down the path that led to the lake. They rushed to catch up with her, and flanked her as they came to the water. Ang turned and followed the lakeshore, scanning the thicket of rhododendrons.

“This looks so different,” Kirstin said. “This may be harder than I thought.” Her expression shifted, and a frown creased her brow. “It is not difficult,” Ang said angrily. “Find the hole.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

2012-01-30T07:00:00.000-05:00

Ang sat for a long time, just staring out the window. She had Richie’s words circling around in her head. She wanted to believe they’d find Kirstin. NEEDED to believe that. If she started to doubt, well there was just no telling what could happen. She longed for first light, when Marty had promised to return and help continue their search. She felt her eyelids growing heavy with waiting. When Ang slipped into slumber a little before dawn, Kirstin was waiting for her.

"Why won’t you let me help you help me?" Kirstin asked, reaching for Angel Rose.

Ang jerked away from her long, cold fingers. "I am trying to help you," she said. "Letting you in is not the way."

Kirstin’s voice was a low, seductive whisper. "But it will be so much easier if I can just show you WHERE I AM."

"So show me. Show us. We want to help you." Ang watched Kirstin deflate, folding in on herself. "We are open to you," Ang said. "Just not that open."

"You are strong," Kirstin said. "You could let me in long enough to find me, then you could let me go." Her tone was hopeful, and her face was as guileless as a three-year-old’s.

"I am sorry," Ang said. "I just can’t."

Kirstin sighed. "Then you must find me quickly," she said. "The pull to join you is strong." She touched the side of Ang’s head, and for a moment, Ang felt her resolve weaken. She wrenched away from her touch and felt warmth rush over her face. She awoke with a start, as the sunlight caressed her cheek.

Ang stood and shook her head, struggling to rid herself of the dream. She looked up, and saw Richie still asleep. "Wake up," she said loudly.

There were general grumbles as he slowly came to consciousness. "Angel Rose, darlin’, it’s just barely morning!" Richie said when he finally managed to get his eyes open.

"We have to figure out a different way to help her. Searching the acreage isn’t the way," Angel said. "We’ll never find her before she binds to me irrevocably. We have to find another way. There’s too much out there, and you’re right, Richie, things – the landscape – will surely have changed by now."

"What else can we do?" Richie asked.

"I don’t know!" Ang said, exasperated. "Maybe there’s something of hers we can use. Maybe there’s something that will give us, me, a deeper connection to her without letting her into my head. I know she can show us the way if only the channels were clearer."

"Like those psychics you see on the police shows on TV?" Richie was incredulous.

"Do you have a better idea?" Ang asked, whirling on him. "If you do, I’d LOVE to hear it."

Someone knocked at the door. Richie shook his head and crossed the great room to answer it while he looked at his meager possessions scattered throughout the space. "Darlin’, I toured this place before I bought it. There was nothing in it. Nothing in the attics or the cellars, or in any of the rooms. Well except for the study."

"Mornin’," Marty said with fake cheer in his voice. He held up three cups. "I brought coffee." He looked Richie over and smirked. "Looks like someone could use a cup."

"Marty, you are a lifesaver," Richie said, taking a steaming cup of brew from the older man. "We were just trying to decide the best course of action for continuing the search."

"I think we need to find something of Kirstin’s," Ang said, refusing to give up on that idea.

"Is there any chance," Richie said, "that anything was left behind?"

"From that long ago?" Marty asked, shaking his head. "I doubt it. The place was thoroughly cleaned before it listed – at least this last time. I assume it was cleaned before prior listings as well. Unless the cleaning crews kept whatever they found, which is very unlikely, the place was completely empty."

"But what about in Kirstin’s room?" she asked. "If Richie couldn’t get in there, maybe the cleaning crews couldn’t either."

"For all this time?" Marty countered.

"Will it hurt to look?" Ang asked, getting testy.

And that’s how Ang, Richie, and Marty found themselves upstairs in Kirstin’s study, sifting through the rubble. They were looking for something – anything – that would act as a sort of divining rod to Kirstin. They’d been searching for half an hour, but found nothing but papers and splinters. Even the key, the key that Kirstin had slid under the door to Richie was gone.

"This is hopeless," Marty said, kicking at a pile of papers. "This house hasn’t been completely vacant since Geoffrey packed up the children and left. There were others here. Anything of value found in this house, sentimental or otherwise, is long gone." He wanted to know the outcome of Kirstin’s tale as much as Richie and Ang did. He had to know which of his ancestors had killed the poor woman. The lack of progress was making him antsy and angry.

"Hey!" Angel said, pushing a sweaty hank of hair from her forehead. "There HAS to be something here I can use to get closer to Kirstin. The alternative is far too scary."

Richie had to agree. The alterative was for Ang to let Kirstin deeper into her head, into her mind, and hope to hell Ang kept the strength to push the spirit out after the fact. He supposed he could dig up the entire estate looking for Kirstin’s grave. Given the choice of alternatives, he didn’t want Ang to go through with the former. Richie was seriously considering the latter.

"I just don’t want you getting your hopes up, Missy," Marty answered. "If there’s nothing here, you’re going to need a ‘Plan B’."

Richie spoke up. "Look, Marty, let’s just keep searching. Kirstin chose to stay in this room for a reason, right? It stands to reason that –"

"Reason?" Marty asked, incredulous. He stood up, looking down at a crouching Richie like the younger man was insane. "REASON? You think there’s reason behind this? Or that what, now you’re an expert? You don’t know anything!" he shouted. "This is a colossal waste of time."

Richie stood too, towering over the other man. "I heard you," he practically shouted. "I said we can’t call it a waste until we finish."

Marty’s face darkened. "Do not raise your voice to me, young man," he said, poking a finger into Richie’s chest.

"Keep your hands off me," Richie retorted, slapping Marty’s hand away.

"HEY!" Ang shouted, stepping up between the two men. She put a restraining hand on Richie’s chest and pointed at Marty. "That’s enough. Marty, if you don’t want to be here, you know where the door is." She stood there between them waiting for them to calm down,

Marty sighed. "Sorry," he said. "I guess this feels like whole lot of ‘doing nothing’."

"We’re doing the best we can," Ang said softly.

Marty circled the room, ranting like a petulant child. "But we’ve been up here for over an hour." He kicked another stack of papers, sending them flying. "We haven’t found anything useful at all! We should go back out to the thicket; keep working on the path." He kicked at a large chunk of wood, sending it sailing across the room.

The broken piece of chair hit the wall, making a solid, slightly metallic thud. The three of them stood slack-jawed, staring at the mark the wood made on the wall. Finally, Ang broke the silence. "What the heck was that?" she asked. "That was not the sound of something hitting a lathe-and-plaster wall." She crossed the room, and started knocking all around the area where the chair had hit. Sure enough there were different sounds around the area of wall. There was obviously something behind it. Ang looked at Richie, an unspoken question in her eyes.

Richie looked around at the wreck of the room. "Go ahead, Angel Rose," he said. "Whatever you want to do, it can’t make this room too much more of a disaster area than it already is."

Ang pressed a quick kiss to Richie’s lips. "Thank you," she said, and ran from the room. Marty and Richie stood there in silence until they heard her footsteps come pounding back down the hall. Ang skidded to a halt just inside the door holding a fireplace poker. She held it in both hands, angled across her torso like a spear.

Richie smiled. "You look like you’re ready to go off to war," he said.

Ang smiled back. "I feel like I’m getting ready to fight a war," she answered. "Whatever happens next with Kirstin, it won’t be easy."

Richie took the poker from her hands. "Whatever happens, I’ll be there right beside you," he said, hefting the iron bar and tapping its end against his open palm. "Now, let’s break something."

He strode to the wall where Ang had heard the strange sounds. After making sure that an outlet hadn’t been added to the wall, he plunged the point of the poker through the wall. He pulled, tearing off a fair chunk of wall. "Sheetrock," he said. "Looks like this wall has been replaced once already."

Marty stepped forward. "Whatever is in this hole may be something from a more modern time than the Maddoxes." At Ang’s angry look he hastened to add "I’m just saying."

"And maybe it isn’t," Ang answered. "Just be quiet."

Richie continued to pull pieces of the wall away until he had a hole large enough to stick his arm into. He didn’t want to risk damaging whatever may be back there by just poking holes in the wall, so he reached in and felt around with his fingertips. They brushed against something that was definitely not wood. "Holy shit, there’s something in here," he said.

"Pull it out!" Ang shouted.

Richie started to methodically pull away parts of the wall until he could better reach the item. The original lathe-and-plaster wall came down with the Sheetrock. "Looks like they just put this wall up over the existing one," Richie muttered to himself.

"Oh, please hurry!" Ang pleaded.

Richie reached his arm into the hole again and wrapped a hand around a small handle. He lifted the object, and pulled it toward the hole. As he drew his arm back, the object came with it – a metal lunchbox. "Ang honey, I’m sorry." The metal container was still relatively clean and definitely not that old. "This isn’t Kirstin’s." He flipped the latch and lifted the lid. "There’s nothing in here except some costume jewelry," he said.

Ang was so upset she nearly cried. "Damn it!" she swore. "Damn, damn, DAMN!" She tore the box from Richie’s hands and upended it in the center of the floor. Dropping beside the meager pile of beads and paste, she pawed through it quickly looking for something, anything that would be helpful. "NOTHING!" She scattered the small pile, sending the pieces skittering around the room. One piece stopped it’s skid in a beam of sunlight. The light reflected off the faux-diamond pendant hanging from a silver-plated chain.

The glints of light hit Ang squarely in the eyes. "Damn, that necklace is blinding – OH!"

Richie looked at her, his pity turned to curiosity. "What?"

"The necklace!"

Richie scooped it up and examined it. "Honey, this isn’t that old."

"Not that necklace, you big goof; THE necklace!"

"What the Sam Hill are you talking about, Angel Rose?" Marty asked. "What necklace?"

Ang was already running out into the hall. "Come ON!" Ang called frantically over her shoulder. The two men shrugged and hustled after her. By the time they got downstairs, Ang had flung the front door open and was racing toward the truck.

"Ang, darlin’," Richie said, "where are we going?"

"To the Historical Society building," she called. "Hurry!" She looked inside the truck to see her purse on the floor and hoped her keys were inside. She repeatedly pulled on the handle of the truck’s door, and growled when she found it was locked. "You’re out here in the middle of nowhere and lock your freaking door?"

Richie chuckled. "I am not from here, darlin’. People steal things in LA." He fumbled the keys from his pocket and hit the button on the fob to unlock the doors. Ang jumped in, grabbed her purse, and dug through it, muttering under her breath until she found the key ring she was looking for. She jiggled it in her hand, the four metal keys clanging together as they lit out for town.

Chapter Twenty-Four

2012-01-20T07:00:00.000-05:00

Richie couldn’t sleep. Every time he closed his eyes, he imagined Kirstin, dirty and bloody, her peach dress torn, reaching for him. "I asked you for help," she begged. Finally, unable to stand it anymore, he carefully extricated himself from Ang’s arms and stood, stretching out his back before leaving the room. She hadn’t wanted to go home. She said she had wanted to be back out there, literally at first light. Richie hoped to hell she would change her mind.

He went upstairs to Kirstin’s room and pushed a pile of rubble aside to sit against the wall. Almost immediately, he felt uneasy and tense.

"Kirstin, where are you?" he asked the room, not really expecting a response.

He sighed and leaned his head against the wall, letting his eyes lose focus as he tried to remember the dream he had when he first stayed at the house. Was it really only a matter of days since that dream? Richie shook his head. He sat there for hours, turning the dream sequence this way and that in his mind, trying to find something, anything that would lead them to where Kirstin was buried.

He was getting frustrated. Try as he might, all he could really remember was the arm poking out from the bushes, grabbing him.

"Wait a minute," he said, excitedly. "Poking out from the bushes! We’ve been looking in the wrong damned place!" He felt a sense of calm wash through him. "That’s it, isn’t it?" he said to the room. "Kirstin, I swear to you, we will find you."

Back in Richie’s makeshift bed, Ang was dreaming. Kirstin was calling to her, crying for her, begging her to keep looking. "Why can’t you find me?" she wailed.

Ang was heartbroken. "I don’t know," she answered. "We are trying, I swear to you, we’re trying. I need more help, more guidance."

Kirstin approached Ang. "There is a way," she said, and reached out with outstretched fingers. "Trust me," she said. "I can show you where I am if you just keep still." As Kirstin’s fingertips met Ang’s face, a bone-numbing cold began to permeate her body. Kirstin was trying to fuse herself, her spirit, to Ang’s soul. If she did that, Kirstin’s thoughts and memories would be Ang’s, and Ang would be able to find Kirstin easily.

"NO!" Angel shouted, sitting upright. She shook off the last vestiges of the dream only to find it wasn’t really a dream. She could feel narrow fingers of cold pulling away from her thoughts. "Why?" a voice said in her head. "Why...."

"Angel, what happened?" Richie had bolted down the stairs and to her side when he heard Ang’s cry. He dropped onto the mattress by her side and wrapped his arms around her. She was shaking and cold. So cold.

"It’s getting stronger," she told him. "Kirstin’s getting stronger. At first it was just troublesome memories. Little snippets that plagued my awake time. Now she’s trying to reach me when I sleep; trying to bind herself to me." She started to cry.

Her mind was a quirky thing; she had learned that long ago. It could allow conversation with a spirit, or could relinquish control on her psyche and let the spirit take over. The possession, the total abandonment of self, was something she had thus far been able to stave off. At best, letting another soul take over hers would be ill-advised, but at worst, it could be catastrophic. She, Angel Rose, could be lost forever. She’d heard stories of people deemed to be mad because they thought they were someone else. In some cases, a few cases, they truly were mad, but in others, most of them in fact, they really had become the spirit to whom their bodies had become hosts.

Angel did not want to become Kirstin Maddox. She was quite happy being Angel Rose Summerlin, gift notwithstanding.

But the fact remained, she found herself losing part of her essence to Kirstin. Every dream, every vision, she could feel the other woman winding her threads of self around Ang’s. It wasn’t malicious, it just was. It was the only way the spirits knew. She felt Kirstin becoming part of her and it scared her half to death. Ang felt, felt so deeply in her bones that she knew, that Kirstin was doing this because they weren’t helping her fast enough, that there was MORE that needed to be done.

"What happens if she does that?" Richie asked her, half-knowing the answer already.

"I become her," Kirstin said. "I mean, I’ll talk like I’m her, having her memories and oh Richie, I don’t want that to happen!" She pushed away from Richie’s chest and shook him by the shoulders. "I don’t want to disappear!"

"Shhh, we won’t let that happen. All we have to do is find her."

"I know," Ang said, getting angry. "But we can’t find her." She looked at her watch. It was coming up on five in the morning. "Soon it will be light. We have to go out and finish clearing the path. We have to find her grave."

Richie suddenly remembered the revelation he had up in Kirstin’s room. "Honey, I don’t think she’s under the path," he said. He recalled the dream to her, explaining how Kirstin’s arm had thrust out from the bushes to grab him. "That has to mean that she’s buried in the thicket of bushes, not along the path, right?"

Ang thought for a moment. "Yes, I think it would." She said. "But," she started getting excited. "We know she took off down the path; we followed her that way. We still have to clear it off, but now we know what we have to look for!"

"We do?" Richie asked. "How are we going to find her if she isn’t in the path? That’s a lot of bushes out there."

"I know," Ang said, "but think about it. Whoever buried her probably didn’t drag her too far into the shrubs. He wouldn’t have wanted there to be any trace. He must have buried her in an empty spot. A – a – void in the bushes. We just have to look for that void!"

Richie smiled at Ang. It sounded so simple, that should be easy to do. Except. "Hell, Angel," he said cautiously. "I’m no scientist, but wouldn’t the void be filled now? I mean, surely in all the time since she died, she’s been, uh, well, taken back to the earth you could say."

"Yeah, and?"

"And," Richie really didn’t want to discourage Ang, but he didn’t want her being disappointed when they didn’t find anything, either. "Well, wouldn’t things have grown over her grave?"

"Probably," Ang agreed reluctantly. "But the bushes are pretty thickly packed; not too much sunlight." She shook her head. "Nope, I believe there’s a place to look." She got up and strode to the window, willing the sun to peek over the horizon. "Now we just have to wait for the damned sun to come up." She put her chin on her fist, fixed her gaze on the horizon, and waited.

The Past

When it was done, when Isaiah was on his way to the bottom of the lake, Jeremiah went back into the woods to his friend’s grave. "I am truly sorry for my brother’s sins." He looked down at her mud-streaked face and cried. He didn’t want to leave her there, but what choice did he have? If he carried her back to her house, Geoffrey would surely believe HE had killed her. No, he decided she had to have her funeral now. But not here. Not in the place where Isaiah had terrified her and killed her. She had to go somewhere different; somewhere pure.

He walked along the path, but everywhere he looked, all he could see was his brother’s face. He veered off the path into the bushes, breaking a few branches as he went. He had to find someplace...here. He came to a place where two bushes had tangled together, making a canopy of flowers. Underneath was a mossy bed, almost fit for a princess to rest on. Grinning, he ran back to get the shovel.

He carefully dug the moss up, setting it aside so he could put it back on her grave when he was done. Then he dug.

Finally, he went back to where he had left Kirstin. He knelt by her side and took her hand. "I’m sorry I cannot take you home. You’re the best friend I ever had, and you should be home. But I can’t. But I found someplace pretty for you to be. I promise." He started to weep as he gathered her gently in his arms. He walked slowly through the bushes, not wanting anything to snag on her hair or poke at her skin.

When he came to the grave, he stopped at the edge and looked down. It looked so dark and scary in the hole. He put Kirstin on the pile of moss and stripped blooms from the bushes around him. Not too many; because he didn’t want to get caught, but enough to line the bottom of the hole. He picked her up again, and transferred her delicately onto the bed of flowers. He straightened Kirstin’s clothes, and crossed her hands over her chest. After dropping a few more blooms around her, he took Kirstin’s hand and said a prayer for her soul. Then he sent up another prayer that she would understand what he was about to do.

With shaking hands, he pulled Kirstin’s wedding ring from her hand and put it in his pocket. Geoffrey would want this. Jeremiah would give it to Kirstin’s widower before he left. He took the locket from her throat, the one she had shown him with her children’s pictures tucked inside, her most favorite thing, and put that in his pocket as well. That he would keep for himself.

Then after saying one last message of goodbye, and putting a mostly clean rag from his pocket over her face, he started to bury her.

Chapter Twenty-Three

2012-01-10T07:00:00.000-05:00

Richie led them to the edge of the dense copse of shrubbery. They fanned out and looked for any break in the foliage, but could find none. Ang called out, "Look at the bottoms of the shrubs," she said. "The branches may be overcrowding the path, but the roots will show the way."

They did as she bid, and fifteen minutes later, Marty called out, "I think I found it!" Richie and Ang ran to his side, and crouched down to get a better look.

"Yes," Ang said excitedly. "This definitely looks like it used to be a path." She started tearing at the branches, trying to make a hole big enough to squeeze through.

"Wait a minute," Richie said, pulling Ang back from the shrubs. "Shouldn’t we start from the house? Work our way into this from there?"

Ang shook her head and pushed Richie away, not wanting to stop. "It doesn’t matter. If she’s in there, we’ll find her." She continued pulling at the branches; throwing her whole body weight against them when they didn’t snap easily.

Richie again tried to stop her, this time clamping his hands around her wrists and turning her to him. "You’re going to tear your hands open doing that."

Ang shrugged him off. "We are so close," she said. "I just know it. If we could just..." She set to work again, frantically pulling furiously at the tangled overgrowth.

Rather than try to argue with her, the men shared a look and waded in, helping to remove some of the thicker branches. They quickly had cleared a path going a several yards into the shrubbery.

"This is going to take forever!" Ang lamented, starting to cry as they moved further into the thicket. "We’re going to lose the light!"

"Angel Rose," Richie said, pulling down another thick branch. "When we lose the light, we will start fresh in the morning."

"That’s right," Marty said. "We won’t give up. I for one really want to see if we can find her. Imagine. Being able to say we solved a hundred-year-old mystery. How thrilling!"

Ang turned on Marty, fire flashing in her eyes. "We are not just solving a mystery!" she cried. "We are finding a lost soul, helping a wandering spirit..."

"Angel Rose," Richie said patiently, "he didn’t mean anything by it. I think you’re a bit overwrought. Maybe we should stop and rest, and come back in the morn—"

"Overwrought? Screw you. No," she said, sniffling, looking past Richie into the dark tangle of leaves. "We will keep going until we can’t see anymore. Then you will go and find flashlights and lanterns and maybe a machete or..."

Richie grabbed Ang and gave her another little shake. "ANGEL ROSE!" he shouted. "I know this is important, but it’s too important to do wrong. What if we miss something in the dark? Huh? What then?"

Ang’s eyes slowly refocused on Richie’s. "I can’t stand that she’s in here, somewhere, all by herself."

"We don’t know that she’s even here," Marty said.

"Oh, I do," Ang answered. "I can feel it. Something happened in here, mark my words." She sighed. "Alright, we’ll work until dark. But at first light, I’m coming back."

"And I’ll be with you," Richie said. "I promise."

They worked hard, sweating with the effort of their labor. They had made it nearly a hundred yards before it was too dark to see. Ang’s hands were so battered; she was tasked with dragging the branches up the path and out by the lake as Richie and Marty pulled them down. Her last trip back, she stumbled on a root and cried out as she fell.

"That’s it," Richie declared. "It is now officially too dark to keep going tonight." Ang started to argue, but Richie was having none of it. "The last thing we need is someone getting hurt."

Ang’s shoulders slumped. "I know. You’re right. Enough people have gotten hurt in here already."

"People?" Marty asked. "You mean more than one person was hurt here? You really think so?"

"Not think so, know so," Ang replied. "Can’t you feel it?"

The Past

"Isaiah, what are you doing?" Jeremiah was confused. Why was his brother hurting his friend? He stood, transfixed, while Isaiah’s hands closed tighter around Kirstin’s throat. He saw her eyes start to roll back as she croaked his name again.

His brother glared at him. "Now, Jeremiah."

"Jeremiah, please," Kirstin said once more, then she was still.

Isaiah shot a triumphant look at his brother before turning back to Kirstin’s body. "If you’re gonna stay, you may as well help me dig, boy," he said, clawing into the dirt. He heard a noise behind him and turned to see a tree branch speeding toward his face. "What the—" was all he got out before impact.

Jeremiah wiped the spray of blood from his cheek. He had broken his brother’s nose with that branch and Isaiah was out cold for the moment, but he knew that wouldn’t last long. He also knew that once Isaiah told their father what had transpired in the rhododendron fields, he, Jeremiah, would face the brunt of their father’s wrath.

He knew he had to work fast.

He knelt by Kirstin’s lifeless body and shook her. "Kirstin!" he shouted. "Please, wake up!" Her head just lolled to the side, and he felt sick at the marks that surrounded her neck. "Oh God," he wailed. "Kirstin!" He hugged her close for a moment, mourning the loss of his friend.

Jeremiah knew he couldn’t leave her here; he couldn’t leave her out for the animals to find. He also knew he couldn’t bring her out of the woods. He knew that people would blame him. They wouldn’t believe him when he told them that Isaiah killed her. Everyone knew he was sweet on Kirstin, and when she married Geoffrey it had broken his heart. They all thought that the grief would turn him wildly violent; after all, that’s the way his father was, and the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, does it? But they didn’t know that he would sooner cut off his own arm than to do anything to harm Kirstin. All he wanted was for her to be happy.

Now, he ran a gentle hand over her face. "I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you," he said. "And I’m sorry I can’t take you home." He laid her gently, reverently, on the ground and picked up the branch he hit his brother with. He dug the end of the limb into the moist earth, starting Kirstin’s grave. As he worked, tears streamed down his face as he apologized over and over for having to bury her here. "At least it’s so pretty here, Kirstin," he sobbed as he dug. It hurt his soul to see what his brother had done to the only woman who had ever shown him unconditional kindness. His only true friend.

When the hole was done, he sat back on his heels and looked at Kirstin. She was all bloody and bruised, and it broke his heart. She had never been anything but kind to everyone. She didn’t deserve this. Didn’t deserve to have his brother’s filthy hands all over her. Didn’t deserve to be dead. He prayed over her for a few minutes, begging the Lord to take care of his friend, and vowing vengeance for her senseless death.

A muttered curse had him turning toward his brother. He watched as Isaiah started to sit up, wiping blood from his face. "Damn you, boy, look at what you done. I’m going to kill you."

He staggered to his feet and advanced on Jeremiah. Jeremiah jumped up, but barely had time to register his brother’s big, meaty arm swinging around before he caught Isaiah’s fist with his mouth.

Isaiah laughed as his brother tripped backwards over Kirstin’s body and fell, landing bedside her. "That’s the first and last time you will ever lie with a girl, you bastard," he hissed.

Jeremiah scrambled to get up and nearly fell into the hole he had dug. Isaiah laughed cruelly. "Go ahead, jump in that hole. Save me some work. When I kill you, I’ll be nice and bury you with your whore."

"Do not talk about her like that," Jeremiah cried, his anger swelling until it consumed him. He scanned the ground around him and found a rock about the size of a ripe cantaloupe.

Isaiah sneered. "What are you going to do with that, little brother? You don’t have the brains or the balls to use it." He advanced again, smiling evilly. "I am gonna love beating you, boy," he said.

Jeremiah held his ground, waiting for his opportunity. Isaiah may be bigger and stronger, but anger made him stupid. He waited, lightly bouncing the rock in his hand while his brother circled closer, taunting him. When Isaiah threw the first punch, Jeremiah ducked, and used the rock as a ram, slamming it into his brother’s chest. Isaiah staggered backwards, in shock from the blow.

"Well, well, little brother," Isaiah said, rubbing his chest, "it seems you were paying attention all those years Pa beat you."

Jeremiah nodded. "I learned a thing or two about fighting dirty," he agreed.

"It really isn’t going to help you," Isaiah said, as he swung at his brother’s head. Again Jeremiah ducked, and this time spun around with the rock to hit Isaiah in the side. Jeremiah heard the satisfying crack of a rib, and smiled. Howling with rage, Isaiah swore, and advanced again.

Chapter Twenty-Two

2011-12-30T07:00:00.000-05:00

The ride to the house was short, but long. There was no chatter in the car; each occupant was lost in his own thoughts. As the house came into view, Angel Rose spoke up from the passenger seat.

"Marty, I think you should stay outside; at least at first."

"I have been in this house many times, and nothing has happened," he remarked. "Your ghost never so much as ruffled a curtain in my presence."

Ang turned in the front seat to face him. "Marty, I can’t explain it," she answered. "Maybe she didn’t know that you were there. She for sure didn’t see you; she couldn’t have. You would have known it if she saw you."

"All I’m saying is that there’s really no reason I can’t come in with you."

"But—" Ang started, but Richie interrupted.

"You’re right, Marty," he said, pulling up to the house and putting the gearshift into park. "Maybe if she sees you and Angel Rose together, once Ang tells her who you are, it will trigger a different vision. Maybe not. Either way, I want you to be very, very careful what you say or do. I will not be a happy man if you do something that makes Kirstin hurt Angel Rose."

They gathered on the front porch, and Richie put his hand on the knob.

"Ready?" he asked. Everyone nodded. "Then let’s go."

The first thing they noticed was that the house was a good fifteen degrees cooler than the outside temperature. Ang shivered and rubbed her arms briskly. "God it’s so cold in here," she murmured. "Kirstin is agitated."

Richie grabbed Ang’s hand and held on tightly. "Are you sure, absolutely sure, that you want to do this?"

Ang nodded. "It’s not ‘want’, Richie, it’s ‘need’."

The three of them ascended the stairs, noticing that it got cooler the higher they rose. By the time they hit the second floor, gooseflesh had risen on Ang’s arms. Richie wrapped an arm around her shoulder and tried to transfer some of his body heat to her. They approached a closed door. The door to Kirstin’s room. Richie squeezed Ang’s shoulder reassuringly and unwound his arm from her. He reached out to touch the knob and drew his hand back as a zing of electricity seemed to pass through him.

"What the hell?" Richie exclaimed, shaking his hand. He looked at his fingers, and saw his fingertips were blackened. "Jesus," he said.

Ang grabbed his hand and examined his fingertips. "This is not a good idea," she said softly, kissing the marks.

"The hell it isn’t," Richie said, pulling his hand back from hers. He wrapped his hand in the bottom of his t-shirt and poised it over the doorknob. With a muttered curse, he quickly turned the knob and flung the door open, ignoring the searing pain in his hand. He stood there agape, not quite believing what he was seeing. The room was in total disarray. Furniture was overturned and papers strewn around the room. The curtains were flapping in the window, and the rocking chair, Kirstin’s chair, was shattered into a thousand pieces.

"Oh my sweet Lord," Marty said, entering the room behind Richie. He looked around at the destruction. "Where is Kirstin?" he said, turning to Ang. "Is she here?"

Ang hadn’t yet entered the room. She was staring, slack-jawed, at the damage done. Her eyes scanned the room until they stopped on a shadow in the corner. "Oh no," she said, stepping into the room. She walked slowly toward that corner.

"What does she see?" Marty asked Richie. "Is that where Kirstin is?"

Richie shook his head. "I don’t know; all I see is shadow." He followed Ang across the room, and stopped just behind her. Ang reached blindly behind her, and Richie grabbed onto her hand. The instant their hands connected, Richie saw what Ang saw. He saw a huddled, scared woman, bloody and battered, cowering in fear. He watched as Kirstin looked up with a petrified expression on her face.

"Help me," she said. "Please."

"What’s happening?" Marty asked, coming to stand behind Richie and Ang. Kirstin looked at him and screamed.

"Jeremiah!" Kirstin shrieked, and Ang recoiled. It was the same tone, the same fright as what she experienced in her vision. Angel Rose blanched when she saw Kirstin reaching for Marty. "Help me, Jeremiah!" Kirstin cried. Richie and Ang looked at each other, then turned around to look at Marty.

Marty looked confused. He saw the looks of fright on Richie’s and Ang’s faces, but couldn’t see what they were so afraid of. "What are you two looking at?" he asked, turning to look behind him.

"You," Ang said. "Kirstin is reaching for you. Asking for your help."

"What should I do?" Marty asked, on the edge of unease.

"Give me your hand," Ang answered, holding out her other hand to the startled realtor.

Marty was hesitant, but grabbed on to the proffered hand, and gasped when Ang’s fingers closed around his. He now saw what Richie and Ang saw. "Good Lord, what happened to that poor creature?"

"Jeremiah?" A weak voice called. "Please help me."

Marty cringed for a moment when Kirstin reached for him, the tendrils of cold wafting from her. Very slowly, reached his free hand toward Kirstin’s. When they clasped, Marty shouted at the surprisingly strong grasp this ethereal creature had.

Richie felt the shock of the connection all the way through his body, and wondered how the hell Ang survived the jolt.

Angel Rose then saw clearly what she had missed in the first visions.

The Past

Crying and spitting blood, Kirstin begged the man attacking her for her life. "Please," she said. "Please, let me go back to my children. I will give you anything you want, just let me go home to my children."

"Shut up," he said, hitting her again, blackening her eye. He pressed his hand hard over her nose and mouth, and she couldn’t breathe. "Shut up or your precious children will be next." Kirstin grabbed his wrist and pushed his hand further into her mouth so she could bite him. He howled in pain, and reared up, shaking his hand. Blood droplets sprayed as he shook. Kirstin tried to lever the man off of her, but he was too strong. He grabbed her wrists and brought her arms down to her sides, pinning them with his knees.

His hands closed around her neck like a vice, choking off her airway. She started to get dizzy, and random images of her children and her husband floated through her head. She smiled at one memory, and the man got angry. "What are you smiling at, bitch?" he demanded, and loosened his grip long enough to smack her hard across the face. Kirstin snapped back to the present, and struggled anew when she felt his hands close around her throat once again. She was able to gouge his hand with her fingernails, but she was too weak to push him away.

As she struggled for breath, Kirstin tried to pull the mask away from the man’s face. She had to know who had done this to her. Maybe then she would know why. She caught the edge of the mask’s chin with a fingernail, and it slipped enough so she could make out her attacker. As her world started to turn black, she started to weep. She wept for her husband, her children, and herself.

Suddenly, she saw a glimpse of something, someone, over her attacker’s shoulder. A familiar face. She struggled against the pull if unconsciousness and tried to focus on another pair of green eyes. Kind eyes. "Jeremiah," she gasped in surprise. "Please, help me."

Her attacker turned toward Jeremiah. "Leave now, little brother."

"Isaiah, what are you doing?" Jeremiah was confused. Why was his brother hurting his friend? He stood, transfixed, while Isaiah’s hands closed tighter around Kirstin’s throat. He saw her eyes start to roll back as she croaked his name again.

His brother glared at him. "Now, Jeremiah."

"Jeremiah, please," Kirstin said once more, then she was still.

Isaiah shot a triumphant look at his brother before turning back to Kirstin’s body. "If you’re gonna stay, you may as well help me dig, boy," he said, clawing into the dirt. He heard a noise behind him and turned to see a tree branch speeding toward his face. "What the—" was all he got out before impact.

The Present

Ang jerked and twitched in Richie’s and Marty’s grasps. Papers and scraps of wood and fabric tossed around the room on their own. A horrible, high-pitched wind poured through the open window, even though the trees outside did not move an inch.

"What is happening here?" Marty asked, clearly scared. He couldn’t seem to pull his hand away from Kirstin’s, which terrified him even more. He watched as Ang’s color got low. He watched in horror as bruises and cuts appeared on Ang’s face. He struggled to pull his hand from Kirstin’s, but the icy cold grip was unrelenting. "Sweet Mother of God, what is happening to her?"

Richie swallowed hard. "She’s reliving Kirstin’s last moments."

"How can she stand it?"

Richie couldn’t answer, for he wondered the very same thing. He tried to slide his hand from hers, fully intending to pull Ang into his arms and flee the house, but he couldn’t get his hand free. Her grip was stronger than that of ten men, and she felt as unyielding as if she were carved into a mountain. Her strength, rigidity and immobility frightened him. Then, just as suddenly as the assault on the room began, it ended. Ang became limp and her hand slipped from Marty’s as she slumped against Richie. The shadow in the corner seemed to retreat. Richie hurriedly scooped Ang into his arms and left the room. He ran down the stairs and outside. Marty followed, slamming the front door shut behind him.

As soon as the warmth of the sun hit Ang’s face, she started to stir. Surprised, for last time this happened, she had to be brought far away from the house, Richie dropped to the ground, cradling Ang in his lap. Marty was half a step behind, panting as if he had run a marathon.

"What the blue-spotted hell just happened in there?" Marty dropped next to Richie and Ang.

"It wasn’t Jeremiah," Ang said softly, her eyes starting to flutter open. "Isaiah killed Kirstin, not Jeremiah. She called out to him for help, but it was too late." Tears sprang to her eyes as Marty swore. "Richie, we have to go back in there."

Richie shook his head. "No. No way. You’re bruised and cut again, Angel."

Ang struggled to sit up in Richie’s lap. "We have to. She showed us what we needed to see. We can ask her the right questions and get her to tell us how to help her." Richie was still shaking his head, and tightened his arms around her. "I know we can; please," she begged.

Marty put his hand on Ang’s shoulder. "Angel Rose," he said, "you can’t be serious."

"We have to help her," Ang said simply, the tears flowing from her eyes.

Richie sighed and stood, still cradling Ang in his arms. Slowly, he started back for the house. As he approached, the front door opened. The threesome stopped dead in their tracks. Ang saw Kirstin descend the once-grand staircase to the lawn. "Do you see that?" she asked in a low voice. "Put me down."

Richie complied and nodded his head. "I see her. Marty?"

"Yes. My God, I can see her too. Where is she going?"

They watched as she circled the house and disappeared.

Richie and Ang looked at each other. "The lake," they said in unison, then started to follow.

Marty watched after them for a moment, stunned beyond belief, and then followed as well.

When they reached the lake, they scanned the shore for Kirstin. "Where did she go?" Richie asked.

"Do you see her?" added Marty.

Ang just shook her head. "I don’t see her," she answered. She was pulled to the large boulder that sat by the lake, getting warmed by the sun. When she reached it, she would have sworn she heard the rock whispering. She rested her hand against it, shuddered. "Here," she said. "Kirstin was sitting here. She was feeding the water birds, and something startled her. It sent her back to the house in a hurry."

Marty frowned. "But the local lore says she disappeared on the way to a neighbor’s from her house. She wouldn’t have had to come this way," he said. "She wouldn’t have run into trouble out here."

Ang slapped her hands at her sides, sighing loudly in frustration. "Dammit, something happened here." She put both hands on the rock. After a moment, she rested her forehead against it and closed her eyes. Several minutes later, she pushed back, disgust in her face. "Something definitely happened here, but it wasn’t Kirstin’s death. We have to go back to the house. See if we can find her there."

"In my dream," Richie said, "she was on some sort of wooded path." The three of them turned their heads toward the thick tangle of rhododendrons. "Maybe that’s where she went."

"Then why would she lead us back here?" Ang asked, exasperated.

"I don’t know; you’re the expert," Richie retorted.

Marty spoke up, speaking softly and calmly. "There may have a path through there once. Several, in fact. There are acres of rhodies in those fields. Some of it’s been thinned, of course, as the developments and farms went in all around here," he said, "but I suppose it’s conceivable she entered the thicket from the house, and..."

"And that’s where she met with trouble and disappeared," Ang said.

Richie shook his head. "Conceivable, but it’s not probable. I read all those news articles; neighbors walked those paths for hours, days, looking for some sign of her." He held up a hand when it looked as if Angel Rose would interrupt. "But, we have to try," he said. "That’s where she reached out for my help. She’s got to be there somewhere."

"But –" Marty started.

"But nothing," Ang said. "Let’s go."

Chapter Twenty-One

2011-12-20T07:00:00.000-05:00

The Past

Jeremiah Halstead had a tough childhood. He was a surprise pregnancy, and his mother died giving birth to him. His father hated him on sight for that, though it wasn’t anything Jeremiah had control over, and his upbringing was left largely to his older brothers. His brothers were a rough group, and were equally pissed at this child for taking their mother away from them.

The five Halstead boys were always getting in trouble for something or other, and more often than not, it was Jeremiah who took the brunt of the punishment. Since he was the youngest, he didn’t know any better than to listen to his brothers, and more than once he took the switch for something one of the older boys did.

Out of necessity, Jeremiah worked hard to be faster and stronger than his brothers. The beatings he withstood would have broken a weaker child, but Jeremiah was tough. He had to be. Any sign of weakness was pounced on by his bothers, and the beatings would only get worse if he cried.

All the hard physical labor meant he’d grown up bigger than his peers. To the young children who were his neighbors and fellow pupils in school, he looked older than he was, so they made fun of him for being "stupid". He got into many fights over this, and each time he did, his father or oldest brother would beat him more for fighting at school.

Jeremiah never knew a tender touch or a mother’s hug, so had no idea that there was gentleness or love in the world.

Until he met Kirstin St. Claire.

Kirstin joined his school when they were both fourteen. She was warned to stay away from "that creepy Jeremiah" by the other girls in the class, but she was brought up to be kind and considerate to everyone, so she chose instead to give him the benefit of the doubt. She saw how the other pupils treated him as a blight; in fact they called him "Jeremiah the Pariah" though few of them knew what the word meant. That only made her redouble her efforts to befriend the loner.

One afternoon, when the class had broken for lunch, Kirstin noticed the boy sitting by himself under the sprawling oak that dominated the area in front of the school. She watched as he furtively unwrapped a cold meat sandwich from a greasy wrapper, and took a bite, smiling a little in satisfaction. Then she watched as an older boy, clearly one of his brothers, strode up to him and took the sandwich from him. Jeremiah leapt to his feet in anger, but his brother pushed him down into the dirt.

Outraged, Kirstin ignored her friends and stalked over to the two boys, who were squaring off for a fight.

"Stop that this instant," she demanded, fury clouding her soft gray eyes.

"Who’s gonna make me?" the belligerent boy, whom she recognize as Isaiah, Jeremiah’s brother, asked her, raising his chin in defiance.

"I will," Kirstin said, stepping to stand between them.

Isaiah laughed. "You, a girl, cannot stop me from doing what I want, when I want." To prove his point, he kicked dirt at his brother, who was sitting in awe of this young girl who wasn’t afraid of Isaiah.

"I said stop that." Kirstin’s voice was getting louder, and some of the other pupils started to wander over to see what would happen. One student went inside to fetch their teacher.

Isaiah looked at his younger brother. "You gonna let this little whore do your talking for you?"

That shook Jeremiah from his reverie. He stood, fire in his gaze. "You don’t call her that filthy name."

His brother’s dirty laughing had Jeremiah pulling back his arm and letting a punch fly that sent his older brother staggering backwards, his arms wind milling to no avail; he fell in the dust, and Jeremiah smirked.

"You’ll get it later," Isaiah said, standing and brushing the dust from his pants. "Just wait until you come home." With that last threat, he turned his back and walked away.

"I’m sorry he called you that awful name," Jeremiah said.

"That’s alright," Kirstin said bravely, though tears clouded her eyes. "I notice he took your lunch; do you want to share mine? My mother always makes more than I can possibly eat by myself."

Jeremiah nodded shyly and the two sat under the tree and shared Kirstin’s cold chicken sandwich and chatting softly with each other.

Jeremiah was in love.

The Present

Richie had stayed with Ang, holding her deep into the night. They made love tenderly close to dawn, and woke to the blaring alarm clock when the sun was climbing high into the sky.

"Good morning," Richie said, kissing the side of Ang’s head.

"Mmmm, morning," Ang answered, and planted a kiss over Richie’s heart. "What time is it?"

"A little after eight-thirty."

"We should get going then, if we’re going to meet your realtor." She stood and looked at Richie; the sheets barely covering him. "Are you sure about this?"

Richie shook his head. "I’m not absolutely sure, but pretty sure." He slid out from under the covers, and stretched; his nakedness making Ang want to crawl back into bed with him. Instead, they showered and dressed, and stopped off at the Thompson Estate for Richie to change clothes. He set a record for fastest quick-change ever, relieved that Kirstin didn’t make an appearance, and the pair made it to the Historical Society a little before ten.

They had been standing over the counter, looking at the drawings they had spread over its expanse, when the door opened and Marty walked in. Ang turned white and gripped the counter for support. "Jeremiah," she whispered.

"Marty!" Richie said, striding toward the man with his hand extended. "Thank you for agreeing to meet us here this morning."

"Of course, of course," Marty answered. He saw Ang’s face, and frowned. "Are you alright, miss?"

"F-f-fine," Ang said, though she was far from fine. When she saw Marty’s face, she knew, beyond a doubt, that this man was descended from the man Kirstin called ‘Jeremiah’.

"So," Marty said, redirecting his attention to Richie. "What did you want to talk to me about?"

Richie flipped through some of the drawings on the counter and selected two. One of Kirstin, and one of the man who was chasing her. He showed them to Marty, whose eyes went wide as he scanned the pictures.

"What is this?" He tilted his head. "Why does this man look familiar?"

"’This’," Richie said, "is what I wanted to talk to you about. My house is haunted."

Marty started to chuckle, but stopped when he saw the look on Richie’s face. "Aw, damn," he said, resignedly.

"So you knew," Richie said, surprised.

"I knew there were rumors," Marty said, "but I didn’t know for sure." He dropped the drawings and held up his hands. "Nothing I had heard mentioned anything violent or malevolent; I just thought it was talk."

"I suspect you thought more than that," Richie said, "but that doesn’t matter right now. What does matter is that man you thought you recognized. Looked in a mirror lately?"

Marty blanched and picked up the sketch of the green-eyed man. "The chin is the same and the eyes....do you really think this looks like me? Where did this come from?"

"I drew it," Ang said. "After Kirstin Maddox showed him to me."

"Who?" Marty asked.

"My ghost," Richie said.

Over the course of the next couple of hours, Richie showed Marty the research he and Angel Rose had been doing, and told him about his experiences in the house. Marty didn’t so much as flinch when Richie told him about the scratches on his arm, and the rocking chair that moved on its own. He didn’t snicker or shake his head when Ang told him about making contact, and seeing through Kirstin’s eyes, what her last moments were like. He did go pale when Richie told him about the vision Angel Rose had had about being chased by a monster called Jeremiah.

"Angel Rose? Summerlin?" When Ang nodded, Marty just said, "huh. Are you sure you heard the name right?" he continued, looking from the drawing to Angel and nervously to Richie, who was hovering just behind Ang’s shoulder.

Ang answered, "Mr. Halstead, there are very few words that sound remotely like ‘Jeremiah’. In fact, I can’t think of a single one."

"Please, call me ‘Marty’," Marty answered distractedly. "And of course you’re right. It’s just – " He trailed off as he stared at the drawings and processed everything he’d been told.

Richie pointed at the drawing of the green-eyed man. "And you did admit he resembles you."

Marty nodded his head. "I do recall having an ancestor named Jeremiah," Marty said slowly, "but I never heard anything about him hurting anyone."

"Anyone but Kirstin, you mean," Ang interrupted.

Marty shot her an annoyed look. "No, that’s not what I meant at all. He was the gentle one. Now, if it were one of Jeremiah’s brothers – that I would believe. Isaiah especially was a real bastard." He looked at Ang. "Tell me exactly what Kirstin showed you."

Ang was surprised. "You don’t doubt that Kirstin spoke to me?"

Marty shook his head. "I knew your mother," he said. "She had the gift. She had thought that her birth mother, your maternal grandmother, did as well." He smiled an easy smile. "Besides, child, I’m from the south. Southerners have a predisposition to believing in the supernatural."

Ang smiled back, happy not to be ridiculed.

Richie was incredulous. "How do you know so much about Angel’s family?"

Marty chuckled. "Son, it’s a small town. Everybody knows everybody else’s business. Story goes that Joy was only 16 when her daughter was born. Her parents were mortified when their only daughter turned up pregnant one day. She was shipped off to a maiden grand-aunt, Beatrice, I think her name was, in Seattle until after the baby was born. A private adoption was made, though unbeknownst to her parents, Joy arranged to keep contact with the adoptive family. When Joy’s parents, Hope and Connor died, she made contact with Angel Rose’s ‘natural’ grandmother, I think her name was Aideen..."

Richie held up a hand. "Marty, I need a scorecard to keep up. Why don’t we just leave it at everyone knows everyone else’s business, and be done with it." He shook his head. Coming from the East Coast, this was totally foreign concept to him. Where he came from, privacy was valued, and outside of immediate family, events like teenaged pregnancy wouldn’t be so freely talked about.

"All right," Marty said with a smile. "Miz Summerlin?"

Ang smiled and leaned into Richie for support while she launched into her story. She told Marty about the contact she made with Kirstin in her third-floor room. A room that looked like it hadn’t been touched in the nearly 200 years since it was furnished. Ang told Marty about both she and Richie having a conversation with Kirstin, asking yes or no questions that she answered with her chair, and Marty just nodded. She next told him about the vivid vision she had: about a happy, carefree Kirstin being grabbed by a hand in the bushes. She told Marty about Kirstin fighting off her masked attacker and fleeing from him.

She continued on, telling Marty about Kirstin trying to run for the lake, and being pushed from behind. Richie noticed Ang rubbing at her hands as if to take rub the sting of the fall away. She gripped Richie’s hand when she told Marty about the man hitting Kirstin, splitting her lip and blackening her eye. Richie interrupted to tell Marty about how matching marks marred Ang’s face while she was in the throes of the vision. When she told Marty about the choking, tears sprang to her eyes as she remembered the terror she had felt at reliving Kirstin’s memories.

"She reached out and snagged part of the mask," Ang said. "That’s when I saw the green eye, and heard her say ‘Jeremiah’. It had to be him."

Marty leaned back in his chair as Ang finished her story. He thought for long moments until Ang thought the silence would drive her mad. "Well?" she demanded.

Marty stood. "I want to show you something," he said. He pulled his wallet out of his pocket. From a protective sleeve, he took a small photo. "Do you have a magnifying glass?"

Ang nodded and retrieved it from her desk. Marty handed her the picture. "Look at the picture," he said. "Look very closely at all the men in the photograph; tell me what you see."

She scrutinized the photo for several minutes, then turned the glass over to Richie. He looked, studying the men’s faces. When he was done, he and Ang shared a look.

Angel Rose blew out a breath. "It’s kinda hard to tell, but the men all appear to have green eyes," she said.

Marty nodded. "The young men in the picture are me, my younger brother, and three cousins on my father’s side. The older men are my father and two of his brothers. Green eyes run in the men in my family. All the color photos and family oil portraits show the Halstead boys having green eyes. It very well may have been Isaiah that Kirstin saw, but she thought it was Jeremiah."

Ang looked shocked, and shook her head vehemently. "No, I don’t believe it. Why would Kirstin use her dying breath to say Jeremiah’s name if he wasn’t the one who killed her?"

"Are you sure it was her dying breath?" Marty asked. He held up a hand when it looked as if Angel Rose was going to protest. "From your own words, you lost consciousness, and therefore contact with Kirstin before the very end."

Richie started to speak, but Ang put a stalling hand on his forearm.

"No, I’m not sure, but it sure felt like she was dying." Ang was getting irritated.

"I’m not trying to minimize what you saw or felt, or claim innocence on my family’s behalf. If someone in my family tree did in fact kill someone in yours, I’m truly sorry; but before we update the family Bible with that, I want to be certain." Marty was quiet for a long moment. "Do you think she would talk to me?" he asked.

Ang just shook her head. "I think she’d take one look at you and, well, freak out without some forewarning. I should go with you, and see if she’s receptive."

Richie stepped protectively in front of Ang. "There’s no telling how it would affect Ang if that happened. I don’t think it’s a good idea."

"How else are we going to figure out what happened?" Marty asked.

"We?" Richie echoed, arching an eyebrow.

"I think I have just as much a vested interest in this now as you do," Marty responded. "Maybe even more so, if my blood was involved in something so sinister." He shook his head. "What if Angel Rose stays here?" he asked Richie. "Does Kirstin talk to you?"

Richie rubbed at his arm and smiled ruefully. "Not so much talk as gouge and scratch," he said, making Ang chuckle.

"Richie, I should go," Ang said. "We know she has a connection to me, and you can take me out of there if something starts to happen." At the frown on Richie’s face, she hastened to add, "besides, I know she will talk to me, do you KNOW she’ll talk to you?"

Chapter Twenty

2011-12-10T07:00:00.000-05:00

Some time later, Angel Rose awoke, finding it dark in her bedroom. She closed her eyes and sighed when she felt Richie’s warm presence still behind her. He had his arm around her, anchoring her to his chest. Being held like this felt wonderful. She shifted slightly, testing to see if he was awake.

The hand that was draped over her began stroking her stomach lightly. Slowly, his hand crept upward until the very tips of his fingers were grazing the underside of her breasts. Ang sucked in a breath but made no move to stop him. Richie palmed one, kneading and squeezing gently. He was kissing her neck; slow, sloppy, open-mouthed kisses that ended with just a little teeth, and he felt her nipple pebble up against his palm. He pinched it lightly, then traced gentle lazy circles around it until Ang thought she was going to scream. Then he moved on to the other breast, torturing it the same way.

Ang shifted restlessly on the bed and the friction of her motions was causing Richie to sweat. He was impossibly hard, and he wanted her again. “Sweet Angel Rose,” he said to her softly, as he kissed and nipped her neck and shoulder. He levered up on one elbow to roll Ang beneath him so he could see her face. “Hey there,” Richie said.

Ang just smiled, her eyes darting back and forth between his.

Richie dipped his head, fully intending to kiss Ang gently, but the taste of her had him deepening the kiss until he couldn’t breathe. Ang threaded her hands into his hair, sealing his mouth to hers, and tangled her tongue around his. She shifted underneath him so he was seated in the apex of her thighs, and sighed. The pressure of Richie against the slow, throbbing ache that pulsed there was almost unbearable.

Ang ran her hands down Richie’s neck and explored his strong chest; her fingers playing over the muscles and sprinkling of fine dark hair. She lightly scraped her fingernails across Richie’s nipples, and he hissed and arched into her, making Ang moan.

“Good Lord, woman,” Richie groaned, and bent to capture her mouth again. He trailed kisses across Ang’s cheek and to her neck, and kissed his way down her chest to a tender, pink nipple where he sucked. Ang cried out and wrapped her arms around Richie’s head.

Richie looked at Ang, his brown eyes nearly black with passion. He flexed his hips and rubbed against Ang again, making her back arch and her head loll to one side. He took advantage, nibbling on her earlobe and neck and Ang wound her arms around Richie’s shoulders and hung on.

“I’m all out, darlin’,” Richie whispered, as he continued to slide his cock against her.

“Night stand,” she croaked back, and waited for Richie to sheathe himself.

He devoured her mouth as he pushed into her slowly, savoring the way her body all but pulled him into her. He started moving slowly inside her, letting her catch up to his rhythm, and within minutes, she was whispering his name, asking, begging for more. Richie moved faster, his cock slamming mercilessly into her. Ang purred and moaned and dug her fingernails into Richie’s shoulders, trying to pull him onto him, wanting to feel his weight. He complied, gathering her into his arms, holding her close while his hips worked furiously to bring them release.

Ang cried out softly when the next wave engulfed her, and the spasming was enough to bring Richie along for the ride. He slowed then stopped his movements when he felt Ang go completely limp beneath him. He rolled off her and gathered her to his chest, kissing her temple.

She was quiet for so long, Richie felt a finger of dread dance down his spine. “Angel Rose? You aren’t having regrets, are you?”

“No,” Ang said, meeting his gaze. “No regrets at all. It’s what I needed, what I wanted – YOU were what I needed and wanted. No regrets.” She was quiet for a minute. “That other, stuff; everything that happened up at the house, that changes everything,” she said softly.

“How?”

“I saw him,” Ang said. “If I close my eyes, I can picture him clearly.” She rolled away from him and sat on the edge of the bed, stretching slightly. “I can draw him.”

Richie stood and stretched before heading to the bathroom. He came back with a warm, wet washcloth and a small towel. He helped Angel Rose clean up before holding out a hand for Ang to take, and he pulled her to her feet. Wrapping his arms around her, he kissed her soundly, loving the feel of her arms looped around his neck, and the press of her body against his. When they ended the kiss, Richie looked around and saw their clothes in a wet heap on the floor. “Uh, Angel, darlin’, not that I mind being naked, but, uh…”

Ang smiled. “C’mon, I can fix you up,” she said, scooping up their clothes and heading for the little room off the kitchen she had set up as her laundry room. She tossed everything into the dryer and fished two clean sets of sweatpants out of the basket on the washing machine. She handed him one, saying, “they’re clean, but they’re gonna be short. You can pull up the legs.”

Ang stepped into her pants and watched as Richie yanked up the uncooperative cotton sweatpants. She nearly groaned out loud when she saw how they cupped him. He tugged on the legs, bunching the elastic around his knees, and the sight of his strong, tanned, hairy legs sticking out from the very snug grey cotton nearly took Ang’s breath away. She raked her gaze upward, scanning his broad chest. Smiling wryly, she added, “unfortunately for you, all my t-shirts are going to be way too tight on you, so you’re gonna have to do without.” She pulled a t-shirt out of the basket for herself and slid it over her head before leading him from the laundry room.

She started a pot of coffee and walked into the living room, to where she had left her pad and charcoals. Richie could feel the fear wafting off Angel Rose and hugged her close. He could feel her shuddering against him, still shaken by what happened at the house, and afraid of what she would see when she drew this Jeremiah. Richie had to admit, he was a little shaken, too. He wasn’t a neophyte by any means, but he had never seen a woman so desperate for a physical connection like Ang was. He tilted her face up with a gentle finger under her chin. After searching her face, he kissed her so softly, so lovingly, that fresh tears sprang to her eyes.

“Don’t cry, sweet, Angel Rose,” Richie said. “I’m here with you. I’ll protect you.”

“You can’t protect me from this,” she said. “You can’t save me from my own mind. But it’s sweet that you want to try.” She stretched up on tiptoe to brush her lips against Richie’s. He caught the back of her head and held her there, pouring all the emotions of the past day into his kiss. His arms trailed down hers, settling around her waist, anchoring her to him while their mouths played over each other. Long minutes later, Ang eased back from the kiss and cuddled into Richie’s chest, pulling strength from him.

With a sigh, Ang gathered up her drawing supplies and took a seat in her chair by the window. Silently, Richie sat by her, watching as the pencil flew over the page. Her hand was a blur as it sketched lines and circles, each joining the last in creating an image of a man, Halfway through, Ang growled in frustration and tore the sheet from the pad, letting it flutter to the floor. “Nose is wrong,” she muttered.

Even before it hit the rug, her arm was hastily moving back and forth across a fresh page. She got further this time before she tore this page from the pad in exasperation and tossed it to join the other on the floor. “Lips. Fuller lips.”

On and on she went, discarding one sketch after another, muttering about the shape of an eyebrow or the cleft of the chin. Finally, when she had nearly exhausted the pad of paper, and had gone through three pencils, she dropped the pad from her lap. “That’s him,” she said, pointing a shaky finger at the sketch.

Richie bent to pick up the pad, but before he could look at it closely, Ang said, “Wait,” and took it from him. She colored the irises of the eyes an eerie jade green. “NOW that’s him,” she amended, and handed the pad back over to Richie.

He stared at the drawing for a full minute. “I know this man,” he said.

“Of course you do,” Ang said. “This is Jeremiah.”

“No,” Richie said. “I mean yeah, that’s who it is, but I’ve seen him. I know I’ve seen him. Or at least a someone who looks like him.” He racked his memories, trying to remember. “I almost have it,” he said.

“Don’t force it, or it’ll never come,” Ang counseled. For her, it was the opposite. If she tried to force it, the images would never leave her head. “Are you hungry?” she asked. “Come on, let’s make something to eat. It’ll distract you, while you figure out who this man is, and you’ve got to be ravenous.”

They bustled around the kitchen for a few minutes, making sandwiches from what they found in the refrigerator. They ate at the kitchen table, an easy, companionable silence between them. As they were cleaning up their mess, Richie stopped. He strode to the discarded sketch pad and picked it up. He stared at the drawing for a moment, standing statue-still in the middle of the kitchen. “Where’s my wallet?” he asked.

“Probably still on the floor in the bedroom,” Angel Rose answered.

Richie jogged from the kitchen, snagged his wallet, and was back in less than a minute. He pulled a small white card from his wallet and held it up. “I’ve got it,” he said to Ang. “Can I use your phone?”

She motioned to the wall where a fire-engine red phone hung. “Go for it,” she said. “Who? Who does Jeremiah remind you of?” Richie had dialed and had the phone pressed to his ear.

Richie held up a finger as the caller answered. “It’s Richie Sambora. Listen, sorry to bother you at home, but something interesting happened at the house, and I want to talk to you about the house’s history.” Richie listened for a few minutes. “That’s fine. Can we meet at the Historical Society, say at 10 tomorrow?” He nodded. “Great. See you then, Marty.”

“Marty?” Ang asked, confused.

“Yeah, Marty. Halstead. My real estate agent.” He pointed to the drawing as he spoke. “He has eyes just like this, and the chin is the same.”

Ang shook her head. “Richie, do you know how many men have green eyes and a cleft in his chin? I think you’re trying too hard.”

“I know what I know,” Richie said, taking another swallow of his beer. “We’ll know for sure tomorrow.”

There was a bit of an awkward “what now” silence between them. Angel Rose cleared her throat. “Are you heading back to your house tonight?”

Richie shook his head. “Uh-uh. Not tonight. Not when Kirstin is still in poltergeist mode. That was messed up.” He looked at Angel Rose, and sensed the real question she was asking. “Oh,” he said. “Do YOU want me to head back to my house tonight? I mean, I’ll need fresh clothes for tomorrow, but I’d like to stay if you’d like to have me.”

Angel Rose smiled. “Of course I want you to stay.” She reached out to pull the pad from Richie’s hands, and studied the drawing. “I wonder what made this man attack Kirstin,” she said.

“Well find out, Angel Rose. I promise you.”

Chapter Nineteen

2011-11-30T07:00:00.000-05:00

Richie carried Ang back to his car. She kept her face buried in his chest the whole way, and was trembling. When they were in the shadow of the house, Ang cried out, sobbing in anguish and pain.

He hurriedly climbed into the front seat of his truck, pulling Ang to sit across him, and fumbled for the key. When the engine roared to life, Richie threw the transmission into gear and tore out of the driveway, a rooster’s tail of gravel kicking up in his haste. Speeding down the lane toward the main road, Ang gradually released her death grip on Richie’s neck until she finally felt secure enough to slide across to the passenger’s seat. She curled up into a ball on the seat and closed her eyes.

Richie kept one eye on Ang and one on the road until he saw Ang slump against the door. He pulled over and stopped the truck, leaning over to make sure she was still breathing. Relieved that she seemed to be okay, he straightened and dropped his head back on the headrest. What the hell had just happened? Ang was living Kirstin’s life – well, her death anyway. He had never seen anything like that before. If he was scared, Ang must be terrified. But, he thought, at least now that she’d gone through that nightmare, they had something to work with – they had a name.

He started the truck again and headed toward Ang’s house. When he pulled into the driveway several minutes later, Ang still hadn’t stirred. He turned off the truck and circled around the front of the vehicle to open Ang’s door, and she spilled out into his arms. He held back a sigh as he carried her up the steps to her door. He tried the knob, it was locked. “Of course it’s locked, you idiot,” Richie muttered to himself. He sat with Ang on the porch swing and gently set it swaying. The soothing motion, combined with the emotional turmoil of the afternoon’s activities had Richie snoozing within minutes.

A rolling rumble of thunder startled Richie awake. A zig-zag crack of lightning flashed in the distance, and dark, menacing clouds were rolling in. Ang was unaffected by the noise and the light. Richie gently shook her shoulder and talked in her ear. “Angel Rose, the skies are gonna open soon, and I can’t get into your house.” Nothing. “Angel!” he called louder. She stirred, but didn’t wake. When the first fat raindrops started splattering against the pavement, Richie looked at the house, then at the woman in question.

He followed the porch around to the backyard, and descended the three steps into the lush green grass. The rain was cool and felt cleansing, and Richie tipped his head back to feel the drops hit his face, Ang frowned in his arms as the rain began to fall harder, plastering her hair to her scalp and soaking into her clothes. Richie sat on the lawn, water soaking into his own clothing, holding Ang close to his heart, and waited.

Ang came to with a gasp, startling Richie.

“Shhh, Angel Rose, it’s alright,” Richie said.

“Where, how, what happened?” Ang was disoriented. It looked like she was home, but why were they sitting out in the rain?

“You don’t remember anything about being at my house and Kirstin?”

Ang’s face went ashen and her limbs began to shake. “Oh, God, that wasn’t a horrible dream?”

Richie just shook his head and gathered Ang to him, trying to soothe her trembling. “I’m so sorry, Angel Rose,” he said. “Please don’t cry.”

“How can I not?” she said simply. “God, you must think I’m insane,” Ang said, shaking her head. She braced her shaky hands on Richie’s shoulders and pushed like she was going to stand up, but Richie held fast. At her questioning look, Richie’s eyes hardened, and Ang’s breath caught in her throat. Her hands slipped down his shoulders, skimming his biceps before coming to rest on his forearms.

“I do not think you’re insane,” Richie said slowly. “I think you’re going through something awful and scary and just plain fucking SICK, and it’s a wonder you’re NOT insane.” He gave her a little shake when she looked away from him, clearly embarrassed. “I don’t know how you were linked with her, I mean it was like you WERE her, and you were DYING for Christ’s sake; that was just about one of the scariest – ”

His words were cut off abruptly when Angel Rose tightened her grip on his arms and pressed her mouth firmly to his. When their lips met, the tenuous hold Ang had on her control shattered. She sobbed and raised her arms to wrap them around Richie’s neck, and shifted so her legs were around his hips. She held him close, feeling his heart beating against her chest, trying to get his warmth to seep into her body, and she kissed him as if her very life depended on it.

Richie gently broke the kiss and tilted his head to one side, confused. “Angel Rose, not that I’m complaining about kissing a pretty girl,” he smiled and smoothed her hair away from her face, “but what’s going on?”

Suddenly, Ang was a frantic ball of energy, tearing at his shirt and hers until they were skin-on-skin. “Darlin’, what are you doing?” Richie asked in between kisses.

“Please,” Ang answered. “Please, I need to know I’m still alive,” she said, nipping at his neck. “I need to know I’m still ME, and not HER,” she said, scratching her nails down his chest. “Please, help me.”

Richie grabbed her hands. “Angel Rose, you don’t want to do this. This isn’t like you.”

Angel Rose pulled her hands from Richie’s grasp. “You don’t know anything about me,” she said as her face turned red. This time she stood without his interference and headed to her house.

“Son of a bitch,” Richie muttered, and followed her. He caught up with her on the porch as she was pulling a spare key from under a flowerpot on the railing. Richie stifled a chuckle. He’d never thought to look there – didn’t think she’d be so obvious. “Angel Rose. Please, listen to me.” He put his hand on her shoulder to stop her but she shook him off.

“If you don’t want me, just say so,” she said. “I’m a big girl.” She got the door unlocked and flung it open. When she tried to slam it in Richie’s face, he slammed at the door with the flat of his hand.

“I asked you to listen to me,” he said. He was still dripping with rain, the water beading up into drops on his face and chest. His jeans were glued to his legs; outlining his thighs, and cupping his obviously hard cock. “I never said I didn’t want you, Angel Rose.”

Ang just gulped as she stared at the man in her doorway. His eyes were burning holes into her, seeming to see all the way through to her soul. She took an involuntary step backwards as he crossed the threshold into her house.

“I-I-It’s just that – ” Angel Rose started to explain but Richie shook his head.

“I know what you were trying to do,” he said, stepping further into the kitchen. “You wanted to use me to ground yourself.”

Angel Rose wanted the floor to open up and swallow her whole. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I never meant to – “

This time her words were interrupted as Richie closed the distance between them and hauled her into his arms. “Did I say ‘no’?” He drilled his tongue into her mouth and kissed her until she was breathless. He palmed then roughly squeezed her breasts, and smoothed his hands down her sides and to her ass, pulling her fully against him so there’d be no mistaking his desire for her.

“Be sure,” he rasped, as he pulled away from her to suck on the side of her neck.

“I’m sure,” she answered, grabbing fistfuls of his hair into her hands.

Mouths fused once more, they stumbled through the kitchen, dropping their shirts with a wet plop onto the linoleum. They passed through the living room and into her bedroom.

Richie leaned Angel Rose against the wall and unfastened her jeans. Though they were wet and tight, his need was growing to be as great as hers and his strength doubled as he wrestled with the wet fabric. He buried his face in Ang’s curls, inhaling the scent of her mixed with that of the rain. Tentatively, he stretched out his tongue for a taste. In response, Ang widened her stance and threaded her hands in Richie’s hair.

Smiling, Richie licked and lapped at Ang until she was gripping his scalp almost painfully hard. He backed away long enough to blow cool air on her over-heated flesh, and she screamed and bucked. Richie pushed her hips roughly against the wall, holding her fast, and drove his tongue into her, curling it so he could stroke her from within. When Ang’s cries became more fervent, he swirled a calloused fingertip around her clit. He could feel her tensing, and he eased back.

Angel Rose gasped, “NO!”

Richie looked up at her face. There was something raw and primal and scared in her eyes and he was so very afraid of doing what she asked because he didn’t want her to regret her rashness later.

“I’m sure,” she said again, sinking to the floor with him. She unbuttoned his jeans and pushed them as far as she could while he was on his knees. She kissed him as she wormed a hand into his pants and over his coarse hair but there wasn’t enough play in the fabric to allow her to explore the way she wanted. She stood, urging him up with her before sinking to her knees again to haul down Richie’s wet denim. She pulled on his pants until they had joined hers in a wet heap on the floor, and rose to lead him to the bed. Richie stopped for just a moment to pull a condom from his wallet while she pulled back the covers, then he followed her.

She crawled up on the mattress, and lay on the pillows, opening her arms to him. “I want this,” she said. “I want you.”

He crawled up to kneel between her legs, rolled the condom on and slid into her, pushing slowly past her constricting walls until he was fully seated in her. He waited a moment for her to accept his size, then started stroking her; his abdomen muscles bunching and flexing as his hips began their dance.

When Richie was satisfied that he wouldn’t hurt her, he knelt up and grabbed Ang’s calves. Pushing at them so her knees were spread wide, Richie started pumping faster. Ang made a little nose in her throat and Richie stilled. “Am I hurting you, darlin’,” he gritted through his teeth.

“No,” she whispered in response. “Don’t stop,” she begged.

Richie started his motions again, slowly, and watched as his sweet Angel Rose, for she most certainly was his now, blushed pink from her chest to her forehead. He watched as her hands flailed about, trying to decide where to go, and finally fisted into the sheets on either side of her hips. He watched as the veins on her neck stood out and her head tilted back, and her back arched ever so slightly, and he watched as a slow smile crept across her face a second before she screamed with release.

The vice tightening around Richie made his head drop back in pleasure, and he let go of Ang’s legs. He dropped so his hands were braced on either side of her head, and he pounded into her until the top of his head flew off, and “Sweet mother of God” escaped from his lips. He stayed seated fully in her until his arms grew weak, and he rolled them to the side, keeping them intimately joined.

He kissed her gently as her pulse calmed, and after a few moments, slipped from her and her bed to take care of the condom in the bathroom. When he came back to the bed, he saw she was lying on her side, and had pulled the covers up over her. Her eyes were almost closed, and she smiled and got into bed on the other side of her, and gathered her close.

“Thank you,” she said sleepily, gripping his hand in hers.

Chapter Eighteen

2011-11-20T07:00:00.000-05:00

Richie framed Ang’s face with his hands and examined her eyes. They were haunted, pain-filled, and she looked afraid. After a moment, Angel Rose eased back and started to stand. Richie sprang to his feet and helped her up, waiting for her to tell him what was next.

“Do you understand what just happened to me?” she asked. She needed to be sure that he knew what he was getting into.

“I think so,” Richie said. “You were somehow possessed by Kirstin’s memories? Reliving what must have been her last day?”

Ang nodded. “Something like that. I saw her memories as if they were happening now. Snatches of colors, sounds, smells, emotions” she broke off, shaking her head. “It’s all in there, mixing around with my own memories. I can’t stop it, and I can’t control it, so I need you to understand that. When we go in there, it’s going to get strange.”

Richie chuckled. “And the last half hour, what was that?”

Ang’s smile was wobbly and didn’t quite reach her eyes. “That was just a teaser. I’m going to say the same thing to you that you said to me: you don’t have to go in there with me.”

Richie looked surprised. “The hell I don’t,” he said. “Not only is it my house, but I promised Kirstin that I would help her.” He smiled a wide smile, his eyes crinkling and his dimples showing, “And I never break a promise to a woman.”

Ang nodded. “I can feel her getting more agitated,” she said. “If we are going in, it should be now.”

Richie looked into Ang’s eyes, and saw steely resolve there. He knew she wouldn’t back down from this. There was nothing he could say to change her mind. The pair turned to the house and brushed the dirt and stray leaves off their clothes, before joining hands. They made their way slowly back around to the front of the house. They climbed the dilapidated steps to the porch and opened the door. With a shared shudder, they passed into the house.

It was cold.

Very, very cold.

Angel Rose gently pulled her hand from Richie’s to wrap her arms around herself. Richie looked around at the living room, surprised that everything appeared to be just as he had left it. There was no upended furniture, no shattered glass. He touched a few things, surprised to find them warm when the room was so cold. He turned to find Ang staring up the stairs. As if in a trance, she climbed; her step heavy on the treads. Richie followed silently, unsure and a little afraid about what was going to happen next.

They stopped outside Kirstin’s door, and it opened of its own accord. Ang’s eyes went wide as a rush of frigid air passed through her. For a moment, she couldn’t breathe. Richie was blown back by the force of the air that came through the door, and he had an almost overwhelming urge to snatch Ang up into his arms and leave the house.

Richie and Ang stood on the threshold of the room, and he gasped. He could see Kirstin in the middle of the room. This Kirstin was the woman-thing from his dreams. Her hair hung in damp, dirty clumps around a badly swollen face. Blood and dirt crusted her lips. As he watched, Kirstin’s eye blackened and he could hear a snap that was unmistakably a bone breaking, and watched in horror as a welt rose on her cheek. Her head was snapping back and forth as these marks marred on her skin.

“What is happening?” Richie asked, horrified.

Tears were streaming down Ang’s cheeks. “She’s being beaten,” she whispered. Richie looked at her, and was horror-struck. Matching welts and bruises were covering Ang’s face.

“You, Angel, your face…” Richie reached out a fingertip to trace a blemish on her forehead.

“I know,” Ang said.

Richie shuddered. “This is her death?” Ang nodded. “Sweet mother of God,” he whispered. He wanted to squeeze his eyes shut and block out the scene in front of him, but he couldn’t. He felt helpless as he watched Kirstin relive her last moments.

The Past

“Where are the children?” Kirstin asked her beloved, as she shut the front door behind them.

“They are preparing for the party tonight,” Geoffrey answered. He hugged his wife and kissed her temple. “You’re shaking, my love,” he commented. “Is everything alright?”

Kirstin laughed a carefree laugh and waved him off. “Oh I am quite fine,” she answered. “Just got a bit of a Hallow’s Eve scare down by the lake. An animal was walking about in the bushes.” She blushed. “I thought it may have been you coming to join me for a tryst,” she finished softly.

Geoffrey groaned and pulled his wife fully to him. “Ah, my dear, had I only known,” he said on a rumble, “I would have loved to lay you atop that boulder.” He leaned in to trail kisses from her mouth to her ear. He lowered his voice even more, and breathed to her, “I would have worshipped your body.” He bit her earlobe gently, and laved away the sting. “I would have stripped your clothing from you, one garment at a time, until you were fully nude,” he said, nibbling on the pulse point under her ear.

Kirstin’s heart quickened at her husband’s words. “Then what would you do, my love?” she asked, softly, breathlessly.

Geoffrey chuckled. “You will just have to wait until tonight to find out,” he said, sipping from her lips. A knock at the door brought them reluctantly apart.

“Yes?” Kirstin called. “Come in.” The door opened to reveal a child, one of the neighbor’s, standing on the porch. Kirstin smiled. “Well hello, Nell. The children are about somewhere,” she said. “You’re a bit early for the party.”

“Mrs. Maddox, Mama sent me to fetch you. She said she needs help with her costumes.”

Kirstin sighed and smiled. “Alright, Nell. Tell her I’ll be along directly.”

Nell smiled. “Oh, thank you, Mrs. Maddox!” She dashed in to hug Kirstin. “Mama is beside herself. Daddy’s ready to shake her.”

Kirstin laughed. “You tell your daddy I said he will do no such thing.” Nell nodded and with a ‘yes, ma’am’, took off. Kirstin looked to Geoffrey. “I am looking forward to the unveiling later,” she said, smiling wickedly. She leaned up to press a kiss to her husband’s lips. “I love you,” she said.

“And I you,” Geoffrey answered. “Hurry back.”

“To you? Always,” Kirstin answered, and left to help her friend.

Kirstin skipped down the road like a child. She was so happy she couldn’t help it. She had her husband’s words in her head, the promise of tender and passionate lovemaking making her heart sing. She trailed a hand along the shrubs that lined the lane, feeling the silky texture of the gorgeous purple blooms. Before she could leave the boundaries of her property, however, a large hand sprang from the bushes and grabbed her arm. Kirstin let out a scream, twisted free, and started to run.

She couldn’t run fast enough. Every time she chanced a glance over her shoulder, he appeared closer -- this faceless, hulking monster that chased her. He wore a mask, a simple burlap sack over his head, but it was enough that she could not identify her attacker. She thought of her children as she fled, and her Geoffrey, and put on an extra burst of speed, willing her God to give her strength to keep running. She stumbled just once, but it was enough for the man to just reach out and touch her sleeve. With a scream, she veered off the lane, crashing through the rhododendron bushes, trying to get far enough ahead of him that she could hide.

Maybe if she could just get through to the lake, she’d take her chances swimming across.

Kirstin raised her arms against the branches that were battering her face. She ran deeper into the thicket until it became difficult to maneuver. She heard the masked man’s horrible laughter follow her through the beautiful blooms.

“You can’t run from me, Kirstin,” he sang, like a child. “I will catch you!”

Her heart tripped at his words, adrenaline pumping into her system anew. She chanced a half turn to look over her shoulder. She didn’t see him coming up from beside her, and he pushed her. She started to fall.

As soon as she hit the ground, he was upon her, straddling her thighs and tearing at her dress. “Stop! No! Geoffrey, help me!” she screamed.

“Your precious Geoffrey can’t help you,” the man said, barely out of breath. Kirstin thought she recognized the voice, but with the blood pounding in her head, it was hard for her to be certain. One thing she did know, she did not want this man to soil her body with his seed. With all her strength, she brought her knee up, firmly coming into contact with his manhood. The man hissed and backhanded Kirstin, and she felt her lip split.

Crying and spitting blood, she begged the man for her life. “Please,” she said. “Please, let me go back to my children. I will give you anything you want, just let me go home to my children.”

“Shut up,” the man said, hitting her again, this time blackening her eye. He pressed his hand hard over her nose and mouth, and she couldn’t breathe. “Shut up or your precious children will be next.” Kirstin grabbed his wrist and pushed his hand further into her mouth so she could bite him. He howled in pain, and reared up, shaking his hand. Blood droplets sprayed as he shook. Kirstin tried to lever the man off of her, but he was too strong. He grabbed her wrists and brought her arms down to her sides, pinning them with his knees.

His hands closed around her neck like a vice, choking off her airway. She started to get dizzy, and random images of her children and her husband floated through her head. She smiled at one memory, and the man got angry. “What are you smiling at, bitch?” he demanded, and loosened his grip long enough to smack her hard across the face. Kirstin snapped back to the present, and struggled anew when she felt his hands close around her throat once again. She was able to gouge his hand with her fingernails, but she was too weak to push him away.

As she struggled for breath, Kirstin tried to pull the mask away from the man’s face. She had to know who had done this to her. Maybe then she would know why. She caught the edge of the mask’s chin with a fingernail, and it slipped enough so she could make out her attacker. There was only one person on this planet that possessed those dead, green eyes. As her world turned black, she started to weep. She wept for her husband, her children, and herself. She thought she saw a shadow looming behind her attacker, but she couldn’t focus. She was so weak. With her last breath, she gasped a name…

The Present

Back in Kirstin’s room, Richie watched in horror as Ang slumped toward the floor. He caught her and laid her down gently. “What’s happening?” he asked, hating that his voice wasn’t strong for her.

“She’s –” Ang licked her lips before trying again. “She’s being suffocated.” Her hands scratched at her throat, but there was nothing there to loosen.

Richie watched as a look of recognition came over Ang’s face, and he heard her croak out the name “Jeremiah” before she passed out. Her breathing had become shallow, and her complexion ashen. Richie scooped her up and ran down the stairs. He ran outside with her in his arms, and started up the lane. The further he got from the house, the better her skin tone looked, so he kept running. He ran until he got to the main road, and then crossed the street into the wheat field beyond, not caring whose property he was on. He ran until Angel Rose started to stir in his arms, then he stopped, and sank into the chest-high stalks.

“Ang,” he said breathlessly, rocking her and kissing her forehead. “Come back to me. Breathe for me.” She started to moan, and Richie encouraged her. “That’s it, come on, you can do it.” He had tears in his eyes. “You’re safe here.”

Suddenly Ang sat upright, nearly knocking heads with Richie. “Jeremiah!” She screamed. “I think I saw the man who killed Kirstin. She called him ‘Jeremiah’.” She burst into tears and curled into Richie’s chest.

“Oh, Angel Rose, I’m so sorry. I should never have brought you into that house. I’m so sorry.” Over and over he apologized while this poor creature sobbed in his arms. He started to rock her back and forth, and eventually, Ang’s tears subsided.

“Richie,” she said in a small voice.

“Yes, Angel Rose?”

“I think I want to go home now,” she said. Richie picked her up in his arms again and slowly retraced his steps, heading for his car. When he crossed the street to his property, Ang’s arms tightened around his neck.

“Are you alright? Do you want to wait here and I’ll get the car?”

“N-n-no,” Ang said, unconvincingly. “I’ll be okay. Just don’t let me go, ok?”

“I promise,” Richie said. Who the hell was Jeremiah?

Chapter Seventeen

2011-11-10T07:00:00.000-05:00

They drove to Richie’s house in silence; there were no words to distract them from the dreadful images that Ang had captured. Richie was horrified on Ang’s behalf. No wonder she called her gift a curse. To have these images mingling with her memories... Richie just shook his head. He wouldn’t be able to stand it. He couldn’t get those drawings of Kirstin being attacked out of his head.

Ang was lost in her own thoughts. She was grateful that Richie didn’t dismiss this whole episode as too weird for him. She thought about warning him that it was going to get a whole lot weirder, but decided against it. He would find out for himself soon enough. Ang tried to relax and prepare herself for the next onslaught. She knew it would take a lot out of her. She fidgeted in her seat, twisting her hands around each other nervously.

As Richie drove, he saw Ang’s discomfort. He reached across the seat to touch his hand to hers. With a grateful smile, Ang twined her fingers through his and drew from his strength. As they approached the house, the sun was shining brightly in their faces. When they pulled to a stop at the top of the driveway, that room, Kirstin’s room, was spotlighted by the sun, at an angle almost impossible from the sun’s position in the sky.

“What the hell?” Richie asked, pointing upwards as they got out of the car. The window to Kirstin’s room was open, and though there was no breeze, the curtains flapped visibly through it.

Shading her eyes, Ang looked up at the third-story window. “There’s no way the sun can shine at that angle. Something’s wrong,” she said softly.

“Jesus,” Richie swore. “What could be happening?”

Ang shuddered. “I think she’s scared. Or pissed.”

“Pissed?” Richie asked, his mouth ran dry. “As in ‘Poltergeist’ pissed?” He had visions of all his belongings strewn around the room. Of furniture upended and shattered against the walls. He suddenly didn’t really want to go inside anymore.

Ang shook her head. “Most likely not. More likely, she’s scared. She’s probably reliving her death.”

Richie jerked his head back to Ang. “Reliving it?” He was horrified.

“Yes. Until her spirit is at rest, she’s doomed to relive the end her life, over and over.” Ang had tears in her eyes, and Richie felt like crying himself.

“That’s just awful,” he said, his deep voice thick with emotion. Then he had a thought that made his blood run cold. “Can she feel it? I mean how does -- ” Richie knew what he wanted to say, but didn’t have the slightest idea how to say it.

Ang knew. She knew more than she wanted to say. “Yes, she can feel everything; the physical and emotional pain. She doesn’t have a body, but her soul remembers. It remembers everything. And it hurts. The fear, the betrayal, but mostly the actual death.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “It hurts so much.”

Richie looked at her, something in the tone of her voice catching his attention. “Ang, look at me,” he said. Richie waited until she did, then continued speaking. “These footprints she – they – leave…” He trailed off, almost afraid of the answer.

“I remember it too,” Ang said in a small voice. “All of it. The fear, the heartache, the pain, all of it. The memories become as real to me as my own until I can exercise them.”

Richie didn’t know what to say. “You mean now?”

Ang nodded. “I feel so scared, I’m ready to throw up. I feel a panic welling up inside me like a giant air bubble. I want to run, but I can’t move. I want to scream, but I just can’t.”

“Jesus,” Richie said, wrapping her in his strong arms, trying to protect her. “And the pain?” Richie’s voice was quiet, soothing in Ang’s ears.

She shook her head. “No, I don’t feel it yet. I think the bastard toyed with her first. I don’t know, but that’s what I feel. But it’s coming. It’s in there and it will come out.”

“Can you see him?”

“Not clearly. I see a vague shape: green eyes, wild hair; you saw what I drew. I have a sense of him being big and powerful. And strong, so strong just his presence is intimidating. Kirstin didn’t show me fully the man who killed her.” Ang slumped toward the car, and Richie reluctantly let her go. “Whoever he is, he’s long dead now. There’s no justice to be had for Kirstin. But maybe we can give her peace.”

Ang sighed, straightened from the car and started forward toward the house. Richie watched her take a few hesitant steps, then gasped when Ang’s whole body stiffened. “Angel Rose?” he said tentatively, and stepped toward her.

Ang felt the cold a moment before her head exploded with colors, sounds, and smells. She could smell the fall flowers that were native to this area. She could smell freshly carved pumpkins. The smell of pumpkins was overpowering. She could see flashes of green and purple, and there was breathing. Labored, evil breathing.

Angel Rose whipped around to look behind her. She saw a large man behind her, and started to run. Richie ran after her. Ang headed around the house and into the maze. She was so fast, Richie thought.

“ANGEL ROSE!” he called, but she didn’t respond. Almost immediately, Ang stumbled on the overgrown hedges, and cried out. She started to fall, but Richie caught her. “Get away from me!” she screamed, her eyes glazed over. “NO!! GEOFFREY!! HELP ME!!”

Richie held fast, though Ang was struggling against him. He could feel her heart pounding, and knew his was beating just as rapidly. She pounded at his chest, and was screaming and thrashing about, trying to hit him with her head. “Angel,” he said softly. “Angel Rose, come back to me.” He repeated that over and over, and eventually, Ang stopped fighting back.

Ang was in a panic. In her head, she was being chased by this large shadowy figure, and he was gaining on her. She stumbled on a root and started to fall, and suddenly he was upon her. No matter how she struggled, he was bigger and stronger than she was, so she could not get free. The panic was so complete that it took some time before she heard a familiar voice in her head calling her “Angel”. She concentrated on that voice, and gradually, the feeling of terror subsided and was replaced by a feeling of safety. Slowly she realized where and who she was. She was sprawled on the ground in Richie’s arms. His face was a mask of fear and confusion, and she all at once wanted to run away again.

“Richie?” she asked, and the tremor of unshed tears in her voice broke Richie’s heart.

“Right here, sweetheart. I’m right here.” He kissed her temple and rocked her, holding her close to his heart, not giving an inch. She sat there, her head pressed against Richie’s warm chest, listening to the erratic sound of his heartbeat, and cried.

There were no words of comfort he could offer Ang. Nothing he could do to take the pain away. He drew her closer into his embrace and kissed the top of her head. He held her for a long time, while she sobbed. She sobbed for Kirstin’s pain and anguish until her throat was raw and her eyes were burning. With a final squeeze, she looked up at Richie.

“Thank you,” she said to him.

Richie dropped a light kiss on her temple. “You don’t have to go in there,” he answered. “In fact, I don’t want you hurting anymore than you already are. You should go; I’ll figure something out.”

Ang took his hand. “It’s too late for that, Richie” she said. “Kirstin and I, we are already linked. I already feel what she feels, and she’s so afraid...we have to go to her.”

Chapter Sixteen

2011-10-30T07:00:00.000-04:00

Slumped over a mug at the kitchen table, idly stirring in her creamer, Ang thought back to last night, trying to sort out when it was that she climbed into bed with Richie. She vaguely remembered waking to pee and she must have been on autopilot and gone back into her room. If she hadn’t been so mortified, she would admit to herself that there were far greater hardships than waking up in the arms of a handsome man. She allowed herself a delicate shiver at the memory of his body pressed against hers. Ang couldn’t believe she was so out of it last night that she didn’t remember having a guest, and chuckled. She sobered quickly as she remembered just why she had an overnight visitor.

Kirstin. And her curse. Her damned curse. It was a wonder Richie wanted to be anywhere near her with all this spooky stuff. As her brain turned over everything that had happened at the Thompson Estate yesterday, the whispering started in the far corners of her mind. Resigned to helping Kirstin and Richie she tried to reach past her self-taught reluctance toward the voices, straining to hear them more clearly. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, focusing her concentration on the wall in her mind. She visualized a small sliding partition on the wall. In her mind’s eye, she reached toward the partition and opened it just an inch. A swirling white mist seeped from behind the wall to envelop her. She struggled to remain calm as the mist transformed into a woman’s form. Slowly, Kirstin’s features became clear in her mind, and the ghost-thought smiled.

“Thank you, child,” Kirstin said softly. “Thank you for helping me.”

“What do we do first? Where do we look? How do I find you?” Ang murmured softly.

“Child, you already know. You dreamt it.”

Ang gasped loudly as her eyes flew open. She bolted upright in her chair and jostled the table, sending coffee sloshing over the rim of the mug and splashing onto the table. In her haste to get to her study, she upended her chair, oblivious to the loud noise it made in her otherwise silent house. At her desk, she grabbed a pad of paper and a set of charcoal pencils. Her hands were shaking as nightmarish visions swirled in her head.

Stifling a cry, she swooned, bracing herself against the wall as vicious images flickered faster and faster in her mind, making her dizzy. After several minutes, she was able to walk, albeit on shaky legs, and went into the living room. She settled into a comfortable armchair by the window. “I’m listening, Kirstin,” she said tearfully, as she started to sketch.

Her hand flew across the page, working of its own accord. Ang was staring sightlessly at the piece of paper, not seeing the markings her hand made. Slashes of color punctuated her black-and-white drawings, and as each page was completed, she’d tear it from the pad and drop it to the floor before starting on the next one.

In the bedroom, Richie smiled as he woke from a wonderful dream and only opened his eyes when the aroma of dark, rich coffee invaded his senses. He rolled out of bed, pulled on his jeans and t-shirt, and followed his nose. He frowned at the overturned chair. “Ang?” he called, but there was no answer.

He turned to check out the living room, and stopped short in the doorway when Ang caught his eye. She was sitting by the picture window; the morning light bathing her and making her glow. She was writing something and it had her full concentration. Richie watched as she tore a page from her pad, tossed it behind her, and started on another page. That’s when he noticed the papers strewn all around her chair. Squinting at one, he could see it looked like a drawing. He took a closer look at Ang, and she looked like she did last night when they were talking to Kirstin: there but not quite all the way.

A bit apprehensive, he cleared his throat softly and spoke quietly so he wouldn’t startle her. “Mornin’, Angel Rose,” he said.

Ang’s head cocked slightly to one side at the sound of Richie’s voice, but she didn’t acknowledge him, and her hand never stopped moving. Richie ventured closer, moving slowly across the room. He was more than a little worried for Angel Rose; she looked like she was in some sort of trance.

“Are you okay, Angel Rose?” he asked.

Ang’s head turned a bit to follow her ear. When her eyes caught sight of him, her vision snapped into clarity, and she dropped the pencil. She barely registered the fact that his bare feet poked out from the legs of his jeans and his hair was sexily rumpled from having been in her bed. She slumped against the back of the chair and gasped as her hand cramped up.

Richie sat on the ottoman at Ang’s feet. “How long have you been sitting here, Angel Rose?” he asked. He cast glances at the papers all around Ang’s feet. He bent to scoop some of them up and sorted through them.

He sat forward abruptly, his pulse racing. “What is all this?” he asked, horrified at what he was seeing.

He looked up at Ang, who had tears in her eyes. “I dreamed it last night,” she said. “I dreamed it, and I think this is what happened to Kirstin.

Richie looked from the drawings in his hand to Ang and back again. “Sweet mother of God.”

The first drawing was a close up of a very terrified woman. Her eyes were wide and unseeing, her pupils mere pinpricks in her eyes. Her mouth was frozen in a silent scream, and the way her hair was drawn, it was clear to Richie that she had whipped her head around and caught sight of something horrifying. Ang had perfectly captured a feeling of abject terror. The drawing made Richie extremely uncomfortable just looking at it.

The second drawing was of the back of a man’s form. He was drawn large and menacing; tall and muscular, and broad through the shoulders. His hair was wild and scraggly, and most of it was tucked under a watch cap. Just past him, Richie could see a flash of peach and a woman’s arm. It dawned on him that the arm belonged to Kirstin – and that she was wearing the dress she died in. This man looked like he was chasing Kirstin. He studied the drawing closely. There were no hints as to where the scene took place. No landscape or other background images. It was just the two figures, stark against the white page.

But it was the next drawing he flipped to that had Richie’s heart pounding and all the air squeezing out of his lungs. The perspective was from someone on her back. A delicate, dirty hand was held up, palm facing out, a woman’s hand, as if to ward off a blow. Between the fingers of the hand, Richie could see part of the angry features of a man. Even in this drawing, he could see the crazy in the man’s eyes. A shovel was flying through the air behind the man, and his hands were reaching for the prone person. Richie couldn’t make out the man’s face from the drawing; just one deep green eye.

Hands shaking with rage, he reached for some of the other drawings on the floor. They were pretty much just more of the same. Richie never wanted to burn anything as much as he did these papers right now. “What – how – does this happen all the time?” Richie asked Ang.

“Not all the time,” she said, wiping tears away, “not anymore. But I don’t know how. I just know that when I stop fighting my curse, they, those poor souls, leave footprints in my memories.” She shuddered, and started crying again in earnest. “I had a dream last night, a terribly vivid dream. It came back to me as I was stirring my coffee – and I knew I just had to draw. I had to get these images out of my head before I went mad.” For the first time, she realized how many sheets of paper littered the floor around her. “What are they? What did I draw? What memories did Kirstin leave for me?” With shaking hands, she took the pages from Richie. They burned her hand as if they were aflame, and she cried out, dropping them to join the others on the floor.

Without giving it a second thought, Richie knelt in front of her and gathered Ang into his arms. Ang curled up into herself while Richie’s arms wrapped around her. He rocked gently, murmuring nonsensical platitudes to her as he would a scared child. Ang’s tears finally dried, and she looked up to Richie. “Sorry about that,” she said in a small voice.

“Nothing to be sorry about, Angel Rose,” Richie said.

Ang leaned back gently, breaking Richie’s hold on her. She reached down to gather up some of the papers. With shaking hands, she flipped through them gingerly, afraid of the horrors they held. When she finished, she looked up and met Richie’s eyes. “We have to go back to your house,” she said. “We have to talk to Kirstin about this.”

Richie sighed. “Can you tell from these, or from what you didn’t draw where this all happened or who the green-eyed man is?” He reluctantly picked one of the drawings from the pile. This one showed a woman’s foot in a slim boot stepping on, actually nearly tripping over, a tree root. That could be anywhere.

Ang shook her head. “No, that’s why we need to talk to Kirstin. Now, while this is all still fresh.”

Richie sighed. “Are you absolutely sure?” he asked. When Ang nodded, he said, “Alright let’s go.”

Chapter Fifteen

2011-10-20T07:00:00.000-04:00

Satisfied, Kirstin settled back into her chair and vanished from view. Richie sat there, mouth agape, staring at the chair. “Holy shit,” he breathed, sitting back in his seat. After a few minutes, he asked, “Is she really gone?”

“Yes,” Angel Rose answered in a tiny voice. Richie looked over at her, and was dismayed to find her swaying on her feet. He jumped up to steady her, and helped lower her into the rocking chair.

“What’s wrong? Are you okay? What happened?”

Ang held up a hand briefly to stop his questions. “It’s alright,” she said. “It’s just been a while since I let them in, and I’d forgotten what a toll they can take.” She leaned her head back and closed her eyes. “I just need to go home and get some sleep. I’ll be okay.” She stood and immediately started to fall. Richie again caught her in his arms.

“You can’t be driving when you can’t even stand; let me drive you home. We can sort out your car in the morning.” When Ang just nodded weakly, he helped her downstairs, and sat her in one of the window seats while he stuffed his pillow into his duffel bag and scooped it up.

“What’re you doing?” Ang asked as she slumped against the side of the seat.

“I’m a little freaked out at the moment,” he answered honestly. “Is there anyplace in town I can stay after I drop you off?” Richie asked. He kept glancing back at the stairs, apprehensive a about spending the night.

Ang checked her watch. “Not without waking someone up or heading out of town,” she said. Richie checked his own watch and saw it was pushing ten o’clock. “The B and B’s are pretty much full or asleep for the night.”

“Holy cow, how’d it get so late without my noticing it?” He could have sworn it was dinner time, but nearly four hours had passed. He’d missed dinner, and wasn’t even hungry.

“That’s just how it works,” she said, shrugging. “You lose all track of time.”

Richie looked at her, nodding in agreement, though he had no idea why. “OK then, after I take you home, I’m going to sleep in the truck tonight while I wrap my head around this whole thing.” He helped her up and supported her weight as they made their way to his truck. He dropped his bag on the ground and helped Ang up into her seat. She leaned her head back against the headrest and closed her eyes. Richie tossed his stuff in the backseat and slid in behind the wheel.

She gave him directions to her place, and soon he was pulling into the little driveway in front of her cottage. “Cute place,” Richie said.

“It is,” Ang agreed. The short drive with the windows open had perked her up somewhat, but she was still bone tired. She poured out of her seat and braced herself on the door handle. Richie chuckled and went around to her side of the truck. He led her up the few stairs and waited while she unlocked and pushed open the door.

“Are you going to be alright?” Richie asked.

Ang nodded. “Yeah, I just need to sleep. Thanks for taking me home.”

“Of course. Well, good night.”

Richie started to back out of the door when Ang stopped him.

“Look, if you don’t want to sleep in your truck or drive all over the place to find somewhere to stay, you’re more than welcome to crash here.” Richie just looked at her. “What’s the problem?” she asked. “We’re both adults, and I think I can trust you, right?” Richie nodded. “Then there isn’t any problem. Go get your bag.”

By the time Richie returned, Ang had pillows and a blanket stacked on the foot of a short sofa.

“You can take your bag into the bedroom,” she said. Richie just winged an eyebrow. Blushing, Ang said, “Look, you’re much bigger than I am, and you won’t fit on the couch.” He started to object, but Ang put up a hand. “I’m gonna be asleep in about 40 seconds,” she said, yawning widely to emphasize her point. “I won’t even notice. End of discussion. There’s some food in the fridge if you’re hungry; please help yourself.”

“But – ” Richie protested.

Ang just gave him a look. “I promise you, I will be fine. Please,” she said, yawning widely. “Have something to eat, and get some sleep. There’s a television in the armoire if you’re not sleepy yet. I’ll see you in the morning.” With that, she took a blanket and pillow from the closet and tossed them on the couch. She disappeared into the bathroom where Richie heard the rustling of clothes and the run of water as she brushed her teeth and changed for bed.

He smiled when she came back into her room wearing a long t-shirt over light yoga pants and heavy socks. She smiled sheepishly as she fluffed up her pillow and sat on the end of the sofa. “My feet are always cold,” she said. “There’s extra pillows in the hall closet, and clean towels in the bathroom,” she said, shaking out the light blanket and effectively dismissing him.

“Good night, Angel Rose,” Richie said, and backed into her bedroom, closing the door as Ang settled in on the couch.

Ang sighed when she heard the bedroom door snick closed, and she relaxed into the cushions. She wasn’t kidding when she’d said she’d be out like a light in a matter of seconds. After these encounters, she always slept; it allowed her brain to unwind. She stuffed her arm under the pillow behind her head, pulled the light blanket up to her ears, and fell asleep.

Richie changed into jogging shorts and a tank top, and opened the door. He smiled when he saw Ang all but passed out on the couch and continued into the kitchen. He fixed a thick sandwich, grabbed a Coke, and went back into Ang’s bedroom. He set the plate down on the nightstand and crossed the small room to open the armoire. He snagged the remote from the top of the TV and sat on the edge of the bed to pop the top of his soda. He flipped through the channels until he found a baseball game and reached back to grab his dinner.

As he chewed through his hearty meatloaf sandwich, he thought back to the encounter with Kirstin. He was amazed at everything that had transpired, and knew he had to help the poor woman. Ghost. Whatever. No woman deserved to be beaten like she was, he didn’t care when it happened.

And Angel Rose. She called her gift a “curse” but he thought it was just incredible. She had the ability to interact with the spirit world. He tried to imagine what it would be like to be that in tune to the cosmos around him. He thought it would be phenomenal to be able to talk to his ancestors, for example, to find out what their lives were like. Or to have a conversation with some of the great men and women of history. He frowned, thinking more on that. What if he couldn’t choose who came to talk to him? What if there was so much noise in his head, it drowned out his own thoughts? He shuddered. That must be what Angel Rose means by curse.

Whatever it’s called, for the moment it was fascinating and new and a little bit scary, and he wanted to experience it again. “Not going to be tonight,” he said to himself as he polished off his sandwich. He brought his plate and empty can back out to the kitchen and placed them in the sink. He stopped to watch Angel Rose sleep for a minute, wondering if she was dreaming of Kirstin.

He grabbed the extra pillows from the closet before closing himself into Angel Rose’s room and climbed into her bed. He was a sprawler, and probably would use up the whole bed. He shucked his shirt and lay in the cool sheets, Ang’s scent teasing him. It was fresh and clean, and nothing like the death and decay he had smelled at his house. “Olfactory Hallucination” is what Ang called it. He didn’t care. It was creepy, and this was much preferred. He was mulling things over in his head, trying to grasp the enormity of what had transpired earlier that evening. Eventually, though, his brain gave up the ghost, so to speak, and he drifted off to a dreamless sleep.

In the middle of the night, Ang partially awoke, needing to go to the bathroom. She stumbled into the bathroom without turning on a light and did her business, already on the way to being asleep again. Barely conscious, she went into her bedroom and climbed into bed, totally unaware of the other person sleeping there. A short time later, Ang was dreaming that she was suffocating. She was being buried alive. The air was heavy in her lungs, and she couldn’t breathe. She clawed at the dirt, but it didn’t help. A faceless man hovered over her, his hands reaching for her throat as he threw his shovel aside. With a strangled scream, she wriggled with all her might and sat upright. She looked around the room, frightened, and completely disoriented.

The scream and motion woke Richie, who bolted out of bed. “What the hell?” he asked, and fumbled for a lamp. “Angel Rose? What are you doing in here? “

Ang blinked and looked around again, her eyes still unfocused. “Am I ok?” she asked in a small voice.

Richie nodded slowly. “Yes, darlin’, you’re perfectly safe, but...”

Ang was already sinking down into the bed again, her eyes closing. Staring at her, Richie watched as she drifted off to sleep. She probably wouldn’t even remember this in the morning, but now what the hell was he supposed to do? Ang sighed and turned away from him, apparently deeply asleep. He shrugged remembering her “we’re both adults” statement earlier, and got back in on the other side of the bed, careful not to touch her. He rolled away from her, closed his eyes, and tried to go back to sleep.

When the first rays of sunlight peeked in the blinds, Ang woke slowly. She was toasty warm, but not uncomfortably so. When she woke a little more she tried to stretch, but something was holding her down. She came all the way awake when she realized it was Richie’s arm. He was spooned against her, holding her to his chest.

Ang swallowed hard, and groaned to herself. She had no recollection of getting into bed with Richie, never mind cuddling up with him. She mentally took inventory, and determined they didn’t actually do anything last night. Judging by what was pressing into her backside, she’d definitely be feeling it this morning if they had. She smiled and blushed, then gave herself a mental shake.

Gingerly lifting Richie’s arm, she tried to sneak out from under him. He murmured incoherently and pulled her closer, nuzzling her neck. “Mmmm, where’re you going?” he rumbled sleepily.

“Richie, wake up,” Ang said softly.

“Don’t wanna,” he whined.

“Okay,” Ang said softly, “then let me up for a minute.”

“You’ll come back?” he mumbled as he released her, his words barely discernable.

“Sure thing,” she answered as she slid out of bed, not intending to do anything of the sort. In fact, she hoped he had no memory of this at all. She was mortified beyond belief to have found herself nestled in bed with him – a man she barely knew. She pulled a robe from the closet and put it on, then hurried to the kitchen where she started a pot of coffee.

Chapter Fourteen

2011-10-10T07:00:00.001-04:00

“You’ll really help me?” Richie asked. Ang nodded.

Richie was quiet for a long moment, taking everything in. “So, we know some of the rumors, and some of the history, but we need to know more. We need to know what happened to her,” he said. “We’ll be able to find out?”

Ang sighed. “We can simply ask her,” she said. “Depending on what she remembers, then yes.”

“And you’ll really be able to hear her?” Richie was shocked. He never believed this would be possible, never mind happening to him.

“Yes, I will,” Ang said quietly. She got up from the ground and brushed off the seat of her jeans. Richie stood behind her and put a hand on her shoulder. “Any time you want to leave, I will take you home.” She nodded and led the way into the house.

Right away, Ang felt chilly. She looked at Richie. “She’s waiting,” Ang said. “Let’s get upstairs.” Ang unerringly led Richie led up to Kirstin’s door; a door that was again closed. Ang tried the handle, but the door was locked. She looked at Richie who took the key from his pocket and handed it to Ang. “Why’d you lock the door?” she asked him.

He looked at her and shook her head. “I didn’t.”

They went into the room, and Kirstin was rocking in her chair. She stopped when she saw the woman enter. Good heavens, that girl looked just like her Hope! Her eyes misted over, and she waited for the woman to come to her. She was still a little hurt that the girl had fled from her, especially knowing they were relations. She was leery of showing herself to the girl until she was certain the child wouldn’t run away again.

“Did you see that?” Richie asked. Ang just nodded. “Can you see her?” Richie asked in a low voice.

“Not just now; she has to want to let me,” Ang said in her regular voice.

“Is that what happened before?” Richie said, still speaking softly.

Ang shook her head. “No, being in that hidden room relaxed something, or made my curse stronger or something. Not now.” She thought a moment before continuing. “I can feel her blocking me from seeing her at the moment.”

“Do you think she’ll show again?”

“I don’t know,” Ang said. “And for the record, you don’t have to whisper. Kirstin, is that you?” The chair started rocking again, then stopped.

“Do you know who I am?” she asked. The chair didn’t move.

“My name is Angel Rose Summerlin. Do I look familiar to you?” The chair moved.

Richie watched with wonder on his face as Ang had a stilted, painful conversation comprised of yes/no questions that didn’t really tell them anything they didn’t already know from the mounds of paperwork they had found. Finally, she asked one last question of the chair. “If I promise not to run, will you show yourself to me? To us?” She looked at Richie, who nodded, though his stomach was in knots.

Very slowly, the chair rocked forward and back, just once, then stopped; like someone had gotten up out of the chair. The door to the room slammed shut, which made Richie jump, but Ang put a calming hand on his arm. She drew him over to the couch, and motioned for him to sit, and she sat next to him.

Slowly, the chair moved again, as if someone were getting into it. Ang put her hand on the arm of the chair and waited. Slowly, the smell of earth filled the room. Richie nearly gagged from it, but Ang seemed unfazed. She closed her eyes concentrated hard on opening her mind and she felt a door open in her head. A blinding pain hit her between the eyes for a millisecond, and was gone. Ang took a deep breath, and opened her eyes.

“What do you see?” Richie asked, whispering. “I can’t see her,” Richie said, frustrated.

Ang described the young woman sitting serenely in her chair, hands folded in her lap, and elbows resting on the arm rests. “She’s the woman from the photo, isn’t she? The one I saw in my dream?” he said, and Ang nodded.

“Holy shit,” Richie said, and Kirstin flinched.

“What he means is,” Ang said, casting a withering glance at Richie, “is that he’s disappointed he can’t see you like I can.”

Kirstin looked at Ang. “Can you hear me as well, child?”

“Yes, Kirstin, I can,” Ang nodded slowly, her eyes tearing. The voice was somehow viscerally familiar to her. She needed no other proof; she knew without a doubt that she was descended from this woman. Ang looked at Richie, who shook his head. He couldn’t hear her either.

Ang put her other hand in Richie’s and squeezed. “Don’t force it,” she said. “Just relax and let her come.” Richie closed his eyes and concentrated on the woman he saw in the maze, and the battered creature he saw on the path leading back from the pond, and his heart squeezed. The smell of earth started to recede, and a different, more disturbingly cloying scent filled the air. “Richie,” Ang said softly. “Open your eyes.”

He did, and gasped. Sitting in the chair in front of him was the woman from his dreams.

“Hello,” he said to her, not quite believing what he was seeing. He had a death grip on Ang’s hand, not wanting to let it go for fear of breaking contact with Kirstin.

Kirstin nodded. “Good evening,” she said in a soft voice.

Richie sucked in a breath. That same voice had begged him for help in his dreams.

Richie looked at Ang, unsure what to do. Ang, for her part, was surprised it was this easy for Richie to see her. In her experience, most people were reluctant to believe this was even possible which made communication difficult at best. Richie was so open to this, it was just amazing to her. He didn’t seem the type. “Talk to her,” Ang said. “You don’t need me for this.”

“Don’t go anywhere,” Richie begged Ang.

She gently shook the hand Richie had crushed in his grip. “I couldn’t if I tried,” she said.

Richie looked at Kirstin. “You asked for my help,” he said to her. Kirstin nodded. “You want me to find you. What does that mean?”

Kirstin shook her head. “I am trapped here,” she said. “Trapped in this house while my family has gone. I watched my beloved wither and suffer in this house. Saw my children turn from hopeful to mournful, and it broke my heart. I wasn’t able to watch over them like a mother should.” She turned away now, tears in her eyes. Richie felt for her. He didn’t understand any of this, but he felt like he was talking to a real flesh-and-blood woman, not a specter of who she used to be.

“When I saw you on the path, you were hurt,” Richie said delicately.

Kirstin kept her gaze averted, staring out her window to the grounds beyond it. “I was,” she said sadly.

“Who hurt you?” Richie asked.

Kirstin shook her head again. “It makes no difference now, he’s long since dead, and I’m sure his God has seen to his punishment.”

Richie grew angry. “It does matter; people should know who did this to you.” Kirstin smiled at the indignation on Richie’s face, and reached out to touch his face. Shocked, Richie felt her touch, as real as Ang’s hand felt under his.

“You are a warm and caring man,” she said. “But truly, it would do no good to anyone to bring this man’s family shame.”

Richie nodded. “As you wish,” he said. “How will I find you?”

Kirstin shook her head. “I haven’t a single notion. I just know I cannot rest or leave this house to be reunited with my Geoffrey until you do. Please,” she looked at Richie, “will you help me?”

He looked into smoky gray eyes filled with desperation and hope. “Of course I will,” he said. And, he added to himself, I will find out who hurt you.

Chapter Thirteen

2011-09-30T07:00:00.000-04:00

Richie was following behind Angel Rose as they walked back into the great room. He was telling her about the ceiling, and had his head tilted back while he pointed at the features as he went.

Ang wasn’t listening. There, in front of her, was Kirstin, wringing her hands together as if she was worried about something. The ghost was standing right in front of her, plain as day, and Ang stopped short to keep from walking through her. After the briefest hesitation, in which she mentally berated herself again for visiting the hidden room downstairs – she should have known a place like that would loosen her mental blocks – she took a couple of steps to the right, ostensibly to look at the massive fireplace.

“This is huge!” she commented, stepping in to look up the flue and hoping Richie hadn’t noticed her abrupt change of course.

Kirstin’s eyes immediately went wide. “You can see me?” she demanded of Angel Rose.

“I know!” he answered, oblivious to what had just happened. “Check this out.” He ducked slightly and sat on the bench inside the fire place. He laid on his back, stretching out his legs, and still didn’t touch the other side. “It’s awesome. I can’t wait to fire it up, but it has to be cleaned and stuff first. And it should probably get cold. Does it get cold here?”

“Sure does,” Angel Rose said, sitting on the bench opposite. “You are certainly going to keep warm with this.”

“Uh-huh,” Richie said. You can sit in the window seats too,” he was saying. “The sun comes right in and warms you to your bones.” He smiled wryly. “Of course, just right now, that isn’t quite a selling point, but when it gets cool, it’ll be great.” Angel Rose followed him over to the nearly floor-to-ceiling windows, and indicated the benches built just under the sills. “They’re pretty comfortable too,” he said. “Give it a try.”

Angel Rose couldn’t move. The bench that Richie was pointing to was already occupied. Kirstin was sitting there, pleased as could be, with a wide smile on her face. She patted the space next to her on the bench indicating Angel Rose should sit next to her.

“What’s wrong?” Richie asked, watching Angel Rose stare at the window seat.

Kirstin narrowed her eyes. “You CAN see me and I’m not even trying!” she shouted, making Angel Rose wince just a little. “Oh! I saw that! You flinched when I shouted. You can HEAR me too?”

“Angel Rose? What is it?” Richie asked. He grabbed her hand, forgetting for the moment that Ang didn’t like to be touched. Her skin was ice-cold and just before she wrenched her hand away Richie caught a glimpse of something on the window seat. “What the hell was that?” Richie asked. “I saw something just now, when I took your hand.”

“I don’t know what you saw,” Ang said distractedly. Kirstin vacated her window seat and circled Ang, chattering at her like a little magpie.

“Could it have been Kirstin?” Richie asked, examining the window seat again and finding nothing out of the ordinary.

“I suppose,” Ang said, heading for the French doors on the opposite side of the room. “What do the back gardens look like?” she asked.

Kirstin swooped in and stopped in front of Ang, who veered around her without thinking. “What the hell?” Richie asked.

Ang didn’t hear him; her only thought was getting outside.

“He can’t see me, but he saw you walk around me,” Kirstin crowed, bouncing excitedly on the balls of her feet like a child. Angel Rose took a few steps more and Kirstin moved with her, blocking her path.

“What are you doing, Ang?” Richie asked.

Ang tried to step around Kirstin, but the ghost matched her step-for-step.

Kirstin grinned at Angel Rose. “You can try to ignore me all you want to,” she said, “but I’m not going anywhere. Not now that I know you can see me.”

“Angel Rose!” Richie said, exasperated now. “What in the blue HELL is going on here? Why are you dancing around my living room?”

Richie strode over to her and stopped in front of her. Almost immediately, cold air engulfed him, raising gooseflesh. After a moment, it dissipated.

“It’s cold again,” he said. Then realization dawned. “That was Kirstin, wasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Kirstin answered for Ang. “Yes, it was me.” She stepped back onto Richie, and his skin cooled again.

“Holy shit,” he said, watching his flesh pucker.

“She’s here, isn’t she?” He stepped away from the cold air and his skin settled once more. “And you were – wait, she was standing right here in front of you. And you were moving – damn. Shit. You can see her! That’s it, isn’t it? You don’t want to walk through her, and you’re trying to go around – holy SHIT.” Richie looked around the room.

“Oh, for a Yankee, he’s pretty smart,” Kirstin said, clapping her hands. Angel Rose threw her a withering glance.

“Who are you scowling at? Oh man, she’s really here?” Richie said. “He turned to the room and raised his voice. “I’m going to help you,” he shouted.

Kirstin clapped her hands over her ears. “Sweet Lord, I’m dead, not deaf, you silly Yankee!” she complained.

“You don’t have to yell,” Angel Rose said softly, nearly in tears. She was so mad at herself for not trying harder to ignore Kirstin. Now he knew.

“What do you – wait, she told you that? You can HEAR her too?” Richie’s eyes were close to bugging out of his head.

He looked at her more closely, and saw there was something else. Something more she wasn’t telling him. “What else?” he asked her, coming up close to her, forcing her look up at him. “What else is there that you’re not telling me? You see and hear dead people. That’s a hell of a thing, Angel Rose – what else could there possibly be?”

Her eyes filled with tears, and she shrank into herself. He may as well know the last of it. “I think that Kirstin Maddox was my great-great-grandmother.”

“You THINK she’s your great-great-grandmother?” Richie asked; disbelief in his voice.

“You’re my blood?” Kirstin said; her joy and exuberance turning serious. “Lord, child, you’re mine?”

“More greats than that, actually,” Ang told him, casting a wary eye at Kirstin. “Seven generations ago, I think. But you get the idea.” Angel Rose haltingly told him about her mother’s adoption, her relationship with her birth mother, and the conversation she had had with her mother that confirmed the Maddox connection.

“Oh child,” Kirstin said, raising a hand to try to caress Ang’s cheek.

Sobbing, Angel Rose turned from Kirstin’s touch, and fled. She threw open the front door and ran.

With a muffled curse Richie chased after her. “Ang, wait!” he called. “Fuck, she’s fast,” he muttered to himself. He caught up to her and she whirled on him, fists flying.

“Damn you!” she cried, pounding at his chest. “Damn you and your estate, and your research project and your cursed money and your fucking GHOST.”

Richie trapped her arms between them as he crushed her to his chest. Adrenaline pumping, he tried his best to calm her down. “Angel Rose, it’s alright,” he soothed. “Just relax.”

He whispered to her as he held her, and gradually, she calmed. When he felt the tension leech from her body into the ground, he relaxed his grip on her. Without him to support her, she started to sink to the ground. He helped her down, and sat beside her.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly.

“It’s okay,” Richie answered, smoothing her hair away from her forehead.

“This is so awkward,” Angel Rose said, turning away from Richie’s touch.

“I’m sorry for that too,” Richie said. “But from where I’m sitting, it’s actually pretty impressive. I mean, I know a lot of people, and other than Miss Nellie, I’ve never met anyone who can talk to ghosts.” He was quiet for a few minutes, but Angel Rose knew he wanted to ask. She could practically feel the words building in his throat.

“Go ahead,” she said, resigned to sharing this bit of herself. “You know you want to ask.”

“I’m sorry,” he said for the second time. “But you’re right. Have you always seen ghosts?”

Ang nodded. She told him a story from when she was a girl. She had imaginary friends like none of her other girlfriends did. Her best imaginary friend, the one she saw the most of, was a lady named Mathilda. Mattie, as Ang called her, was an old woman who had lived for more than a hundred years. She told Ang stories about raising her children on a farm during the Great Depression, and for days, Ang thought she was hearing the locusts coming; great swarms of them, with their ominous hum growing louder in her head until she couldn’t stand it any longer. She’d wake in the night, sure that the flower garden would be gone, and wouldn’t go back to sleep until her father had taken her to check it out.

There were other friends, but Mattie illustrated the point for Richie. When Ang finished telling her story, Richie just looked at her. “Wow,” he said. “I just had an imaginary dog.”

Ang burst out laughing. “Oh God”, she said. “I can’t believe you said that.” Getting herself under control, she looked in his face and tried to gauge if he was making fun of her or not. She decided he wasn’t.

“So,” Richie said carefully, “I take it you are not overly pleased with this gift you have?”

She just glared at him. “You mean ‘curse’, don’t you? Do you know how long it took me to suppress it? Of course you don’t. No, I’m not overly pleased, as you say. It’s damned inconvenient, truth be told, and frankly, I wish it wasn’t so. But, oh God, she is my great-great-whatever-grandmother; at least I think she is, so I owe her. I have to help you help her.”

Chapter Twelve

2011-09-20T07:00:00.002-04:00

Richie found himself outside the Historical Society early Monday afternoon. He wanted to do more research now that he’d learned more over the weekend; he had managed to find someone who knew something about the ghost in his house. SueBeth at the diner introduced him to Samson Woodbridge, one of the older men who had “his” stool at the counter, who’s Auntie had the sight. Richie had spent the afternoon drinking sweet tea with Mrs. Cornelia Woodbridge who knew all about the Thompson haunting and had a gift for telling stories.

Richie learned about the rumor that one of Kirstin’s “childhood chums”, as Miss Nellie called him, grew sweet on Kirstin, and became enraged when she had gotten married. He had bided his time and waited long years until he had the opportunity to find her alone, and beat her to death. Richie had shivered at that one.

Another rumor had her coming across a family of runaway slaves who didn’t know that Kirstin was the woman of the house at one of the safe houses along their escape route. The family, which included three nearly grown sons (though the number of sons varied, Miss Nellie had said, depending on the story teller) who protected their family by killing the woman so she could not expose them to the authorities.

There were other rumors too, but they all ended with Kirstin being beaten to death. He had to wonder if that part was actually the truth, or just repeated as rumor so often that it made it into all the stories. Nobody knew for certain, and he wanted to check the newspaper reports he and Angel Rose had uncovered so far to see if there was anything in them about a jilted would-be suitor or scared slave family.

Kirstin had never been found. No trace of her, alive or dead, since she disappeared on that night in 1865. She would most assuredly stay with her home, Miss Nellie insisted, until her remains were found and properly laid to rest. Miss Nellie believed that Kirstin was indeed the spirit that remained in the Thompson house.

Kirstin’s spirit was quiet for the rest of the weekend, and Richie slept deeply and dreamlessly. He had even had spent hours in Kirstin’s office, poring over the papers there, but did not see the rocker sway again.

Richie sighed now and looked up at the sign above the door. “Historical Society” it read, in large block letters. Underneath, in a feminine, flowing script was added, “Angel Rose Summerlin, Director”. He was anxious to share what he had learned from Miss Nellie with Ang, and to see if he could sort out which of the rumors was most likely to be true. He didn’t know what he would do with the information, but knowledge was power, right?

The buzzer over the door sounded as Richie walked in. Angel Rose was not at her desk, but her voice came over the intercom almost immediately. “I’ll be right there.”

Richie crossed to the desk and leaned over, finding the little speaker. He pushed a button marked ‘Talk’ and spoke into the white box. “Ang, it’s me, Richie. I’ll come up.” He chuckled. That was far more civilized than shouting.

As he reached into the copper pot for the key ring, something on the desktop caught his attention and he stopped. There, in the center of the desk was looked like a pile of sketches. The one on top was of a roll-top desk and delicate chair. It was clear – to him at least – that this was some of the furniture in Kirstin’s room. Stunned, Richie sat at Ang’s desk and flipped through the sketches. Parts of the room – the rocking chair, the pattern on the fabric walls, even the small fireplace, were depicted perfectly in pencil on the heavy parchment.

Ang’s came through the archive-stair vestibule, stopping short when she saw what Richie was looking at. “I’m sorry; did I take the keys with me?” She patted her pockets as Richie startled, not expecting her.

“Huh? Oh, no, no, I have them,” he said, holding up a key ring in one hand. With the other, he lofted the sheaf of papers. “What’s all this?”

“Oh,” Angel Rose said, self-consciously. “Just some sketches I did this morning – that room wouldn’t leave my mind last night for some reason.”

“These are really good,” Richie said, shifting through the drawings until he got to the one of the rocking chair. He brought the paper up close to his face and squinted. He could just make out the faint outline of a woman in the chair. “Hey,” he said, crossing to Ang. “Is this a ghost in the chair?”

Ang’s color deepened. “Probably,” she said, taking the paper from Richie’s hands. “Huh,” she said. She didn’t remember sketching in the figure, just drawing the chair. Wonderful, she thought. Now her sub-conscious was doodling. “Guess that does look like a person there. Makes sense, I guess; since there is apparently a ghost in your house.” That sounded sufficiently flippant, she thought. “So, you ready to get to work?”

“Yep,” Richie said. “You’ll never guess what I found out yesterday.”

“You’re right,” Angel Rose replied as they walked up the stairs. “So why not just tell me.”

And he did. Richie told Angel Rose about Miss Nellie and her stories. He mentioned the papers in Kirstin’s desk, and mentally kicked himself for not bringing any of them with him. They weren’t of any great significance in the grand scheme of Kirstin’s mysterious disappearance, but they’d make a nice addition to the historical society. He’d have to remember to bring them by next time.

“Wow,” Angel Rose said, wide-eyed. “You sure have been busy.”

“Yeah, well Miss Nellie was a hoot. Seemed a bit, well, ‘not quite there’ if you get my meaning – I’m not what to make of what she told me. That’s why I wanted to look through this stuff again.” He fit the key into the doorknob and let them into the room. “I wanted to read some of the old articles and stuff and see what was in there.”

“Well I’ll get out of your hair,” Angel Rose said. “I have some new things – well, things new to me – to sort and catalog. Old Mr. Jamieson dropped off a load of his grandfather’s papers and memorabilia which date back to before the Civil war. Ring if you need me,” she said nodding at the phone.

“Will do,” Richie said, already riffling through the papers in the closest stack.

Several hours later, Richie stood and stretched; groaning when his back popped. None of the articles he found voiced any rumors or suspicions about Kirstin’s absence. He chuckled to himself – the press was certainly different back then than it was today. He learned a bit more about the Maddox family though, and the Thompsons before them, and was enthralled with the Underground Railroad articles he found.

Deciding he had worked enough for one day, Richie locked up and headed back downstairs. Angel Rose was on the phone when came into the main lobby, and didn’t notice him – she was in some sort of heated conversation.

“I know what I saw,” she said in a harsh whisper. “I can’t believe this is coming back again.” She paused for a moment, then continued speaking in her regular voice. “Alright then, I’ll see you in a few weeks. Love to Dad. Bye.”

She hung up the phone and slid some documents into her desk drawer before locking it. She was still unaware that Richie was watching her as she dropped her head into her hands, her fingers rubbing at her scalp. With a sigh, she raised her head and was startled to see Richie standing there.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, coloring slightly. Her eyes flitted quickly between the drawer and Richie. “You done for the day, then? How’d it go?”

Richie filled her in on the articles he’d read about the Maddox Mystery and the Underground Railroad. “You interested in taking another stab at seeing the hidden room? I promise, we won’t go upstairs to Kirstin’s room.” He made a little ‘x’ over his heart with his right forefinger and then held up the first three fingers of his right hand. “Scout’s honor.”

Angel Rose smiled. “I would love to see the room.” She grabbed her purse and her keys. “I’ll follow you there, if it’s all the same to you,” she said.

“Whatever you like,” Richie answered, dropping his key ring into the copper pot.

Ang followed Richie through town. While they made the short trek, she thought back to the conversation she had just been having with her mother, and hoped Richie didn’t overhear it. She wasn’t ready to tell Richie that she was one of Kirstin’s descendents. Something in the back of her mind was screaming at her to keep that to herself for as long as she could. As they drove up the long driveway that lead to the Thompson estate, she cast her eyes up to the third-floor window where she knew Kirstin’s room to be. Thankfully, she didn’t see any motion behind the curtains.

Richie had flashlights in his hand as he unlocked the front door. “You’re gonna love this,” he said. He led the way into the great room, and didn’t even pause on his way to the serving kitchen. “Just down the stairs here,” he said, indicating an old staircase. They came around the last stair to the pantry door. They crowded inside, and Richie shined his flashlight on the small crawlspace door. He opened it, and motioned for Angel Rose to go first.

“You can stand upright once you get under there,” he said. “But here, take this,” he added, handing her a flashlight. “It’s pretty dark in there.”

Angel Rose took the flashlight and directed the beam through the opening. Seeing the hard-packed dirt floor made her heart race. She crouched down and braced herself on the top of the doorframe and nearly swooned at the surge of emotions that poured through her. Alternating waves of terror and elation coursed through her, breaking easily through the barriers she thought she had solidified over the past years.

Struggling to keep a mask of wonder and curiosity on her face so Richie wouldn’t question her, she ducked her head under the door jamb and went inside. Straightening, she turned off the flash light and stood stock-still, waiting for the worst of the bombardment to be over.

Richie came through behind her and nearly walked into her in the darkness. “Aw, sorry, Angel Rose, is your flashlight dead?”

Ang shook her head. “No, I just wanted...” She turned her head to the side to try to better catch the voice that was teasing the edges of her hearing. She was quiet a moment before shaking her head. “Never mind.” She turned just right, and caught the voice; a young boy’s voice, chattering on about his run through the fields.

“No, no,” Richie said, coming to stand beside Angel Rose, and turning off his own light. “I get it. You want to get a feel for the room as a piece of history. Do you want me to close the door, so you can get the full effect?”

The boy’s voice stopped its story about darting away from the slave-catchers and materialized in front of Angel Rose. “Missus, dat door ain’t got no pull on dis side.” Ang didn’t even blink at his sudden appearance. She supposed she should have known better than to come into this room.

Richie flipped on his light and had moved toward the portal to swing the door shut when Angel Rose stopped him.

“Don’t,” she said. “Please; there’s no knob on this side; we’ll be trapped in here.”

Frowning, Richie looked at the smooth expanse of old wood under his hand. “Damned if you’re not right,” he said. The small boy crowed at Angel Rose. “How did you know there wasn’t any knob?”

Angel Rose turned her back on the boy and flipped on her own flashlight. “Most of these rooms didn’t. It was the only way to make sure that frightened runaways didn’t panic and burst from the secret rooms at an inopportune time.” She hoped that sounded right.

“Makes sense,” Richie said.

Angel Rose walked a circuit around the small room, trailing a hand gently over the earthen walls. Small crumbles of dust flaked at her touch and fluttered into the flashlight’s beam.

“How many people do you imagine the household hid here?” Richie asked.

Angel Rose closed her eyes as the boy’s voice floated into her head again. He was excitedly telling her what he knew, and Ang was unable to stop herself from relaying the story to Richie as she heard it. “There were so many who tried to get away. Whole families would run – parents with small children, or with daughters of a certain age. There weren’t many places to go in the South. Once you made it to one, runaways would rest as much as they could, saving their strength for the continued journey northward through Memphis.”

She stood in a corner of the room and braced her back against the wall. “From there, depending on where the runaways wanted to go, whether it was Chicago or Madison, or even all the way to Canada, they’d have to go through miles upon miles of unfriendly territory.” The little boy was sitting at her feet now, his talking done for the moment, with a wide smile on his face.

“I’d imagine there were dozens, if not scores of runaways who came through here.” She had a moment of sadness as she looked down into the boy’s smiling face. “And for every family that made it out safely, there was a life that was lost here: malaria, cholera, tuberculosis – so many illnesses.” Angel Rose felt drained. The boy laid his hand on Ang’s shoe and smiled sadly before disappearing.

Richie noticed the sorrow in Angel Rose’s face. “C’mon,” he said. “I didn’t mean for this to make you melancholy. Let’s get out of the dark. I don’t know if you noticed, but the great room upstairs has the most amazing pressed-tin ceiling.”

“I’m sorry,” Angel Rose said, trying to shake off the last vestiges of her blues. “I don’t know what came over me,” she lied. “But yeah, let’s get out of here.”

Chapter Eleven

2011-09-10T07:00:00.006-04:00

When the door closed, the color began to creep slowly back into Angel Rose’s face. The swirling sensation in her head started to subside as well.

“Are you okay?” Richie asked softly.

“I – I – I’m not sure,” she answered honestly. “I just have to get out of here. Please. I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright,” Richie said. “C’mon.” He led her down two flights of stairs to the main level. With each step away from Kirstin’s room, Ang’s breathing slowed a little more. They crossed the great room quickly, and Richie spared a glance over his shoulder at the staircase. He had a ghost. Holy shit.

Once in the truck, Richie wasted no time in heading toward the street. “Sorry you didn’t get to see the Underground Railroad room – maybe next time?” he said.

Angel Rose let out a shaky breath. Right now, going back in that house was the last thing she wanted to do. “Maybe. Thank you for getting me out of there.”

As they drove away, neither looked back at the house, so they missed the curtain pulling back slightly from the window.

Kirstin watched them leave, seeing the lights fade in the distance. The man had kept the key and left his belongings in the great room so she believed he was coming back, and she was glad. This one would help her, she just knew it. The woman too. She felt it. They would definitely help her. Not like the last ones who were here.

The Recent Past
Winter, 1967

The Aragon family had been living in the house for only a few short months, but they were all unpacked and were decorating for the holidays. They had given up on the third-floor room, and in fact had made plans to wall in the staircase, and turn the whole of the third floor into storage space. They were going to open all the walls and sell off whatever they found up there, and were excited about it. Kirstin was less so. She had to try to change their minds. Later.

For now, Kirstin sat in her window seat, looking at the decorations. Pine boughs graced both window seats and mantle, and a large tree festooned with twinkling lights, glittering baubles, and shiny tinsel had a place of honor by the fireplace. The family, a young couple, a two-year-old baby girl, and a cat, all seemed to be excited about the Christmas season. Kirstin watched and laughed with pleasure as the baby tried to pull the sparkly ornaments from the lower boughs of the tree. Her mother gently redirected her, and she toddled to the window seat where Kirstin was sitting.

The child, with her beautiful moss-green eyes and soft brown hair, looked up at Kirstin with a smile on her face. “Ma-ma-ma-ma-ma,” she babbled, talking to Kirstin. Babies and animals had the innate ability to see things that more cynical adults could not.

“Hello beautiful,” Kirstin said to the child, reaching out to try to touch her. The child grabbed at her, and laughed when her pudgy little hand went clear through Kirstin’s outstretched, slender one.

“What are you looking at, Caroline?” the baby’s mother asked. She came over and squatted in front of Kirstin. Shivering, she said, “Come away from there baby girl,” and scooped up the girl. “It’s too cold over here for you.”

Christmas morning, Kirstin watched as Caroline’s parents helped her open shiny packages. The little one was more interested in the wrappings than the trappings, and Kirstin remembered back to the days when her children were the same way. Later, when the little one slept in a basket by the hearth, Kirstin watched as the couple stood guard over her, and smiled at them. This was a family strong with love, she thought. Surely they would help her.

That night, she reached out to the couple. While they slept, she joined them in their dreams. As she has always done, she let them find her in the maze, then waited to see if they’d follow her to the lake. They did, and when she approached them on the path, they ran from her, terrified. The couple woke in a cold sweat. The woman looked to her husband. “Did you just…” she trailed off, not sure how to broach the subject.

“Yeah, I did,” he answered. “What do you suppose that means?”

At that moment, Caroline cried out. When her parents went to investigate, they saw the cat hissing, standing on the edge of the crib with his back arched. They couldn’t tell what it was looking at, but it was clearly frightened. When they approached the crib, the cat whirled on them, lashing out. Caroline’s cries got louder. Kirstin tried to calm the baby, and in the process, became visible to the parents. Caroline’s mother cried out, her father grabbed the frightened cat and flung it from the crib and he scooped up the baby, and they ran from the house. The next day, they had packed up their belongings, and moved away.

After that, the house remained empty for more than twenty years.

The Present

The pair drove on in silence until they arrived back at the Historical Society. Richie parked next to Ang’s car, but neither moved to get out of the truck. “So, what happened to you back there?” Richie asked, turning toward Angel Rose. He braced one elbow on his headrest and the other on the steering wheel, and waited.

Damn, what do I say? I don’t want to lie. “I’m not really sure what happened. I just felt like I had to get out of there. I couldn’t breathe, and I was starting to get dizzy.” That part was true, at least, she thought. She forced a chuckle through dry lips. “Maybe I should have listened to you and just stayed in the truck.”

“Maybe,” he said, frowning slightly. He’d let it go for now. He could tell she was hiding something, that there was more to the story than that, but he didn’t know her well enough to press for answers. “How in the hell do I deal with a ghost in my house?”

Angel Rose gave a genuine laugh this time. She put on an affected Southern accent. “One does not ‘deal with’ a haint. One strives to peacefully coexist with it. Mostly by ignoring it.”

Richie shook his head. “I know you really don’t know me, but that’s not my style. I can’t just ignore it. This ghost, if it’s Kirstin, she invaded my dreams and asked me for help.” He grinned sheepishly. “I have a bit of a white knight complex; I can’t just let it go. I have to try to help her.”

Angel Rose sighed. “Well then, I guess you need to learn as much as you can about Kirstin, the house, and the circumstances of her disappearance. Then maybe the answer will present itself.”

Richie nodded, giving the matter some thought.

After a few minutes of silence, Angel Rose cleared her throat. “Uh I really have to get going,” she said.

“Of course, right, right,” Richie said. “So, see you Monday then? I can work on the papers some more.”

Angel Rose noticed he said “I” and not “we”. She appreciated that. “Sure, sounds good. Well, g’bye”

“Bye, Ang.”

Angel Rose opened her door and slid out of the truck. Richie watched as she got into her own car, gave a little wave and drove away. Starting his own vehicle, Richie set out for a drive. Hopefully he could gain some perspective on this, this haunting. He shook his head. Never in a million years would he have believed anyone who had told him he’d have an encounter with a ghost, let alone buy a freaking haunted house.

There was no question in his mind that he would keep the house. One little ghost, so far non-malevolent, was not going to keep him from the place he fell in love with. He chuckled; he’d just have to start another list – this time of people to talk to in town who might be more knowledgeable in the ways of the spiritual. He’d been in enough Southern towns to know that each had at least one person who was in touch with the “Other Side”. He’d simply ask around, starting at the diner, until he had some answers.

He was startled to find himself in a section of town that wasn’t covered by Ang’s tour, and pleased when he spied a small park. He pulled in to the parking lot, grabbed his guitar from the back seat where he had left it that morning, and headed in. For the most part, the park was deserted. He found a quiet bench, sat down, and started to play. Music had always been a way for him to think things through. When he was playing, he could busy his sub-conscious so he could let his conscious mind go to work.

He knew that Kirstin disappeared on Halloween – could that be why she was haunting the house? Or wait, didn’t spirits stick around if their bodies were killed in some violent fashion? He shook his head. All he knew about ghosts he learned from watching horror flicks and reading thriller novels. Of their own accord, his fingers started playing something slow and melancholy, as he thought more about Kirstin.

She had reached out to him in his dreams, not once, but twice. Then again she tried to communicate to him in the house. And in his dreams, she looked like she had been badly beaten, perhaps beaten to death. And it had been what, more than a hundred years ago? Richie tried to imagine what Kirstin was thinking and feeling and he figured she had to be as scared as he was. Wait, do spirits have feelings? He didn’t even know.

But she asked for help, and he was never one to turn down a damsel in distress – apparently even the specter of a damsel. He had to help her; that much was clear. But how? Maybe there were answers in all that paperwork at the Historical Society. Wait, maybe there were some clues in the papers on Kirstin’s desk. Richie shook his head and his hands changed the music into something more upbeat; a melody he’d been toying with.

Then there was Angel Rose. When she was at the house with him, he remembered that she didn’t really enter the room – like she was afraid of what was in there. Did she know more about Kirstin than she was saying? And why didn’t Marty tell him about the supposed haunting? Richie chuckled as he answered that last question himself – Marty obviously didn’t want to risk the sale.

Richie sat and played and stewed a little while longer. When it grew dark, and the bugs came out to have him for dinner, Richie packed it in and went back to his house. He sat in the driveway for a long time, looking up at the window where he had seen the woman – Kirstin. This time there was no flutter of the curtains signaling someone watching.

If Kirstin wanted his help, he figured she certainly was not going to hurt him. Then there was the whole White-Knight syndrome thing. Plus, he really didn’t want to back out of the sale, though he’d be well within his rights to do so. No, he’d have to just suck up any residual fear or discomfort he might have and go back into the house.

Chapter Ten

2011-08-31T13:53:00.000-04:00

As he drove up the driveway, Angel Rose by his side, Richie should have been looking forward to exploring the basement. Instead, he felt a sense of foreboding. Something wasn’t right. He glanced to his right, and saw she could feel it too. Her face was ashen, and she had a death grip on the purse strap in her lap. When they rounded the last corner and the house came into view, Richie slammed on the brakes, forcing Angel Rose to relinquish the death grip on her purse to brace herself against the dashboard.

“Son of a bitch,” he swore.

It may just have been a trick of the light, but it looked like the sun was shining directly on the window to the room he could not open. What’s more, there was a figure in the window that quickly disappeared when he peered through the windshield to get a closer look.

“Holy shit – do you see that?” Richie asked Angel Rose. “Someone is in my house.”

He slammed the gearshift into park, and bolted from the car before Angel Rose could answer. Richie was racing up the porch, and bursting through the front door, throwing a “Stay in the truck!” over his shoulder.

“Wait!” she called back, but it was too late.

Richie skidded to a stop in the great room. Nothing looked amiss; everything looked exactly as he had left it. Heart pounding, he bolted up the stairs to the third floor, and stormed up to the door that wouldn’t open. This was where he had seen the figure in the window; he was sure of it. How the hell did someone get into that room before he did? Angel Rose came up the stairs behind him and stopped just out of his reach. “What are you going to do?” she asked.

“I’m going to see who the hell is in there,” he answered, and started pounding on the door when the knob wouldn’t yield. “I saw you in there,” he shouted through the thick oak-paneled door. “Open this door or I’ll break it down!” His chest was heaving, and he was ready to crash through the door when he heard a faint scraping, and felt something hit his boot. He looked down and saw a key lying on the floor.

When Kirstin heard the pounding of feet on the hardwood stairs, she was scared. She could feel his anger – he must have caught a glimpse of her in the window. She’d have to be more careful. Clearly he wasn’t ready. When he pummeled his fists on the door demanding entry, she channeled her energy to the key lying on the floor, and gave it a shove. It slid effortlessly under the door. She heard his muffled curse, and sensed him bending to pick up the key. She also sensed that he was not alone.

Richie swore. “What the fuck game is this?” he yelled, as he bent down to pick up an extraordinary looking key. It was long and slender, with an iron ring on one end and three misshapen teeth on the other. A real old-fashioned skeleton-looking key. He showed it to Angel Rose. “I don’t have a key like this in the jumble Marty gave me,” he said. “And I know there was nothing on the floor here earlier when I tried to get into this room.” He turned the key over a few times in his hands and shouted through the door again. “I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, but you’re trespassing, and I won’t have it!” He fit the key in the lock and turned, satisfied at the loud snick of the lock. The knob was all but crushed in his hand, but it turned easily, and Richie flung the door open.

Kirstin watched with a mixture of anticipation and fear as the knob turned, and the door slammed open, bouncing off the adjacent wall, sending a spray of plaster chips to the floor.

Richie barreled through the door and stopped; a strangled gasp slipping through his half-opened mouth. The room looked like it had just been furnished. There wasn’t a mote of dust to be found on any of the surfaces. Richie was almost afraid to step any further into the room. He wasn’t sure he was actually awake. Maybe when he came running up the stairs, he tripped and fell and hit his head, knocking himself out cold. That had to be it. This just couldn’t be happening – the room was immaculate.

“Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” he asked Angel Rose.

“I see a very well put together room,” Ang answered softly. Her eyes were locked on Kirstin, and she refused to step into the room. “I see linen wall paper with a rose pattern, roll-top desk, rocking chair, other furniture – everything looks clean and new.”

“Yeah,” Richie said. “That’s what I see too. What the hell?”

The floral wall coverings were pristine, and when he reached out hesitantly to touch one wall, he was surprised to feel the warmth and texture of the fabric. He saw the fireplace with its grate in place, and not a cobweb in sight. The leather chairs on either side still looked soft and supple.

He took a step further into the room. The floors were solid; no squeaking like in some of the other rooms on the third floor. He turned toward the old-fashioned roll-top desk and frowned. There were papers in the little pigeon holes, and when he moved closer, Richie could see a delicate, feminine script on some of them. He was reaching for one piece of folded parchment when he felt a breeze and turned toward the window.

The sunlight was streaming in, illuminating perfectly a gently-swaying rocking chair. There was no reason for the chair to be rocking at all – the window was closed. Richie’s blood drained from his face, and he stumbled backwards into the hall, bumping into Angel Rose in the doorway and sending them both sprawling against the wall.

He pointed at the rocking chair. “Do you see THAT too?” he asked, his voice trembling. “The chair,” he said, pointing a shaking finger at the seat in question. “It’s moving.” He didn’t even so much as slide his eyes over to Angel Rose. He was too afraid to look away from the chair.

“I do see it,” she said. And so much more. Damn – so much more.

“What does it mean?” he asked. “What is happening?”

Angel Rose didn’t answer, just watched as a woman rocked slowly in her chair. The woman had a hard grip on the ends of the arm rests and Ang thought she appeared to be staring at her. This was the woman from the articles. Her ancestor. Kirstin.

“What is going on here?” Richie persisted. He gulped and finally turned to face Angel Rose. “That’s a ghost, isn’t it?”

All Ang could do was nod.

The scratches on Richie’s arm started to burn a little, and he rubbed absently at them. When he realized what he was doing, he stared down at them. “Is it the woman from my dreams?” he asked. “Is this Kirstin?”

Kirstin made the scratches on his arm. She was his ghost. Richie’s legs gave out, and he slid to the floor. He wasn’t afraid of many things. Not anything he could think of, for that matter, but he was scared now. He didn’t think he was in any real danger, but she did scratch his arm up, and he just really didn’t understand what was going on. That scared the shit out of him more than anything else did. From his spot on the floor, he watched as the rocking chair stopped moving.

“Holy shit,” he whispered. “The chair stopped. Does that mean she’s gone?”

Ang swallowed hard and watched the chair start back up again. Her fear was a nearly tactile thing, and Richie scrambled up from the floor to take her hand. “Hey,” he said. “Ang, are you okay?”

Angel Rose nodded, though she couldn’t pull her eyes away from Kirstin, nor could she pull her hand from Richie’s grasp.

Kirstin frowned, and wondered why the woman was staring so intently at her, but was overjoyed that she and the man hadn’t run. She continued rocking slowly, and waited to see what the pair would do next.

Richie and Angel Rose looked petrified, but slowly, cautiously, started to take tentative steps toward the room. As they crossed the threshold, Kirstin slowed her rocking. Richie’s eyes locked on hers, though he couldn’t see her, and his boots made a hollow sound as he crossed the whiskey-colored floors to sit on the couch by the window.

“Are you real?” Richie asked softly.

“Yes,” Kirstin said emphatically, rocking again. She suspected that since Richie couldn’t see her, he couldn’t hear her, but she had talked to him anyway. She thought about making herself seen, since he did apparently see her in the window earlier, but was afraid of sending him running. He seemed to be able to handle the rocking, so that’s all she would do for now.

Her attention turned to the young woman. The pale girl couldn’t seem to tear her gaze away from Kirstin. She acted as though...

“Miss, can you hear me?” Angel Rose held perfectly still and tried not to flinch at the sound of Kirstin’s voice. Kirstin sat forward in her chair to squint at Angel Rose.

“Jesus,” Richie said, seeing the chair perch forward on the very edge of its rockers and hover there, and tentatively reached out to touch the back of the chair. Feeling a coldness unlike anything he’d ever felt before, he snatched his hand back and cradled it to his chest. He flexed his fingers and turned his hand over, but saw nothing wrong. He once again reached out, this time to the armrest.

Kirstin closed her eyes, and concentrated. For a minute, Richie felt his palm warm up, and he’d swear he felt silk or satin under his fingertips. Just as quickly as the feeling came, it was gone.

“Jesus,” he said again. “Angel Rose, there is a ghost. It has to be Kirstin, right?” he whispered. “She’s really here,” he said in wonder. “What do I do?”

That was the million dollar question.

“Go,” Angel Rose breathed. Her skin was pasty and clammy, and the room was starting to spin. “Please, let’s go; take me back.”

Richie turned to Ang and gasped at her complexion. “Oh hell, Angel Rose, why didn’t you say – yeah, let’s get you out of here.” He led her back toward the door, though Riche couldn’t help but stare over his shoulder at the rocking chair. When he came to the door, he carefully took the key from the lock and slid it into his back pocket.

“Kirstin,” he whispered. “What happened to you?” Shaking his head, he led Ang out into the hall and closed the door behind them.

Chapter Nine

2011-08-20T07:00:00.001-04:00

Angel Rose tried to go back to sleep; tried to recapture the dream so she could figure out why it was important, but she couldn’t. All she could do was recall the heady scent of hundreds of rhododendrons with something else underneath it; something unpleasant and foul.

Sighing, she got out of bed. If she wasn’t going to go back to sleep, she may as well get a jump on the day. She’d at least be able to get through the mail she neglected yesterday. She took a quick shower and dressed in jeans and a t-shirt in deference to the weekend, and wound her hair in to a knot at the nape of her neck. The short drive back across town perked her up somewhat, and she plowed through the pile of post on her desk. When she had everything filed or answered, she checked the time and was dismayed to find it was still early. With nothing pressing demanding her attention, she started to feel the pull of the records upstairs.

“You know you want to help him, so just go do it already,” she said to herself. She grabbed the door pager for just in case and went upstairs to the microfiche room where she began to pull reels from the years relevant to the Maddox mystery. She would print out the articles and add then to his pile.

As she scrolled through the film, scanning articles and pictures, that peculiar itching began at the back of her brain again. When she concentrated on it, flashes from the dream last night came back to her – the lake, the noise in the bushes, the rhododendrons. She stopped and sat back in her chair. Could they be related? Did she have a vision of the past instead of a premonition? It wouldn’t be the first time that had happened, either. As she blindly printed off page after page of accounts of the Maddox woman’s disappearance, the itch grew a voice, and she heard unintelligible whispers.

Trying to ignore the whispering, Angel Rose straightened the stack of papers that had accumulated next to her terminal. As she placed them back on the desk, a few slipped off the top of the stack and fluttered to the floor.

“Dammit,” she muttered, as she squatted to pick up the errant sheets. “Oh my God,” she squeaked. She felt behind her for her chair and dragged herself up into it. She was staring into her mother’s face. She quickly scanned the caption on the photo. “Kirstin Maddox,” she said.

She reached for her phone and speed-dialed her mother.

“Hello, my darling daughter,” Kelly said. “To what do I owe this pleasure so early on a Saturday morning?”

“Hi Mom. Sorry it’s so early. I’m doing some research for a new homeowner, and came across a picture of a woman that looks just like you.”

“Like me? I’m pretty sure I’ve never been in Mississippi – and I’m sure I’ve never been photographed there.”

“It’s not you-you,” Angel Rose said. “It’s a photo from back in the 1800’s of someone who looks like you. Did you and Joy talk about her family?”

“Of course – you think this may be an ancestor?”

“She has to be. Were there any Maddoxes in Joy’s family tree?”

“Maddox? Let me find Joy’s photo albums. Hang on.”

Angel Rose tapped her fingers nervously on the desk while her mother searched. A buzz at her waist startled her. She glanced at the clock and was surprised to see more than an hour had passed since she sat down at the machine. She hurried to the doorway and called out, “I’ll be right down!” She straightened the papers into a pile so she could give them to Richie.

“It’s just me, Angel Rose,” he called back. “I’ve grabbed the keys; I’m coming up.” His heavy boots thumped quickly up the stairs, and when he came to a halt outside the open door, he leaned on the jamb. “So, couldn’t wait to get to work today?”

Ang smiled. “Something like that. OH, hang on a sec. Yes, mom?” She held up a finger while she listened to her mother’s response. Her smile faltered a little when her mother answered the question at hand. “Well, that explains it. Thanks Mom. Love to Dad, and I’ll see you soon, okay? My client’s here.” She was quiet for a moment more. “Love you too. Bye.” She hung up the phone and smiled at Richie. “Sorry about that. Anyway, I was able to pull a few years’ worth of newspaper articles from fiche. There are articles from the disappearance, I started there, and went backwards to the Maddox wedding. I figure anything before or after that, you could get later if you were so inclined.” She wasn’t going to say anything about Kirstin Maddox being an ancestor. Not yet anyway.

Richie clapped his hands together once, smiling widely. “That’s just great, Angel Rose. Thank you.” He strode into room to help gather the piles of copy paper that sat next to a complicated-looking machine. He started riffling through the sheets. “I’ll start on these; bring ‘em into the other room and get ‘em sorted out.”

“Great,” Angel Rose said, yawning widely. “I’ll go make some more coffee, and will be back up in a little bit.”

Richie didn’t hear her; he was staring, mouth agape, at the paper in his hand. “Holy shit,” he whispered.

“Something wrong?” Angel Rose asked. She frowned as a knot formed in the pit of her stomach.

He turned the piece of paper toward her, so she could see the photo that had accompanied the article. “This woman. I dreamed of her last night,” Richie said quietly. He almost added “again”, but he wasn’t quite ready to admit that.

“Who is she?” Angel Rose countered. The knot unraveled, letting dread spread through her belly.

“Uh,” Richie said, scanning the article for a name. “This says it’s Kirstin Maddox,” Richie said. His arms dropped to his sides, and he stared off into space.

“You dreamed about her?” Ang answered. “What happened?”

“I was having lunch in the maze by the fountain,” Richie started. A light blush tinged Richie’s cheeks. “With you in fact.”

All the color leeched out of Angel Rose’s face. That’s what happened in HER dream, too. A chill pulsed through her as she realized that her dream wasn’t a premonition, and it wasn’t a remembered past event. What was it then – a shared dream? She couldn’t remember that happening before. But if it was a shared dream, the earlier questions she had about the dream were answered. Richie obviously had some sort of link with Kirstin, and apparently had some link to her – or Kirstin did – that allowed them to share something on a sub-conscious plane. Her head dropped back for a moment, and Ang stared at the ceiling. The possibilities and potential repercussions were giving her a headache.

“We went for a walk, you and me,” Richie continued, not noticing her discomfort, “then all of a sudden, you were gone, and SHE,” he held up the paper again, rattling it loudly, “was there.” He absently began rubbing the marks on his arm while he stared at the picture. “She didn’t say anything, just looked at me like she was lost. I tried to talk to her, but she just shook her head and disappeared. Then I woke up, and I felt all weird inside, and couldn’t go back to sleep.” He clamped his lips closed before he told her the rest of the story of having warm beer for breakfast to try to calm his nerves, grabbing his guitar and suitcase, and spending the wee hours of the morning in his truck wondering whether he should stay or go, all because the house made him uneasy.

“Hmm, maybe you saw a picture of her somewhere else in your pile of stuff and she stuck?” Ang asked softly.

“I guess,” Richie said, “but why did it feel so real? I mean, I could taste the food we were eating. I could smell the flowers.” Angel Rose looked like she was going to answer him and he held up a hand to stop her – he was freaked out enough. “No, no, no; on second thought, I don’t want to know. What do we do now?”

Angel Rose let her cheeks puff out, and forced the puff of breath from them. “Well, let’s get this stuff sorted out, and we can start a timeline. Do you want to start with the most recent stuff or the oldest?” Richie just stood there, staring at the copy of the photo in his hands. Angel Rose crossed to him and put a hand on his arm briefly, and the shock had him looking into her eyes. “Oldest first or newest?” she said again.

“Newest,” Richie said. “Not that the other stuff wouldn’t be interesting, but the mystery really starts with the recent history right?”

“Right,” Angel Rose said. She led Richie down the hall, and waited for him to unlock the door. He did so, though he seemed to have trouble pulling his gaze away from the article in his hand. After a few minutes, he put the printout on the stack of papers from the most recent year, and went on to the next.

Two hours and three pots of coffee later, Angel Rose had helped Richie put together a rough timeline. She had taped butcher paper along one wall, and Richie started from the first pile, calling out events and dates that Ang wrote on the paper. When he got to the stack for 1866, he said, “And here’s an article about the history of the house; it says that it was a stop on the Underground Railroad in ’61.” He looked up and grinned. “I already knew that.”

Angel Rose made a notation on the timeline. “Really? I didn’t think there were many sympathizers in the South.”

Richie smiled. “Marty told me a little about it when we found that door under the cellar stairs.” He started to relate the same story that Marty had told him, but stopped when he saw Ang’s eyes go wide. “What is it?”

“You found a door? You mean to a secret room?” Riche nodded. “That is SO cool.”

“It really is,” Richie agreed. “It’s nothing but a dark hollow, earth floors and walls, but it’s cool.” He flipped through more papers. “I wonder if there’d be more about the railroad in other newspaper stories.”

“There could be,” Angel Rose said. “So the room, where was it exactly?”

Richie smiled at her enthusiasm. “There’s this stairwell leading down to the kitchen in the basement. Under the stairs there’s this wooden door, like for a pantry or storage or something. Inside that little alcove is another little door that led to the hidden room.”

“Wow,” she replied.

Richie pursed his lips for a minute. “Hey, you wanna come see it? It’s not much in and of itself to look at, but it does get you wondering what it must have been like back then.”

Angel Rose didn’t even stop to think about what her curse would pick up in that history-rich space -- she just knew she wanted to see it. “Absolutely; that would be amazing. But let’s finish this timeline first – you’ve only got a couple piles left. Then it’ll be on to the details.”

They made quick work of the rest of the paper, then locked up, and were on their way.

Chapter Eight

2011-08-10T07:00:00.015-04:00

Going home for Angel Rose meant a short drive across town. Her street was almost picturesque in its simplicity, with twin rows of colorful, cottage-style houses fronted by white picket fences. The third one on the left was hers, painted a bold red with black trim and shutters. She loved her little cottage-house, and wouldn’t trade it for anything.

She smiled as she walked up the path to the front door. The fuchsia and yellow chrysanthemums were in bloom, their fragrant blossoms waving to her in the slight summer breeze that rippled through them. The trellis of roses under her bay window released their fragrance into the evening, and she stopped for a moment to inhale their bouquet deep into her lungs before fitting her key into the lock. When the door was safely bolted behind her, she stowed her bag in its customary spot under the hall table, and dropped her keys onto its surface.

Kicking off her shoes and listening to the utter quiet of her home, she sighed peacefully. She padded down the short hallway to the kitchen, which was done in blue and white gingham. Light curtains fluttered gently at the window over the sink, and the small table in the corner was set with matching placemats. She pulled a bottle of pinot from the wire rack on the counter and opened it, setting it on the Formica countertop to breathe.

Humming to herself, she set about prepping a short loaf of garlic bread to go with her dinner. As she melted the butter and grated garlic and fresh parmesan into the pan, her thoughts wandered irritatingly back to the Thompson project. “Stop it,” she scolded herself, and poured her first glass of wine before turning her full attention to the pan on the stove.

She used a basting brush to paint the butter mixture onto a loaf of Italian bread which had been sliced lengthwise. When the white surfaces were sufficiently slick, she wrapped the loaf in foil and set it into the oven to heat. She set a pot of water, complete with a drizzle of olive oil, on the back burner to boil. Then she turned to take salad fixings from the fridge. She caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of her eye, but when she turned, there was nothing there – nothing except for long-clawed talons pulling at the carefully constructed wall she’d built in her mind.

“NO,” she said loudly to herself. “Absolutely not. You will stop that right now, Angel Rose Summerlin.” She drained her wine glass and poured a refill; leaving it on the counter while she stepped out onto the back deck. Angel Rose leaned on the railing and looked out over the lush green lawn. A sun-catcher staked in the middle of the yard did its job with help from the slowly setting orb; sending a colorful shower of light over the grass.

She concentrated on the smell of the garlic bread and the colors dancing cross the lawn and was able to push the claws back over the wall. She breathed deeply through her nose, taking in as much air as she could, and held her breath. She closed her eyes and “sipped the air” like swimmers do before long underwater races, taking as many microns of air into her lungs as she could. She sat on the deck, crossing her legs in a classic Lotus position, and concentrated on centering herself.

Slowly, she let out the air. It hissed through her lips, sounding like a slowly leaking balloon. When her lungs were empty, she repeated the process, sipping a little more air this time. By the third time through the exercise, she was thoroughly relaxed, and there was no more scrabbling coming from behind the wall.

She finished her second glass of wine with the dinner she brought to the deck for a little springtime al fresco dining. A radio tuned to a local station played softly in the background while she made quick work of her meal. She thought a third glass of wine while she watched her movie was a great idea. She settled onto the end of her couch, placing her wine glass carefully onto the low table in front of her. She clutched a butter-yellow over-stuffed pillow to her chest, tucked her feet up under her, and settled in.

The movie she had selected from Blockbuster yesterday, turned out to be a terrible selection for tonight – especially given what had happened during the day. Still, the wine was doing its job, and she was lost in the story of Sam Wheat and Molly Jensen, and when the heartstring-tugging pottery wheel scene came on, Angel Rose was chagrinned to find she had tears streaming down her face.

“No more wine,” she told herself, and wiped the moisture from her cheeks. At the end of the movie, she took a light afghan and headed back to the deck to watch the stars.

* * * * *

Richie sat at the diner, enjoying that evening’s “Dinner”. It was meatloaf and mashed potatoes, smothered in the most delicious gravy he’d ever tasted, served along with a deep bowl of string beans. A rib-sticking meal to be sure – comfort food at its finest. As he munched happily through the heaping plates in front of him, Richie thought about what he’d learned about his house today. He had to admit he was excited to be doing some of his own research. He thought he’d be getting some sort of report from the historical society with everything all spelled out, but going through the stacks and pulling the records, then putting them into some semblance of order by himself was exhilarating. Well, not exactly by himself; he did have help from Angel Rose.

Angel Rose.

He’d be lying to himself if he said he wasn’t attracted to her. When she had taken his arm to examine the scratches, he thought he’d jump right out of his skin. Her touch was electrifying, and he was fairly certain she felt something too. But in the first few hours they’d spent together, she felt like a long-lost friend he was reacquainting himself with rather than a potential romantic interest. Still, she was a beautiful woman, and he remembered the little shock he felt when they first shook hands, and how it was repeated whenever her arm would brush his as they sorted documents side-by-side.

After taking care of the bill, he sweet-talked the waitress into selling him a six-pack to take with him, and headed back to the house. It was a beautiful night, made for sitting under the stars. There was a light breeze, keeping all but the most blood-starved bugs away, and the sky was so clear, so inky black that the stars seemed extra bright. Richie sat on the back porch, beer in hand, leaning against a post. He stared into the vastness of “up there” and took a deep breath. A person could breathe out here.

He went in to fetch his guitar before popping the top off of the second beer. He downed the bottle in four swallows, all but moaning in pleasure as the cold liquid slicked his dry throat. He picked at a tune he’d been toying with, but set himself on autopilot, letting his fingers go where they wanted to without him giving it conscious thought. As he played, the bullfrogs and katydids hushed their own night songs to listen.

The third and fourth beers went down just as easy as the first two, and Richie was relaxed as he let the music take over. He lost all sense of time and space – there was only the music and the way it made him feel. He always thanked his lucky stars for the musical talent he’d been given, and looked up into a blanket of glittery spots, chagrinned to find they swam a little. “Lightweight,” he muttered to himself, chuckling.

He went inside to put his guitar away, and grabbed his bedroll. It was too pretty a night to turn in just yet; he wanted to lie on his back and gaze up at the stars, and ponder his own mortality – or some such shit, he thought.

* * * * *

Angel Rose was surprised to find herself on a thick plaid blanket spread next to a fountain, next to Richie. What the hell?

“And I have no idea if I’ll ever get the fountain working again,” Richie was saying, as he finished the last of his turkey sandwich. “But never say never, right?”

“Mm-hmm,” she said, vaguely. I was just on my deck at night, not here in the day... I must be dreaming. Huh. Why do I know that I’m dreaming?

“Something wrong with your sandwich?” Richie asked. “You’ve only taken a few bites.”

Startled, Angel Rose looked down at her hands, which were inches away from her lap. Clasped in the fingers was a stuffed sandwich in danger of dropping to the ground. Hurriedly, she took a bite. That’s strange, she thought, I can taste the cranberry sauce on the bread. I don’t even like cranberry sauce. “No, nothing’s wrong.” She took another bite for good measure. “It’s delicious. I’m just not all that hungry.” She put the sandwich down on a plate and brushed her hands. “So now what?”

Richie laughed. “Oh, playing coy, are you? You know damned well what.” He closed the distance between them and settled his mouth on hers as if he’d done it a thousand times before.

Angel Rose struggled against the urge to push him away, but this dream started in the middle. Usually when that happened, she knew she had to be alert and try not to lead it or change it; it was her curse in action – if she was having a dream, and aware of it, she was having a premonition. Some of the premonition dreams she’d had in the past helped avoid injuries or heartache – others she’d never figured out. This one, she knew, had to do with Richie and the Thompson estate. In fact, she thought, I could be there now. This could be the center of the maze. Wasn’t there a fountain there? Anyway, pay attention, Angel Rose, she said to herself. And be warned – if Richie has a few beers he’ll probably try to kiss me, she thought, as she tasted the Bud on his breath.

She sighed, which Richie took as a cue to deepen the kiss. But damn, the man does have a way with a kiss, she thought.

“Mmm,” Richie said, breaking the kiss. “Let’s go for a little walk. Will you walk with me, Angel Rose?” He asked.

Dazed from the dream-kiss, Ang nodded, and waited for Richie to stand. He stretched out a hand to help her up, and they walked along the path until they came out of the maze and to the lakeshore. “It’s so pretty here,” Angel Rose said, looking at the way the sun played over the light ripples in the water. Something was familiar about this lake. It HAD to be the Thompson estate. “Where are we again?” Please don’t tell me we’re where I think we are. Please. Why was she so afraid of being here?

A rustling in the bushes had her spinning around. “What was that?” she asked.

“You’re being silly,” he said, laughing. “And you know damned well where you are. But you’re right; it sure is pretty,” Richie agreed. “C’mon, let’s go this way.”

He led them around to the rhododendron bushes, and Ang was suddenly terrified. She didn’t know why, but she did NOT want to follow that path through the beautiful purple blossoms. “Where are we going?” she asked, trying hard to keep the panic out of her voice. NO, no, no, no.

“Just going for a stroll,” Richie answered.

When they stepped onto the path, a foul stench overrode the sweetness of the blooms and roots from the nearby shrubs wound themselves around her ankles, paralyzing her. Oh my GOD!

“Come on, slowpoke,” Richie teased, calling back over his shoulder. “Let’s get it shakin’ bacon.” He frowned when he caught a glimpse of her standing there, unmoving. “Angel Rose? Is everything alright?”

Ang sat up with a start, a scream dying on her lips, and the afghan wrapped around her legs. Shaking, she pushed the hair out of her face and untangled the blanket. Her heart was racing, and a cold sweat covered her body. “Damn,” she said. It was one of THOSE dreams; the ones that wouldn’t let her alone. The ones that were in full-on Technicolor glory complete with sound, taste, and smellivision. “Why is it so damned important that I be at the Thompson estate with that man?”

Chapter Seven

2011-07-30T05:00:00.001-04:00

They made quick work of the rest of their lunch and left; leaving a big tip for the waitress. On the way back to town, Angel Rose continued her local history lesson, pointing out more interesting buildings or historic sites, and in no time they were back at the Historical Society. Ang was out of the truck before Richie could come around to open her door. “Don’t tell my Ma I didn’t open the door for you,” he joked, tossing his hat on the bench seat before closing and locking the door.

“Your secret’s safe with me,” Ang answered, smiling at his silliness.

She let them into the building and grabbed huge wooden fob with three keys dangling from a hoop on the end of it from a drawer in her desk. “Here,” she said, handing it to Richie. “You can use this until you’re done; the keys will let you through all the locked doors. The larger brass key is for the third floor rooms. The smaller brass one will unlock the elevator and the stairwell. The silver-colored key will unlock the research room upstairs. You can come and go as you please as long as the office is open.” She led Richie upstairs to the stack of papers and boxes they had left behind. He unlocked the door and pushed it open, flicking on the light switches before closing the door behind them.

Richie groaned. “This looks like a daunting task,” he said, shaking his head.

“It won’t be that bad,” Ang answered quickly. Then she looked around and tried to see it from Richie’s point of view. “Well, maybe it is a lot, but we haven’t even gotten the rest of the records yet. Do you want to do that, or do you just want to just start with the deep history and tackle the rest later?”

“Look at all this paper! Will dealing with this first, then going for the new stuff later really make a difference?”

“No,” Ang said, shaking her head. “The process will still be the same; you’re just starting with the beginning this way. You can think of it like searching for all the parts of a story. You know the general plot of the story – you know that at the end the heroine disappears. What we have in here,” she said, gesturing to the pile, “is the back story, the middle, and some details. It’s just a matter of putting it in order, and seeing what you have.”

Richie shrugged. “I guess you’re right. Let’s just start with what we have here, and we can fill in the recent history later.”

“Alright,” she said, putting a hand on the doorknob. “Just remember to lock up before you leave, and you can drop the keys at my desk on your way out.”

“Aren’t you going to help me?” Richie asked.

Ang just shook her head and looked at her watch. “Alright, I can help you get started, but I do have a job here, you know.”

All Richie heard was “alright” and he beamed. He scooped up a pile of papers, and said “What’s first?”

Ang sighed and took the lid off of a box of records. “The first thing we should do is lay out this stuff chronologically on these long tables. Then you can start at the beginning, and build your story.”

The pair worked in tandem, sorting through the paperwork and laying out piles for each year they found. The first time she forgot to just sort, and started reading, she felt a familiar clouding in the back of her mind. She willed it to go away, and found that as long as she was careful, she could keep it at bay. When Richie finished his pile, he was surprised to see it was after five o’clock.

“Whoa,” he said. “Look at the time.”

Ang, still with a fistful of papers, tilted her wrist to look at her watch. She swore softly. “Damn, I’ve gotten nothing accomplished today.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say ‘nothing’, Darlin’,” Richie answered. “I think we made quite a bit of progress here.”

She had to agree, but it wasn’t the work she had planned to get done. “I need to close the office,” she said. “You good for today?” When Richie nodded, she returned the gesture. “What do you think so far?”

“I haven’t been reading everything as we sorted, but from the bits I’ve caught, I can tell it really is a mystery what happened to Kirstin. Nobody seems to know what happened. I did find one interesting thing, though.”

“Really? And what was that?” Ang answered, distractedly sorting the last few papers she had in her hand.

“I found that you’re wonderful company, Angel Rose.” He just stood there quietly, watching her finish with the documents in her hand.

Ang finished sorting the last few items and smiled at herself, dusting off her hands. Frowning at the silence, Ang turned to Richie. “Sorry, I missed what you said. What did you find interesting?”

Richie shook his head. “Nothing, not really important, I guess.” He headed for the door and held it open so Angel Rose could pass through ahead of him. “So, hey, tomorrow’s Saturday – are you still going to be open?”

She nodded. “For half the day at any rate,” she said. “Though I’m not sure why we even bother sometimes.”

“You do it because you love it,” Richie said simply, turning the key in the lock. “So see you in the morning then.”

“Yep,” Angel answered, leading them down the stairs. Richie held out the key to Ang, who gestured at the copper pot on the corner of the desk. “You can leave it in there if you like,” she said. “That way, if I’m somewhere else in the building when you come in, you can just grab the key – you don’t have to wait for me.” She held up the pager-like device she had picked up earlier. “This will buzz when the front door opens, and all the rooms are hooked into the camera system, so I can see you come in.”

Feeling thoroughly dismissed, Richie just nodded. “Sounds good. Have a pleasant evening, Angel Rose,” he said.

“You too,” she answered.

Richie reluctantly left, pointing his truck toward home.

* * * * *

Kirstin paced around the house. She was worried that she pushed too hard too fast with this one, visiting him in his dreams like that. She just felt sure that he would accept her, especially after what had happened yesterday. She had sensed it when he seemed so fascinated by the great room, and was almost dialed in to her presence. She sighed. He had been gone for some time, though. Not that time meant much to her anymore. Distracted, Kirstin roamed from room to room, passing through walls and doors. She always returned to her room, though. It gave her comfort. She was almost happy there.

Sitting in her rocking chair and staring blankly out the window, she remembered back to that Halloween afternoon, and for the hundred-millionth time, wondered if she shouldn’t have told Geoffrey about what had happened at the lake.

The Past

Kirstin reached the lake with a smile on her face. She daringly removed her sturdy boots and stockings, and sat on a boulder; looking out over the glassy water. She could see small fish darting here and there just beneath the surface. Trailing one delicate foot lazily in the water, she listened eagerly for more sounds of Geoffrey approaching. Hearing none, she thought she must have been mistaken in what she had heard.

Looking around to make sure she was truly alone, she scampered down from the boulder and, gathering her skirts high between her legs, waded out into the lake up to her knees, letting the cool water wash away some of her fatigue.

She reluctantly returned to the boulder to let her legs dry and to reflect on some of the games the adults were going to play. There of course was the masquerade, where the guests would have to guess who each of the costumed people were. That was always amusing, as the children usually gave the adults away. There would be bobbing for apples, a race through the maze, and pumpkin carvings. The house staff was preparing a giant feast and there were long tables laid out in the great hall to hold the delicious foods.

Finally for each guest, Kirstin and her daughters had crafted a small gift of charms and talismans for each partygoer. Each guest would select a small sack tied with orange and black ribbon from a basket. Inside each tiny bag was a strip of paper bearing an individual charm for each guest. They would be told that the bags were blessed by Titania, Queen of the Fairies, and her blessing would serve to keep away the witches for a period of one year. All they had to do was follow the instructions on the charm. The girls had agonized for hours over what to write, and they had dozens of little sayings written on the slips of paper: ‘Hidden in your favorite book, pleasant memories around will look’, ‘Gaze on this charm in the morning, it will bring you much adoring’, ‘Worn in your glove this simple token will bring words to you, kindly spoken’ and on and on.

Ready to get back to the preparations, Kirstin donned her stockings and laced up her boots. She tossed the crust of bread into the lake, and smiled as a greedy duck made quick work of it. Turning to face the path, she saw movement in the trees. She knew now she was not imagining things. She also knew this was not Geoffrey, for he would not scare her so. Kirstin ran up the path, breathless by the time she reached the maze. She didn’t know who was out there watching her, but she was afraid.

Collecting her faculties and sensibilities, she chided herself for letting her imagination run away like that. It was All Hallow's Eve after all. She was probably just letting the wind get the better of her. She smoothed her hair back into its plait and straightened her clothes. With a slow, dignified step, she continued on to the house. When she got there, Geoffrey was waiting for her on the porch, a wide smile on his face.

“Sweetheart, we missed you,” he said.

“Darling, I just went for a little walk to get some air,” she said, ascending the stone steps to step into the circle of his arms. She turned her face up for a kiss. “I am sorry I took so long.”

“A moment away is an eternity for me,” Geoffrey said, sipping from her lips. “I am glad you are back.”

Arms wrapped around each other, the pair went into the house.

* * * * *

The Present

Angel Rose spent a little time going through the mail on her desk, but really couldn’t concentrate on her work. She was preoccupied by the piles of papers that were up in Richie’s research room. The more she thought about them, the more she felt a little pushing at the back of her brain to go up and look at them. When the pushing turned into a whisper, then a murmur, she gathered her things and locked up. The mail would wait.

No way was she going to give in to the curse now. Richie could just do the next batch of sorting on his own. She had helped him make some serious headway; the rest was up to him.

Chapter Six

2011-07-20T05:00:00.000-04:00

Angel Rose stood frozen for a moment, her hand all but glued to the marks on Richie’s arm. In the span of six heart beats, she saw everything – a young woman sitting by a fountain, her walking along the lakeshore, grabbing Richie as he looked for her along a rhododendron-flanked path, and the desperate plea she made for help. When Richie tilted his head and frowned slightly at her, she sucked in a breath and pulled her hand back quickly. “That looks like it hurts.”

Richie shrugged. “It’s not too bad.”

“And you have no idea how this happened?”

Richie shook his head. No way was he telling this stranger about his dream. “Nope. No big deal; I’ve been tramping around the yard – I probably scratched myself on a bush or something. I’m sure they’ll fade in a day or two. Now, Marty said you’d be able to help pull together a history of the house? What did you call it? The Thompson estate?”

“Absolutely. The Thompson family was well-known and well-loved in this town, and most people know about the family who lived in the house way back when. I’m sure there must be reams of records upstairs in the stacks.” Hopefully not spooky ones, she thought. “Follow me. I’ll tell you what I know while we walk.”

Ang snagged her keys and a small pager-like device from the copper pot and led the way across the room to a locked, white door. She unlocked it and it opened onto a wide landing preceding a stairwell. She led Richie up a flight of stairs to the second floor, chatting as she went.

“The Thompsons made their fortune in London, and emigrated here sometime in the early 1700’s. The patriarch of the family, James, wanted a grand adventure, so he packed up his wife and daughters, and steamed across the pond to America. They did well here, growing cotton and fruit and such, and their fortune stayed solid, which was unusual back then. There were a few generations of Thompsons in that house before things got interesting.”

Richie nodded as they came to the top of the stairs. She led him up the hall to a nondescript door, unlocked it, and continued her story as they passed through and settled on a sofa situated along the wall next to the doorway. Richie was enthralled by what he was hearing, and didn’t even glance around the room; he merely sat with his full attention on Angel Rose.

“Most of the last remaining Thompsons to live in the house were all taken by a small pox epidemic. The only survivors were Elizabeth, an old spinster, and Geoffrey, the grandson of Elizabeth’s sister, Katherine Maddox. Elizabeth raised the boy like her own son and gifted the estate to Geoffrey when he fell in love and married. Geoffrey Maddox and Kirstin St. Claire married in 1855. It was true love at first sight. Most of their married lives are chronicled here in the stacks.”

Richie looked around, becoming aware of his surroundings for the first time. He whistled as he looked around the room. Along one side was a low table with computer work stations spaced out on its top. Discreet cameras in the corners of the room covered the whole expanse, and a small screen mounted on the wall showed an image of the front door. The rest of the room was line after line of filing cabinets. “Why so much of their story, and not their ancestors?” he asked.

“Ah, well, you see, their ancestors were boring. Geoffrey’s and Kirstin’s story involves an honest-to-goodness mystery.” She swallowed hard and continued. This was getting too close to what she wanted to avoid. “The Maddoxes had three children: twin girls then a son. The story goes that on Halloween afternoon in 1861, Kirstin left her house to go to a neighbor’s to help with costumes. The Maddoxes had hosted a Halloween celebration at the estate every year since they were married – even when the war broke out. Kirstin never made it to her friend’s house, and she never returned home. The sheriff, neighbors, relatives, and friends combed the estate and neighboring lands, and the road between the Maddox’s home and the neighbor’s, but no trace was ever found of Kirstin.” She looked at Richie’s face, seeing the disbelief there.

“Whoa,” Richie muttered under his breath.

“And we haven’t even really scratched the surface yet,” Angel Rose said. She debated for a moment about what to say next, then decided he’d find out anyway. “Strangely, the estate’s flowers won’t flourish and the trees won’t blossom – it’s almost as if the house is in mourning. The one exception Rhodie Row: the rhododendron trail that runs alongside the topiary maze, leading from the lake to the house. It yields flowers every year, which is unusual; rhododendrons usually alternate floral growth and foliage growth.” That was about as much as she wanted to tell him.

Richie’s gaze wandered around and landed on the computers in the room. Surprise registered on his face. Ang took the opportunity to redirect the conversation before he could ask her any more questions.

“Surprised to see we’ve joined the 20th century?” Angel Rose chuckled. “This building was the original saloon from when the town was founded more than three hundred years ago, but we really couldn’t protect all this history without some major renovations.”

She went on to tell Richie about the year that the building was converted to the Historical Society, thoroughly distracting him. “The building was hoisted up onto trucks, and backed away so that a cellar and temperature-controlled vault could be built underneath. Once that was done, the building was gently put back into place. The rooms on the upper two levels were converted into file rooms, and in the last couple years, we added a computer system. A battalion of high school kids had spent the better part of last summer transferring everything from zillions of index cards to the computer.”

“Wow, I woulda liked to have seen the move of the building. That must have been cool.” He smiled widely, and Angel Rose couldn’t help but smile in return.

“It sounds it, doesn’t it? I hear it was something. They say some of the older men actually brought out brooms and swept the road clean before the trucks rolled, so there wouldn’t be any jostling of the building.” She smiled. “I would have liked to have seen that. It was before my time here, though. I’ve only been here a few years.”

Richie laughed. “There were several older men in the diner this morning – I can just imagine them with push brooms, cleaning dust off the street.” He shook his head to clear the mirth and looked at Angel Rose. “I hope someone took pictures of that; I’d love to see it.”

She laughed. “This is the Historical Society – of course there are pictures. Do you want to find them?”

“No,” Richie answered, shaking his head. “Not right now – first things first. So, where do we start on the Thompson estate?” Richie asked.

She smiled sickly at the word ‘we’. “Actually, you start with the computer. Everything in here is indexed. You just have to look up ‘Thompson estate’ and it will tell you where all the records are. Your search should also yield information on the surrounding properties, and the newspaper accounts of the disappearance, as well as any recent information we may have.” Ang put finger-quotes around ‘recent’.

“Recent?” Richie asked. “How recent?”

“Oh, we’re probably online current through the late seventies to early eighties. Anything later than that will have to be done the old-fashioned, slow way.”

“Cool,” Richie said distractedly, looking despondently between Ang and the computer. As excited as he was about the thought of digging into an honest-to-God mystery, he really didn’t want to use the computers, so he tried a stalling tactic. “Say, you don’t have a southern accent, and you said you weren’t raised in the South. Where are you from?”

Ang was thrown by the abrupt change of subject, and her breath caught at the smile that split Richie’s face at her consternation. She couldn’t help but return the grin. “I grew up in Boston, went to UNC, fell love with the South, and stayed on after college. What about you? I mean I know where you’re from; why come down here?”

Richie chuckled. “Promise not to tell?” Ang nodded. “I’ve been on the road for pretty much the last eighteen months, and I felt burned out – needed to recharge. I couldn’t do that at home, so I went to New Orleans and wound up making a solo record, and hell.” He pushed a hand through his hair. “I guess I got bit by the bug, too. I love the pace, the people, and the history of the South – always have. Now I have the time to spend more time here, so here I am.”

“And you had to buy an estate to do that?”

“Didn’t ‘have to’, darlin’,” Richie said, in all seriousness. “Wanted to. And was able to.” Richie shook his head and sighed. “I guess I can’t put off the inevitable any longer – would you give me a crash course in the computer stuff?”

“Sure,” Ang answered. “It’s really just a matter of cross referencing the relevant dates and topics on the computer. The interface is quite simple.” She started to explain how the indexing program worked, and about the labeling scheme, and struggled to suppress a chortle when she saw Richie’s eyes glaze over. “I’m sorry; I guess you don’t like computers?”

He chuckled. “It’s not so much I don’t like them, as I have a pathological fear of them.” He was so sincere that Angel Rose lost the battle with her laugher and it rolled from her. Richie’s grin widened, and he continued. “I don’t like machines that are smarter than me.” He noticed she had a nice laugh: full bodied and genuine. He also noticed her eyes danced when she laughed, and she had a small dimple under her left cheek.

“I guess can help you,” she said, trying to keep the reluctance out of her voice. “It’s the least I can do to make up for jumping to conclusions about you earlier. The older records, from the War Between the States and earlier are all upstairs. We’ll print out a list of everything we need here, and can go up and get the older stuff first.”

“There’s a room just down the hall that you can use for the duration of your research. It’s climate controlled, there is really good light, and it locks with a separate key from the stairs, so nobody will disturb your progress; not that we get too many researchers in here or anything. There’s also an intercom that connects with my desk in case you need something.” Richie looked at her with surprise. “Yes, all of your research has to be done here. This isn’t a library; I can’t let you take this stuff out. Some of these documents and artifacts are priceless. They all are irreplaceable.” She led him up the hall to the room in question and flipped on the lights. The room was ringed on three sides with long tables. Overhead, incandescent light fixtures illuminated the space. In the middle of the room was a desk with a computer, printer, phone, and intercom speaker.

“Ready?” she asked him.

“Lead on.”

Angel Rose worked the computer and soon had a two-page printout of material for them to find. “Let’s head upstairs. There’s a cart up there we can put into the service elevator, so we don’t have to carry everything down the stairs.”

The third floor was just as cool and dry as the second, thanks to the air-conditioning system. The rooms all had little signs on the doors listing the years of the documents inside. The sign on the third door they came to read, “1860-1875”.

“This is the room,” Angel Rose said. She fit yet another key into the lock.

“Why are these rooms locked, but not the ones downstairs? Doesn’t the lock on the stairwell protect these rooms, too?”

Ang shrugged. “The older the documents, the more precious they are, I guess. It’s always just been that way.” She looked around the hall and spied the cart she wanted at the far end, near the elevator. It looked like a room-service cart, with a wide top and a shelf underneath. “Can you grab that cart down there? Just leave it outside the door here.”

Richie went for the cart as Ang opened the door and turned on the lights. He left the cart outside the room and followed her inside, closing the door behind him.

“Everything in this room is extremely fragile,” she cautioned. “To help protect them, all the documents have been put into polypropylene sleeves. Please leave them in the sleeves, okay?” Richie nodded. Ang continued. “Don’t worry about mixing up the documents; each of the sleeves has a tab on the end that has an index code so they can be re-filed quickly. The multi-page items, like old magazines and newspapers, are all here but they’re also on fiche. It’ll be easier to scroll through them on the machine. We can print out the relevant articles, and you can make notes on them.”

“Whatever you say,” Richie said, perusing the list. “This is a lot of stuff to find.”

“Then let’s get started,” Ang answered.

They worked together; pulling files and boxes from various places throughout the room, and piling them up on the table closest to the door. By the time they were done, the stack was formidable, and Ang was happy that the twinges and whispers she heard earlier were absent. Instead, she heard a growling noise, like an angry bear. Cautiously, she turned and saw Richie look at his watch, and pat his rumbling stomach. “Miz Summerlin, it sounds like it’s way past my lunchtime. Why don’t we plan our next phase of the attack over a big, juicy burger? My treat. It’s the least I can do to repay you for your help.”

Next phase? she thought to herself. The research hadn’t triggered her curse, and she had to admit it was fun. She loved digging into a new project. Some of the tension eased from her shoulders as she chewed on the decision to help Richie with his research. It felt like the right decision. Lunch felt like a good choice too -- she had to eat anyway; may as well do it with a gorgeous man. “Please, call me ‘Ang’, and lunch does sound good. Let’s drop this stuff off in your research room first, then we can go.”

“Where should we go? I’ve only seen the one eatery – that Diner. Is their lunch any good?” He was pushing the cart alongside Ang as they walked toward the elevator. She unlocked the control panel with the same key that let them into the stairwell, and pushed the call button.

“Depends on the day. Let me think on that a minute.” She ran through the menu in her mind. Today’s ‘Lunch’ was not burgers so the Diner was out. “If you’ve got a hankering for a good burger, we could go to The Farmhouse,” she said, naming a restaurant in the next town. “They’ve got the best.” The elevator doors slid opened, and the two of them, with the cart, filled the small space.

“’Hankering’?” Richie teased. “That is not an East Coaster talking.”

Ang blushed. “So sue me, alright? I picked up some of the vernacular. If you stick around, I bet you’ll be saying ya’ll by the time the summer’s over.”

Richie laughed. The elevator dinged and the doors opened onto the second floor. Richie pushed the cart into his allotted research room, and re-joined Ang on the elevator. They smiled at each other through the short ride down to the first floor.

He watched as Ang gathered her purse and keys, and led them outside. He waited for Ang to lock the door of the Historical Society, and then led the way to his truck; a hand automatically moving to hover at the small of Ang’s back. He opened the door for her, and she climbed up onto the bench seat. Ang’s eyebrows rose. “Southern-bred manners,” she commented.

Richie just shook his head. “Nope. Good ol’ Jersey-bred survival skills. My Ma would skin me alive if I didn’t open a door for a lady,” he said. “And she’d know, too, even if nobody told her.”

Ang laughed. He really was delightful and not at all what she’d thought a famous rock star would be like. She expected aloofness and a ‘do it right now, and do it may way’ attitude, but Richie was respectful and considerate, had a sharp wit and a wicked sense of humor, and in no time at all, she felt like they’d been friends for ages. She had a strong feeling that he had never in his life met a stranger —she’d have to be careful not to let her guard down too far.

As they drove the short distance to The Farmhouse, Ang pointed at buildings or people and shared stories about her town. Richie threw in a few of his own anecdotes, and had Ang in stitches by the time they hit the town line. She was partway through a story from her college days when they pulled into the half-full parking lot of the restaurant.

Richie playfully grabbed Ang’s hand as they crossed the lot, and Ang went ramrod straight, stopping abruptly and pulling her hand away. In that brief contact, she saw a flash of Richie listening to an answering machine someplace that definitely wasn’t the Thompson estate. There was some sort of music playing through the phone followed by a familiar voice saying, “Man, we should get together, see if we can do something with this. Call me when you’re back.” She shook her head slightly to try to clear the image.

“Sorry darlin’,” Richie said, spinning around to face her. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”

Ang shook her head. “No, I’m sorry,” she answered. “I’m just not used to being touched.”

Richie nodded. If he knew her better, he’d make some sort of remark about maybe needing to change that, but he wasn’t getting that vibe from her. He was getting some sort of vibe from her, but not the ‘flirt with me’ one.

“Shall we?” he said, sweeping his arm toward the restaurant. She nodded and started walking. They were quiet until they were seated at their table. They placed their orders, and chatted a little bit more about the Maddox Mystery.

After a short time, a waitress approached with their drinks and appetizer. Richie waited until she had left to change the subject.

“So,” Richie said, “how did a computers major,” he shook his head and shivered at that, “end up working at a historical society?”

“Well, I sorta fell into it,” Ang said, sipping her sweet tea. “I had my freshly minted degree, and no desire to go lock myself in a cubicle for twelve hours a day. I toyed with the idea of teaching, but I didn’t want to spend more time in school.” Ang grabbed a crab puff and ate it in two bites. She moaned, licking her fingers and closing her eyes. “So, I – ” she broke off when she opened her eyes to see Richie staring at her. “What?” She felt around her face, sure she had spilled something on it.

Richie’s eyes darkened as he watched her stroke her cheeks and pat her mouth. “Nothing. You were saying?”

“Uh, oh yeah. I needed to do something to earn some money, and taking over at the historical society came with a small apartment across town.” She laughed. “Apparently, this was not a job anyone wanted. When I got there the records were a mess. I spent the whole first year sorting and filing and nursing hundreds of thousands of paper cuts.” She laughed and had more tea. “Once it was done, I brought in the computers and wrote the programming that we use now.”

Richie examined Ang’s proffered. “Looks like you healed pretty nicely,” he said.

“Yeah,” Ang said, “I heal quickly.” They were staring at each other for several moments when the waitress came with their burgers, and another round of sweet tea.

Richie picked up his burger and sunk his teeth into it, letting its juices run down his chin. “Oh my God, this is good,” he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

She took a bite of her own burger, and moaned. “These are the best burgers around,” she said, her mouth full. “Didn’t I tell you?”

“You sure did,” Richie answered. “I will believe anything you tell me, darlin’.” He took another bite and looked at Ang. Mouth full, he said, “Anything at all.”

“We’ll see about that,” Ang said under her breath.

Chapter Five

2011-07-10T05:00:00.004-04:00

Ang had been told that she had a gift. It was the only time she thought her mother was actually lying to her: Ang had always thought of it as more of a curse. For as long as she could remember, Ang saw things that others didn’t; sensed more than others did. It scared her when she was young and didn’t understand what was happening.

Sometimes she had dreams – premonitions really – that had her dreading going to sleep at night. After the first few premonitions came to pass, Angel Rose would talk to her friends and family, to try to make them understand what was coming. At first, they didn’t believe her. As more and more of these dreams came true, people hesitated when Ang talked about them; not really wanting to believe that she could really see what she did. Reactions to her curse were mixed. Some people steered clear, not wanting to be associated with a “psychic”. Others thought it was a cool parlor trick, nothing more, and didn’t pay much attention to it.

As Angel Rose grew, so did her gift. She found that if the “vibes” on an object were strong enough, she could touch an object and could see things about the owner that only that person could possibly know. That’s how she had learned her mother was adopted.

Kelly Patterson Summerlin was a sentimental woman, and had kept a swatch of her own baby blanket. One afternoon, when Angel Rose was looking for something in her mother’s closet, she found the blanket. The instant she touched the fragment, she saw images of a crying young girl and a trio of wimpled nuns, and heard a name. Angel Rose sought out her mother and asked her who Joy was, and why was she giving away her baby if it made her so sad she was crying. Her mother had paled with the realization that her daughter’s gift was growing, but told Angel Rose the whole story of her own adoption as she knew it.

Kelly had found her birth parents (with her adoptive parents’ blessings) when she was eighteen. She learned that Joy, Kelly’s birth mother, and Patrick O’Hara, her birth father, had Kelly when they were teenagers. They were strongly persuaded to give up their baby for adoption, and Joy told Kelly all about taking their precious baby girl to the convent for adoption. Sadly, Patrick was killed during World War II so Kelly never met him, but she and Joy had forged a friendship that lasted for nearly a decade before breast cancer took the older woman. Kelly’s eyes filled when she told Angel Rose about Joy’s final days in the hospital, and the great joy she took in placing her hands on Kelly’s growing abdomen.

“I swear, she told me to ‘take care of this precious baby girl angel’ growing inside me,” Kelly had said, as they looked through photos she had stored in a shoebox. “So when you were born, I knew I had to name you Angel.”

Angel Rose had been taken aback. “I thought you didn’t know I was a girl until I was born,” she said.

“I didn’t,” Kelly answered, “she just knew. She must have had the sight too, like you.”

As Angel Rose got older, the gift grew stronger still, and she found she could shake hands with someone and learn things about the person he never said out loud. Meeting with new people had now become one of those frightening events she tried desperately to avoid.

Eventually, Angel Rose worked very hard to suppress this ‘gift’. She had grown tired of being the trick pony trotted out at parties to “do readings”. When she was looking at colleges, she concentrated on schools that were far away, and were not very desirable among her friends – she wanted to make a clean start. Any time she had a twinge or a dream she ignored it, and she avoided physical contact with others as much as possible. Within a year or so, the murmurings all but stopped and Angel Rose rejoiced.

Now, for some reason, the thought of researching the Thompson estate brought the whispers back again. There was clearly something going on with this house, something strong – and she most definitely didn’t want to get involved. Maybe she should tell the owner that they’d lost the records from that particular century. Maybe she’d just tell him to do his own research. Maybe –

Her thoughts were cut off when the front door opened and in walked the most gorgeous man she’d ever seen. He was tall, a good eight inches taller than she was, with long dark hair that kissed his shoulders. Expressive, clear brown eyes were partially hidden behind the fringes of hair that hung over his forehead and he quickly snatched the hat from his head and smiled under her perusal. His mouth was sensuous with full, utterly kissable lips, and the dimple that winked when his grin widened did nothing to dampen the deadliness of his smile.

The stranger’s broad shoulders and ripped torso were clearly outlined in the skin-tight black t-shirt he wore tucked into equally tight blue jeans. Tattoos peeked out from the bottom of his shirt sleeves. Battered cowboy boots added half an inch to his height, and he all but swaggered into the room. He looked familiar to her, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on why. Cautiously, she stood to greet her visitor.

“Good morning,” she said.

“Mornin’,” Richie said, smiling at Ang. “I’ve been waiting for you.” He took in the woman before him. Small, lithe, and with a riot of red-shot-with-gold curls that he imagined quite a few men would like to delve their fingers into. He couldn’t tell the color of her eyes, but knew they must be blue or green or something in between. He was inexplicably drawn to find out, so he strode to her desk, and sat on the edge of it like he owned the place.

Ang was shocked by the man’s forward behavior. “How can I help you?”

“My real estate agent, Marty Halstead, said he was going to get in touch with you about digging into the history of my new house and...” Riche was cut off.

“YOU bought the Thompson estate?” Ang blurted helplessly. She recognized his voice, but didn’t want to call attention to the fact, yet couldn’t help the outburst. “What the heck for? You’re not going to tear it down, are you? It’d be just like a rich guy to want to build some sort of dude ranch or escape mansion or whatever the hell you rock stars do with your millions.”

“Whoa, whoa, wait a second there, darlin’,” Richie said, smirking. So, she did recognize him. He’d been wondering. “First of all, hi, I’m Richie Sambora.” He held out a hand and waited for the woman to take it.

“Yeah, I know; hi,” she replied, “I’m Angel Rose Summerlin.” She sheepishly reached for his proffered hand, and gave only the barest of shakes. “And I hope you can forgive me. I may not be from the South, but my mama did raise me better than to spout off at strangers.” The instant their skin touched, a little shock passed between them, like they had scuffed their feet on a wool rug before shaking hands. She quickly dropped his hand.

“Nice to meet you, Miz Summerlin,” Richie said. “And don’t worry about it,” Richie continued, absently rubbing his palm where she had zapped him, “Though I had this speech all coming together in my head about how I don’t have to justify my purchases or intentions to you and so on – but I will tell you, I am not tearing down anything. I want to restore the house, and can’t do that without knowing what it looked like back in its heyday.” The scratches on his arm started itching, and he rubbed at them, frowning. “That’s why I’m here.”

Ang noticed Richie’s frown, and saw the scratches. “My goodness, what happened to your arm?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Richie said shrugging and holding it out for inspection. “It was like that when I woke up this morning.”

Without thinking, she reached for Richie’s arm and lightly touched the wounds. As soon as her fingertips touched the scratches, three things happened: Her blood turned to ice, her eyes lost their focus, and she saw with perfect clarity the woman who had made the marks.

Chapter Four

2011-06-30T05:00:00.003-04:00

Richie woke from a long slumber, feeling more rested than he had in a while. He stretched; surprised his back didn’t hurt more from sleeping on the hard floor, and sat up, smiling at the sun that streamed in through the sparkling windows. He stood and crossed to the back of the room, staring out over the wide expanse of luxurious green lawn and at the apple trees that still bore their fruit. Getting dressed, he went outside to enjoy the crisp autumn air. He strolled around the house, enjoying the sights and smells of the fall flowers.

Rounding the side of the house, he started for the maze. As he traveled its neatly pruned lanes, he let his mind wander. He was really in love with this house, and was so glad that it seemed to love him back. When he got near the center of the maze, a soft, lilting voice made him stop short. He peeked around the corner of the bush he was standing behind and gaped at what he saw. Sitting there on the ground at the base of a beautiful fountain was a small waif of a woman with dark hair so long its edges touched the grass around her. She wore a pale peach old-fashioned gown, and Richie could swear he saw the toes of sturdy walking boots peeping out from under the hem of the dress. The woman was smiling with her face tilted up to the sun, and humming a tune he didn’t recognize. Richie smiled at her and turned his own face up, enjoying a shared stolen moment with this woman.

When he looked back at her, he was startled to see she had gone. He hurried to the fountain and around it, but she wasn’t there. He went out the back of the maze, knowing she couldn’t possibly have passed him without him seeing or at least hearing her. He followed the flagstone path down to the lake, but there was no sign of her there, either. He scanned the shoreline, but didn’t see even a footprint in the soft moss that lined the lake’s edge.

When he turned away and started up the rhododendron path that skirted the edge of the maze, he felt rather than saw someone watching him from the bushes.

“Hello?” he called softly. “Miss, are you in there?”

Hearing no answer, he continued along slowly, peering through the branches to see if he could get a glimpse of the woman or her peach dress. Halfway up the path, a skinny hand reached out and grabbed his arm. It was clearly a woman’s hand by the size of it. There was blood under her nails, her skin was dirty, and it held a smell that Richie could only describe as decay.

With a startled curse, he reared back, but the hand held fast, and when he stepped backwards, more of the woman was revealed. A tattered sleeve with patches of clean peach fabric among the filth came out of the bushes. The curve of a bosom and a long sweeping skirt peeped out. Richie tried desperately to free himself, clawing at the ice-cold hand that was clamped tightly to his forearm, but he couldn’t. He really didn’t want to see what the rest of this creature looked like, but he couldn’t make it let go.

As he took another step back, a scuffed and battered black boot came out of the shrub border. He jerked his arm hard, and the woman-thing’s nails raked his skin, leaving angry red trails along his forearm. He watched in horror as a swing of dirty, matted dark hair emerged from the bushes. With one more step, the woman was revealed. She had been badly beaten. Her left eye was puffy and bruised, and her lower lip was split and caked with dried blood. He could see a welt on her cheek, and leaves and dirt clung to her hair and tattered gown. She held the ruined garment closed at her breasts with a tiny, damaged hand, and Richie could see finger-shaped bruising around her neck. Outraged, Richie immediately forgot his fright.

“Oh my God, what happened to you?” he whispered.

For a moment, the visage before him shifted to that of the woman he had seen sitting at the base of the fountain. When their eyes met, his brown to her gray, Richie saw flashes of images behind his eyes – a wedding, twin baby girls, a Christmas tree, a baby boy, the lake, and an angry man’s face. In a split second, the woman turned back to the horrible thing that he had pulled from the rhododendrons. The woman-thing leaned forward.

“Will you find me,” it said with a slightly accented voice that was barely a whisper. “Help me, please.”

Richie gasped and bolted upright on his bedroll; a sheen of sweat covering his chest. For a moment, he was disoriented, hanging in that realm between conscious and subconscious thought. Before he knew it, he was on his feet and running for the door. He didn’t recognize his surroundings and had started to panic, but he knew it would all be okay if he could just get out of the room. He threw open the door, and was startled to see his truck parked at the bottom of a short staircase. He squeezed his eyes closed, and willed himself to wake completely up. Tentatively, he opened his eyes and focused on the truck. Slowly, his consciousness caught up to his body, and he remembered where he was. He turned to look behind him and saw the empty room, the cold, dark fireplace, his sleeping bag, duffel, and guitar. Once his breathing returned to normal, and his heart rate came down from triple digits, he frowned impatiently. “What the fuck?” he asked the room. Of course, there was no answer.

After that dream, Richie knew he wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep. He wouldn’t even try. He groaned when he looked at his watch and saw it was only 5:30. With a muttered curse, stalked back to his bedroll and folded it up. He snatched his jeans up off the floor, and pulled a fresh pair of Calvins and a clean black t-shirt out of his duffel. He rummaged around until he found his towel and a bar of soap, and went upstairs to use the one bathroom that worked. Maybe a hot shower would help clear his muddied head.

Richie sat on the closed commode lid and waited for the bathroom to fill with steam. He thought about the dream last night. It was so vivid, so real. Shaking his head, he got up and climbed into the shower, groaning as the hot water pounded into his back. He turned and hissed in pain when the water hit his arm. He looked down and was shocked to see four angry red scratches, like fingernail marks, on his forearm where the woman in his dream had grabbed him. Startled, Richie’s knees gave out and he sunk to the floor of the tub, the water pounding his head as he examined his arm, turning it this way and that. On the underside, was the fifth mark, where the thumb had dug in.

“What the fuck?” Richie exclaimed for the second time that morning, truly scared now. He tipped his head back against the edge of the tub and had an argument with himself over what could be going on. Richie was never one to ignore the spiritual – he was raised Catholic after all, but this was pushing the limits of his beliefs. Did he really believe that the woman in his dream, whoever she is, really lived here and died here? That he had a ghost? He laughed to himself. He had bought himself a haunted house? He shook his head. It was almost too crazy to be true, but he looked down at his arm again. The evidence was there, but still, he was reluctant to believe it.

Richie stood; his resolve firm. Antiquing will have to wait – he had some sleuthing to do.

* * *

The little placard on the window of the Historical Society said it opened at 9:00. It was only quarter past seven. Grumpy and grumbling, he angled across the street to the diner he had seen the night before. It was a charming old-time diner with a metal-edged Formica counter-top running down its length, anchored by a twenties-era mechanical cash register. Cracked red leather booths flanked tables covered in red-and-white checked tablecloths.

Richie selected a booth in the back and sat heavily, dropping his Stetson on the bench seat beside him. He opened the menu and chuckled at the selections – Breakfast, Lunch, or Dinner. A tired 40-something waitress approached with a pot of coffee and Richie eagerly turned his mug over so she could fill it.

“Are ya having breakfast with us this mornin’, hon, or just coffee?” she asked, with a voice made croaky by too many years of smoking unfiltered cigarettes.

“Breakfast would be wonderful,” Richie said.

The waitress nodded and left. Richie scanned the other patrons in the diner. Even at this hour, the counter was full. A contingency of old men sat placidly sipping their coffees and reading their morning papers. Richie sighed and sipped from his own cup, pleased at the brew’s strength and rich, delicious flavor. A short time later, the waitress reappeared with a heaping plate. Richie’s eyes went wide at the amount of food she had brought him. The plate was full with scrambled eggs, pancakes, grits, bacon, sausage, and biscuits with gravy.

“That’s a hell of a lot of breakfast, darlin’,” Riche said to the waitress.

She winked at him. “Well, hon, ya look like a hell of a lot of man.” Richie laughed, and the woman smiled and blushed, taking ten years off her face. “Give a holler for SueBeth if you need somethin’ more,” she said before disappearing into the kitchen.

After lingering over breakfast, and eating everything on his plate, he left a generous tip, pulled his hat down low over his eyes, and walked up and down the length of the main street waiting for the Historical Society to open. Finally, a few minutes before nine, a car pulled up in front and parked in the spot next to his.

Angel Rose Summerlin got out of her car and sighed at pickup parked next to her. She didn’t recognize the truck. Sure enough, when she checked the rear license plate, she saw it was from New Jersey – definitely not someone she knew. “There goes my quiet morning to myself,” she lamented, and shook her head. From the corner of her eye, she noticed someone at the far end of Main Street heading her way. Ignoring him, she let herself into the building, and turned on the overhead lights. She dropped her bag into the plush leather chair that sat behind her antique partner’s desk, and tossed her keys into the copper pot she kept on the corner of her desk for odds and ends. The floors creaked under her well-worn cowboy boots, and her heels made dense happy clunk sounds as she crisscrossed the room to open windows. A small credenza at the back of the room held a coffee pot, set up from the night before, and she punched the ‘on’ button before settling behind her desk.

Satisfied that everything was ready for the day, she took a few breaths, and checked the answer machine. There was one message.

“Ms. Summerlin, this here is Marty Halstead. The old Thompson place sold today, and the gentleman who bought it is gonna be itchin’ to learn all about it. I give him only a day or two before he’ll be at your door. Could I ask you to start pulling a basic history together for him? I’d leave out any of the spooky stuff if I was you, but of course, you know best. I surely would appreciate it. You take care now, Ms. Summerlin, and I thank ya kindly.”

Ang loved her job. She’d been running the Historical Society for a few years now, and though not too many of the townspeople stopped in anymore, it never got old. She loved digging through the journals and papers that were stored in the two climate-controlled stories above her in fireproof file cabinets. She loved going into the basement vault and fingering (through white cotton gloves, of course) the dozens of gowns and other items of clothing that had been donated over the last century. The vault also contained precious, some would say priceless, jewelry; either purchased from estate sales or donated by local families.

Her very favorite piece was an oval gold locket on a delicate chain. On the front was engraved a rose, and inside were old sepia-toned pictures of three children. On one side was a young boy, no more than five, and the other, twin girls. The piece had no provenance, so she had no idea to whom the locket had belonged, but she felt a strange little shock whenever she looked at it, almost as if she had a connection to the people in the photographs.

Almost as if her curse was rearing its head again.

She usually would love a project like the one Marty had asked her to complete, but something about it was giving her an uneasy feeling – a feeling she hadn’t had in many years. The ‘spooky stuff’ as he called it scratched at a scab in her psyche she thought was healed.

Chapter Three

2011-06-20T05:00:00.003-04:00

The Past
October, 1861

Kirstin was enjoying the autumn afternoon. All Hallow’s Eve was a week away and there was still work to do to get ready. Each year, she and Geoffrey had hosted a party at their home – a tradition that started after their wedding. Their children especially were excited this time of year, and Kirstin and Geoffrey were not going to let a little fighting get in the way of their children’s happiness. Fort Sumter was attacked just a month after their new president was inaugurated, and the country was torn. Of course, the South would emerge victorious, any day now in fact, so there was no reason to curtail plans for the party.

The elaborate costumes had been planned for the last several months. Her daughters had helped her decide on the party games, and James had helped his father in decorating the barn. She still needed to finalize the menu for the evening and complete her own costume, but most of the preparations were complete. It had been a harried several weeks, but the end result would be well worth the work.

Needing a moment of solitude, Kirstin left her third-floor office, slipped down the servants’ staircase and out the kitchen door to the garden. She meandered through the topiary maze, trailing her hand along the soft evergreen hedge and releasing a light but potent honeysuckle aroma into the air. Once at the center, she sat at the fountain, listening to the water – a rare commodity and absurd extravagance – as it cascaded down its nested bowls to the basin at her back. She tipped her head back to catch the rays of the autumn sun, still strong at this time of the year.

Rolling her shoulders, Kirstin sighed. She loved her family more than her own life, and even in these few minutes alone, she missed them terribly. Her children were her light; her husband, her life. She considered herself the luckiest woman she knew, and knew there were those that envied what she had.

Kirstin stood, dusted off the seat of her dress, and wound out the back end of the maze, intending to visit the lakeshore before heading back up to the house. The trees made beautiful reflections in the mirror-flat surface, and the rays of sun playing across the water always made her smile. She had a small crust of bread in her pocket, in case there were fish or birds looking for a treat.

As she wound down the path toward the lake, she heard a noise behind her; a rustling in the bushes. She judged the sound too large for the rabbits or squirrels that sometimes slipped down to the lake. Her pulse quickened. Smiling to herself as she realized who must be behind her, she hastened her step. The further away from the house she was, the less likely she and Geoffrey would be interrupted. She skipped a bit, and hurried down the flagstone path.

The Present

By the end of the day, Richie had all the paperwork signed, and keys in hand. The town rolled up its sidewalks promptly at five, so nothing but the diner was open as he drove home from Marty’s office. Home. That had a nice ring to it.

It took him all of five minutes to bring his things in from the truck. He had brought with him a single beat-up duffel bag containing some of his clothes and toiletries, a camper’s bedroll, a fan, and his favorite guitar. He had been staying in local inns while he visited various prospects, but now that the place was his, he wanted to settle in as much as he could. He’d need to be sure he had running water before he canceled his reservation, though.

Richie set the fan up in the great room, intending to get the almost stifling air circulating, but he was worried about the old wiring. Shrugging, he unplugged it and left it in the corner. Looking around the empty room, he spread his arms wide, grinned, and spun like a child. There was so much space! He would have to arrange for a moving van to bring the rest of his personal stuff in the next few days, but he decided he didn’t want to transport any of his furniture; he wanted things that would fit this house, and his stuff was too modern.

Smiling happily, Richie took his time exploring many of the rooms on the upper floors of living space in the house. He wanted to get a sense of what he’d need for furniture, and he had to make sure that at least part of the house was inhabitable while the renovations he wanted were taking place. As he strolled through the second-floor rooms, he found that most of the lights worked, though they flickered, and he was able to get the water in one of the bathrooms to run clear. That made him happy; he wouldn’t have to go back to the hotel. One by one he examined the rooms but they were all empty. He was hoping to find little treasures like end tables or old chairs, but everything was gone. Maybe when he got to the attic he’d find something.

When he got to the third floor he found a door that wouldn’t open. At first he thought it was just stuck, but the knob wouldn’t even turn. Richie tried every key he could find, and finally gave up, went downstairs to fish his cell phone out of his duffel, and called Marty.

“Hey Marty, it’s Rich,” he said into his phone, as he sat down in one of the window seats in the great room.

“Good evening!” Marty replied, surprised. “Is there a problem already?”

“Not really,” he said. “I just had a question: do I have all the keys for this place?” Richie gazed out over the grass – it couldn’t really be called a lawn yet. A truckload of fertilizer and a good watering would start to remedy that.

Marty sounded puzzled. “Yes, I believe so. Why, is there a problem?”

“Well,” Richie said, “There’s one room upstairs that I cannot open – one of the front rooms; the first door at the top of the stairs on the third floor.”

“The door is probably just stuck due to the humidity,” Marty said, unconcerned. “I’m sure it’ll sort itself out.” Marty didn’t want to get into what the problem most likely was with that door – just like didn’t give his opinion on that cold draft earlier.

Richie shrugged, and after thanking the man, he hung up. There’d be time enough to explore that door. Noting the time and realizing his stomach was growling, Richie decided to head out to check out the Blues Festival advertised on roadside signs all over town. He didn’t have any way to keep perishable food from, well, perishing here at the house, and his mouth watered at the thought of true Southern barbecue. He looked at his guitar, then back at the door. “Nah, I’ll just listen,” he said, and left; locking the door behind him.

The young woman sat and watched him go; staring at red lights fading in the distance. She could sense his affinity for the house; could tell that if he stayed, this man would make it a home again. She hoped and prayed that she was right this time. Taking in his meager possessions, she fervently hoped there were more bags and boxes coming; that he planned to live here.

Looking longingly at his guitar, the young woman sighed. How she hoped to hear music again! She crossed the room to kneel by the gorgeous instrument. The rich mahogany color contrasted beautifully against the light tones of the maple floor, and the guitar seemed to shine like a beacon. She reached out to touch it, and concentrating hard, was able to strum her fingers across the strings. The perfect tone resonated through the room, and she laughed with pleasure. Music was something she really missed – that and the laughter of her children.

Sighing, she rose and went upstairs to the room the Yankee wasn’t able to get into earlier – HER room. Though it was on the servant’s floor, this room had been her place to go to when she needed to think or plan a surprise. Her husband had his study, she had hers. It had been furnished simply; with a roll-top desk and matching high-backed chair, a deep soft couch by a window, and high-backed leather chairs flanking a modest fireplace. The wall coverings were a floral fabric, and the hardwood floors a honey-streaked brown. A rocking chair, brought up here when her son moved from the nursery to his own room, sat by the other window.

Few rooms in the house had a lock on the door. She had rarely used the lock on this one – really there was nothing to safeguard. Though on her last day in the house, she did turn the key; she had secreted small gifts in her room for the All Hallow’s Eve celebration that she didn’t want her children coming across.

The gifts were long gone, but the room remained locked. Her husband had locked it and slid his copy of the key under the door on his last day in the house. She looked at the key. It had sat there for years. Whenever one of the new owners would “find” the key and come into the room, she would make herself seen. The person would either back out the door, shaking his head and holding out his hands as if to stave off an attacker, or else run screaming from the place and not return. In either case, the room would get locked again, and the key returned to its place on the floor. She knew if she tried hard enough, she could slide it under the door for the Yankee to find, but she wasn’t yet convinced that he would understand or welcome her presence.

Many hours later, she heard the front door open. He was back.

Richie had spent longer than he had intended in Leland, but there were so many good bands at the Blues Festival, he was reluctant to leave. He chatted up some of the performers; old men with grizzled beards and battered guitars, and talked music until he was one of the few people left on the fairgrounds. God, he loved the South. The music all but dripped with history, and more than once during the evening, his mind wandered back to the room under the stairs. He had wondered how many of the old men he spoke with were descended from slaves that may have taken refuge in the very house he now owned.

By the time he had arrived back in town, even the diner was closed up. He drove the dark streets back to the house and parked by the front door. Once inside, he kicked off his boots, stripped off his socks, and padded barefoot to the French doors, which he threw open to the night. He grabbed his guitar, settled in on the top step of the porch, and turned sideways to rest his back against a post. He strummed absently, a slight grin on his lips. He closed his eyes and lost himself for a little while, playing whatever came to mind.

The young woman stood at the doorway, transfixed by the music. She didn’t recognize any of the songs, but she did recognize the pure, clean sound of a well-played instrument. She watched the Yankee’s fingers dance up and down the neck, and swayed along with the beat. After a while, she glided over to the edge of the porch, and sat on the step against the opposite post to watch and listen.

Richie felt eyes on him. Abruptly, he stopped playing and sat up straight, looking around. “Who’s there?” he called.

The young woman was startled by the Yankee’s perception. She almost reached out to him then, but didn’t want to spook him any more than she already had. She sat, silent and still, and waited.

After a minute or two, Richie chuckled to himself. “Probably just raccoons or something.” He shook his head at his own silliness. “I must be tired.” He stood and stretched before going back into the house.

The young woman followed.

After stowing the instrument back in its case, Richie went about setting up his bedroll. He considered sleeping on the porch, but only for a moment. If there were animals out there, he’d just as soon they not find a nice warm body to investigate. That was a bit more roughing it than he was prepared for. No, he would lie on his back in the great room and gaze up at the pressed tin ceiling and let his mind wander – after he studied the fireplace more closely. Richie rubbed his hands together with glee. He felt so happy with himself. He was taking control of his life, and doing what he felt he needed to do.

The past few years had been a whirlwind of activity. Between studio time, promotions, travel and touring and all the bullshit that went with it, not to mention the business side of things which Jon usually handled himself in the background, but had started to bleed into the forefront, there was barely enough time to blink, never mind relax. It was emotionally draining as well as physically -- especially the shit with Doc. He still couldn’t believe all that had happened. The guys were all living in each others’ pockets and getting on each others’ nerves. Too much togetherness was definitely not a good thing.

He was glad when Jon had decided he needed to unwind and hopped a bike for a destination yet to be determined. Honestly, all of them were. They had made their piles of money, managed to keep bunches of it, and had a good run. Richie knew they’d always be friends, and he’d always have his music, but if the two never came together again, well, maybe it was for the best. Exhausted, Richie had spent most of the first week home asleep, practically comatose in his bed. The next few weeks were spent catching up with his parents and friends and doing just about as little as possible. Then he started getting itchy fingers.

Of course, the first thought he was to call Jon and see what was going on, maybe get together and dick around in Jon’s studio. The second thought was, “why not use this time to do something for myself?” and he did. He had worked with a great team, enlisted help from Teek and Dave, and put together what he thought was a good solo record. He’d done some interviews and promotion for the record, which was due out in the fall, and had lined up a few tour dates, just to test the waters. Richie had to admit, he was never happier than when he was playing to a crowd, and was looking forward to this adventure. He had his music, and now he had a place that spoke to his soul rather than his sense of image. The music was taken care of, and his house now needed his full attention.

He thought about what he’d do first. There was a small store in town; it would have to have local papers. He’d get one of everything, and scour them for estate sales. Not really being one for antiquing – he was more of the ‘hire a decorator’ kind – he’d decided to make an exception and furnish this place himself. If he was lucky, he thought, there might be an original piece or two in the attic he could use. He’d check that out after he finally got into that locked room. And called the electricians, the plumbers, the bank, the post office to get his mail forwarded... Richie laughed to himself.

“Better make a list,” he chuckled to himself. Richie sat cross-legged on his bedroll and spent the better part of the next hour doing just that, and soon, he had quite an inventory of things that needed doing. He stretched and grimaced as his back popped a little.

The young woman watched as the newest inhabitant of her house readied himself for sleep. He zipped the bedroll open and spread it wide, fishing a small pillow from his duffel to finish the makeshift bed. He circled the room, opening windows to let in the night air and sounds, and hoped to hell the mosquitoes had forgotten about this place. He looked longingly at the fan again, but really didn’t want to burn the place down his first night. Shrugging, he stripped his t-shirt over his head.

The woman gasped at his half-nakedness. He was certainly quite a specimen; tall and broad shouldered, with a mostly smooth chest that was ripped with muscles. When the Yankee started to unfasten his pants, she squeaked and turned away quickly, rushing upstairs to her room.

Richie thought he had seen something out of the corner of his eye –a flash of something pale, almost like a dress flapping around a woman’s legs. It was just for a heartbeat, and when he whirled around to get a better look, it was gone. Laying on his blanket in just his briefs, he thought about the strange occurrences that had been going on all day. The drafts, the condensation on the window, the mysterious locked door, and now the strange flash of something – either he was more stressed out than he realized, or something else was going on.

Shaking his head, he chalked everything up to being exhausted and burned out, and went to sleep. After a short time, he began to dream.

Chapter Two

2011-06-10T06:00:00.003-04:00

Richie hadn’t committed to the sale yet, but Marty had seen enough buyers in his time to know when someone was completely taken in by a property. Richie had that faraway look in his eyes, as if he could see what the house looked like in its heyday, when it was truly a home. When Richie looked out over the acres of land, Marty knew he saw the ruin and decay, but he also saw potential. Someone like that was just what this house needed – Richie was a perfect match for this house.

The two men had spent close to an hour touring the grounds and outbuildings. Richie hadn’t seemed daunted by the mess that had once been beautiful landscaping. On the contrary, once he started walking around, his reticence faded, and he seemed excited at the prospect of cleaning the place up and bringing life to the gardens. Marty was surprised. He’d just assumed that someone with Richie’s money would have hired people to take care of that, but Richie had volunteered that working the earth was soothing for him; a kind of therapy.

When they stepped through the door into the great room, Marty could tell from the look on Richie’s face that the man had changed from browser to buyer. Marty just had to seal the deal. And pray that the haint kept to herself for the remainder of the house tour.

After the exchange in the foyer, the pair of men started the tour in earnest, heading down to the basement. Richie found the stone walls and packed dirt floors fascinating. He wondered about the masons that laid the stones and about the countless broom sweeps this floor must have seen. As he ran his calloused fingertips across the smooth, cool stone, he marveled at the workmanship and thought about the history of the house. He was amazed that a house this old was in such good shape. This house had survived when the Union and the Confederacy battled over slavery. It had seen most of the presidents of this country, and countless wars. If the walls had memories they could share, the stories would be endless. He almost wanted to tell Marty to skip the rest of the tour, but he really wanted to get up to the top floor, to look out the windows at the garden maze.

Aside from the house itself, the maze was the element of the property pulled at Richie the most. When they had come to the overgrown mass in the back of the property, he was able to enter the maze only a few yards before running into a veritable wall of leaves. The hedges were so unruly that the path was choked closed. He had never actually seen a hedge maze before, and he was anxious to get this one back to what it once was. He was sure he’d be able to see most if not all of the maze from the third floor. But, he was determined to let Marty show the house his way, in his own time. He let his mind start to wander, trying to imagine his kids, when he got around to having them, running wild through the maze.

Richie’s attention was snapped back to the tour when they entered the kitchen. He whistled as he looked around at the massive space and the appliances spread throughout the room. These clearly hadn’t been updated in a good long while, but the quality of what was here was impeccable. Pale yellow Geneva steel cabinets ringed the room about halfway up the walls. Some of the space above the cabinets would have been used to store the larger pots and serving platters. The rest of it was clear, albeit dusty, glass; casement windows that let in lots of natural light. An island divided the space neatly in half, its thick wooden top scarred from years of knife cuts. A steel rack hung suspended from bulky chains and would easily hold three dozen pans. The eight burner stove sat next to deep double-sinks, all of which were the same pale yellow as the Genevas. The walls and cabinetry all glowed softly in the afternoon light. There were fixtures overhead that would brighten the space even more, but it was nearly perfect the way it was.

Richie listened as Marty went on about the kitchens – there were two, one down here, and a smaller one upstairs connected by a dumbwaiter. Richie smiled, imagining David demanding to be raised and lowered by that pulley system. He shook his head. He’d have to remember to tell D that it was broken. Marty showed Richie the laundry area, added in the 1950’s, the root and wine cellars, and the storage areas before finally leading him back to the staircase where they would climb back up to the main living floor.

Before they headed upstairs, Marty directed Richie’s attention to a small door tucked under the stairs.

“What’s this?” Richie asked, “more storage?”

Marty chuckled. “Not quite. This is an historic home,” he said proudly. “Inside that little crawlspace, there is another panel leading to a bigger space – nearly a full sized room. Did you notice that the root cellar did not seem to span the length of the kitchen?”

Richie crouched down and peered inside the crawlspace. Sure enough, at the back of the space was another knob, all but hidden in the shadows. He crawled in, heedless of the dirt he was grinding into the knees of his jeans. He grasped the knob and pulled, having to put some muscle into it. Almost reluctantly, the door gave way, and Richie swore under his breath. “Marty, do you have a flashlight?”

“As a matter of fact, I do have one in the car. I won’t be but a minute.”

Richie nodded absently, and crawled through to the larger passage. The room was pitch-black, and Richie did no more than stand up and feel his way along the wall to find a place to lean. He waited anxiously for a light.

A few minutes later, Marty returned with two large flashlights. He crouch-walked through into the hidden room, and handed one to Richie. “This, sir, is one of the very few Southern homes to have been part of the Underground Railroad.”

“Whoa,” Richie said, shining his light around.

“Yes.” Marty cleared his throat and tucked his thumbs into his suspenders like an old-time orator. “When schoolchildren are taught about the railroad, they’re taught more myth than truth – not that it’s bad. But really, there were very few places in the South where a slave could find respite on his or her journey North. This was one of maybe a half-dozen such places in the whole of this great state. Most of the safe havens were in the North, and even then, most Northerners, though anti-slavery, were not receptive to what they called ‘fugitives of the South’.”

Richie was playing his light around the room. The walls, floor, and ceiling were dense, packed earth, and there were holes here and there, both carved out of the walls and into the floors. Richie imagined that the wall-caves were for candles or perhaps a place for the runaways to store their meager belongings. The floor holes, he assumed were toilets of some sort and cringed at the thought of what these people had gone through.

Richie searched his school-days memory and turned to Marty. “Were there signs, you know, to flag this for the slaves? Like a lantern in the window or white bricks along the chimney – something like that?”

Marty shook his head and chuckled. “No, though folks around here did know that the family who lived here at the time didn’t believe in keeping slaves. No, it was really word-of-mouth. Folks were real cautious though. The family that lived here was well-loved by the community, but one couldn’t be too careful.” Marty cut himself off before he went on too much about the history of the family who lived here during the Railroad time. He had to remind himself that he didn’t have this Yankee’s signature yet.

Richie nodded and started for the crawlspace door. “Let’s get on with the rest of the tour. I’ll have plenty of time to explore and dig into the history later.”

Marty smiled at Richie’s tell. Another satisfied customer.

After closing the doors and dusting off their hands, the men made their way up the staircase back to the main level of the house. Richie was turning over in his mind everything he’d seen so far. This house had a ton of history and amazing stories. What that room downstairs alone must have seen... Richie shivered involuntarily, and fleetingly wondered if it was the same breeze from earlier.

The young woman was pacing nervously back and forth across the scarred maple floors of the great hall. She hadn’t meant to be so angry at the men’s intrusion, but she had forgotten for a moment that they could not see her. Any self-respecting Southern woman would have taken umbrage at the intrusion into her home, but she had forgotten for a moment that she was no longer technically a Southern woman and this was no longer her home. It was easy for her to think of herself in the present tense, as she still walked and thought and apparently talked; though with nobody to talk to in the last several decades, she hadn’t heard her own voice in a good long while. It had been even longer since someone else had heard her voice. She wondered if the Yankee would be able to hear her if she tried harder. Perhaps he would; after all, he appeared to have felt her anger. When she heard the men’s footsteps approaching, she hurried to sit at one of the windows to see what would happen next.

Marty led Richie through the main floor of the house. They went through the butler’s kitchen to the formal and receiving parlors, the library, dining room, conservatory, billiard room, and ended in the grand hall, where Richie rubbed at his arms. This chill was still there. Where was it coming from? It didn’t feel like just a breeze, but it had to be, right? It was summer for Christ’s sake. Nothing else made any sense; but this felt different from just a summer breeze. He thought back to the room in the cellar.

Surely not everyone who sought refuge here found it, he thought. Maybe...naw it couldn’t be.

Richie looked around and finally up and his eyes widened with delight at the pressed tin ceiling. The craftsmanship was just amazing. He could feel his fingers itching to trace the patterns, and would have to make sure a ladder was on the list of purchases that needed to be made.

He took in the moldings, the wood paneled walls, and the massive stone fireplace and hearth. He mused that he could recline in the fireplace and there would still be room at his feet for his guitar. He barely had to duck to stick his head into the flue, and made a note to have it cleaned, and to see if the chimney needed to be straightened.

“Marty, what did they use this room for?” he asked, as he continued his circuit around the room, trailing a hand gently across the walls. The space was enormous, spanning the entire depth of the house, and taking up fully one-half its length. Set into the middle of the back wall was a set of extra-wide French doors that led out to the lawns. Almost the whole length of the room was waist-to-ceiling windows, with generous seats built under them. The cushions would all need replacing, but Richie could imagine himself sitting in a sunbeam, playing his guitar while a gentle honeysuckled breeze streamed in through the open doors. He smiled to himself – he always was a romantic.

Marty answered, “Oh, balls and celebrations. There would be music and dancing, and hundreds of people spilling out of this room onto the back porch and lawn.” He crossed to one of the wide window seats and with some effort, managed to throw up the sash. He turned back to Richie. “These windows would let the joy and laughter from this house out into the world. It was a grand time.”

The woman had tears of in her eyes. It was so long since music or laughter had a part in her existence. Hearing her home discussed so casually, as an anecdote to history saddened her. But as she remembered the music and dancing, she smiled wistfully. Maybe this time, with this Yankee, her house would be a home again.

Richie stopped in front of the window seat currently occupied by the young woman. He stared at her, she thought, as if he could see her. He reached out, and the woman held her breath. His hand passed through her cheek to touch the smooth glass. She couldn’t feel his touch, and knew he could not feel her cheek, but she drew back. When Richie lifted his hand from the glass, he stared at the condensation left behind. That shouldn’t happen. It was far too warm. Before he could say something, however, it dissipated. He shook his head and turned to his agent.

“Marty, I don’t think I need to see anymore,” he said. “I know there is much to be done here, and frankly, a large manually intensive project is just what I’m looking for.”

Richie added to his mental list of everything he would have to do. Most of the electrical and plumbing throughout the house would have to be updated. Nearly everything needed to be scraped and painted. It was gong to be a huge effort, and he couldn’t wait. He was burned out from the last couple years of touring, and was looking forward to unwinding. He was working on a solo project, but it was nearly wrapped up, and he really needed time to relax. The record would hit stores in the fall and he’d go and do the promotions and performances late in the summer, but in the mean time, he needed something to sink his teeth into that would let him just relax.

He’d have to contact the local Historical Society, newspapers, and the County Clerk’s office, and see if they could get him information about the house’s history. He hoped that there would be some old-timers around who would remember stories from their parents or grandparents about the house and times. Stories passed down through the generations fascinated him. He’d have to scour whatever archives there were for photographs of this house – if it was historical, even slightly, there should be records somewhere.

He was already onto the next steps in his mind. He decided that he’d work to get enough space renovated to live in comfortably. Once the large projects – the electrical, plumbing, and HVAC – were taken care of by the contractors, he’d complete the rest of the renovations slowly himself. His friends had all laughed at him, saying he was crazy to disappear and turn handyman. The boys in the band were all doing their own things, so they didn’t know what he was doing; but he was sure they would share the same opinions. The only people who thought he was doing the right thing were his parents. Joan and Adam had seen the stress in their son’s face and the heartache in his eyes. They knew that a monstrous project was just what he needed, something positive to focus on, and they were supportive of his decision.

Richie was excited to learn about the history of the place. He knew that it had an old soul, just as he did. “This place is speaking to me, Marty; it’s just perfect. I’ll take it.”

The woman sucked in a breath at the Yankee’s declaration and bolted from her seat, running from the room. She passed right through Richie on her way out the door, and he shivered.

Chapter One

2011-06-01T10:00:00.001-04:00

The Past
Mid-1800’s

The white plantation house stood proudly if not gloomily, high on a hill; standing guard over the now desolate landscape. It had been many decades since there was laughter or love in this house, and from the cracked slate tiles on the roof to the peeling and faded whitewash on the siding, to the sad tilt of the black-painted wooden shutters around the house’s window-eyes, to the sagging bricks of the porch steps, the house seemed to know it and all but sighed with misery.

Built in the early-1700s by a prominent Southern businessman of wealthy English heritage, the home was once grand. Standing proudly at three stories tall, it featured a deep wrap-around porch, balconies on the second floor demarking the various bedrooms, and cheery dormers for the house staff on the third floor. Tall, graceful columns stood six feet apart all around the home, giving it a secure and stately appearance.

Beautiful hedgerows had encircled the estate like a graceful necklace; the only breaks were where the stairs descended into a sea of grass. Lush green lawns, perfect for summer picnics, had graced the front acreage. Majestic oak trees provided dappled shade from the heat of the sun, as they stood like soldiers in twin rows, leading guests from the lane to the cobbled area in front of the house. The stones continued around to a massive stable where a full complement of stable hands treated the guests’ horses like kings.

In the back of the house, a formal English garden entertained and amused many a guest throughout the spring and summer months. Leading from the porch's back stairs, partygoers found winding brick pathways, outlined with low rows of trimmed English Boxwoods. Helleri holly shrubs sat just beyond the Boxwoods, outlining colorful flower beds. Fragrant Jasmine, lavender and bay were interspersed with colorful marigolds, pansies, and hibiscus. Here and there, hydrangea-covered trellises provided shelter from curious eyes, and benches behind these floral walls were perfect for brief romantic trysts.

Beyond the low gardens was an elaborate maze, sculpted from privet hedge, and interspersed with sweet honeysuckle. As guests would navigate the maze, their clothes would brush against the blooms, releasing a heavenly scent. Those lucky enough to find the center found an elaborate fountain waiting for them – the sound of the gently falling water mesmerizing.

A long, winding flagstone path, edged by six-foot tall rhododendron bushes, led out the back of the maze and down a sweeping hill to a lake that always seemed to glow from within. The cool, clear water offered relief from sticky summer afternoons, and more often than not, the family of the house would seek the shade of the immense oak and willow trees that lined its shore.

Music, light, and laughter poured from the windows on hot summer nights, and beautiful people, dressed formally in long coats and sweeping gowns, would dance and twirl in the grand hall. Delightful children would dart in and out among the adults, chasing each other with the abandon only the young and innocent can show.

The couple who last lived, really lived, in the house was young, beautiful, and utterly devoted to one another. They met by chance when their families attended the same Christmas celebration. The very definition of ‘love at first sight’, the pair had eyes for only one another, and the girl found her dance card was filled with only his name. Geoffrey was descended from a long line of farmers who had refused to keep slaves. His family did not believe that one could own another man, regardless of skin color, and was of the mind that if the land was to be truly theirs, it needed to be worked by their own hands. Kirsten was of English noble descent. Despite living in America for ten years, still had a light, charming accent that positively enchanted Geoffrey when they first met.

They shared a connection that was deeper than even they could understand. During their courtship, Geoffrey had been injured when thrown from his horse. His dearest heart Kirsten had felt a sharp cramp in her leg at precisely the same moment, cried out in alarm, and gracefully slumped to the floor. Doctors were summoned, but nothing was found to be physically wrong with her. When it was discovered that her beloved had broken a leg, the same one that had so pained her, whispering of true love and of one soul sharing two bodies began.

The pair was inseparable, and wed on a midsummer’s night in 1855 surrounded by family and friends. They were gifted the house by Elizabeth Thompson, a maiden aunt who wanted to see the house come to life under the aura of love and tenderness that surrounded them. Under their care, the lawns and gardens flourished, the trees blossomed and bore incredible fruit, and their animals were healthy and strong. The home was called the Thompson estate in her honor.

A year after their marriage, they were blessed with twin daughters, whom they named Hope and Joy, and a year after that, a strapping boy called James. No children on God’s green Earth were loved more than these three. The young family attracted attention wherever they went; their obvious love for each other and their good looks making even the old curmudgeons who sat in rocking chairs outside the general store smile.

Their house, their home, was a happy place; full of joy and the promise of tomorrow.

Then, one mild October night in 1861, tragedy struck. The mistress of the house disappeared, and with her went all the happiness from the home. Local authorities searched for clues to Kirsten’s whereabouts, but to no avail. Friends and family of the young woman scoured the house’s forty-odd rooms, from the highest attic gable to the lowest corners of the root cellar for any sign of her, but found nothing. Men from neighboring plantations helped search the acreage and outbuildings, and rowed boats up back and forth across the property’s lake, but found no trace of her. The war had just really started to take hold, and though the South firmly believed they would emerge victorious from this frivolous squabble, there were murmurs that Northerners may have taken her.

Geoffrey, with three young children to rear, and no female relations to assist, avoided fighting in the war. As a Northern Sympathizer, he tried to do his part, opening his home to the Underground Railroad to help enslaved men and women escape their bondage, but once the war ended in April of 1865, and with nothing to take up his time, he found he could no longer bear to be in the house without his love. The children didn’t understand where their Mummy had gone, and why she hadn’t written in the years she had been away. Sad and broken, they finally left the house, taking with them precious few reminders of their once-happy lives.

For a time, friends of Geoffrey and Kirsten kept up the house and grounds in the hopes that Kirsten would someday return. As the months and years went by with not so much as a word from her, however, they eventually stopped. Soon the gardens were overrun with weeds that choked all the beauty from them. The trees, which had once borne such succulent fruit as to be the envy of the other farmers, were now barren. The topiary maze grew into one large shrubbery, its fountain run dry; and the once-clear lake had a haze of grief just beneath the surface.

The Present

The current resident of the once-grand house, a lone soul, a young woman, wandered from room to room, looking mournfully out the windows. The woman was in her mid-twenties, with long dark hair arranged in a complicated up-do and haunting gray eyes. Her complexion was as smooth and pale as porcelain, and nearly blended into the muted peach summer-weight gown she wore over her slender form.

She could feel the sadness of the house all around her, pressing on her like the thick clouds of smoke from a dense forest fire. Nothing could soothe her restlessness, and as she moved from one window to the next in the once grand great-room, the house seemed to bristle with agitation along with her.

She sighed as she glanced around the vast empty space. The rooms had all been stripped bare years ago, and the faded, peeling wallpaper lent an air of hopelessness to the already stifling sadness. A fire hadn’t graced the grate for decades, and she couldn’t remember the last time there was laughter.

A noise from outside jarred her from her reverie and brought her back to the nearly floor-to-ceiling windows. Sitting gracefully on one of the window seats, she gazed through one of the few clean panes of glass to see two unfamiliar men walking around the grounds. One man, tall and dark like her lost love, had a look of apprehension on his face as if he, too, could feel the air of despair that surrounded the house. The other man, who was shorter but obviously the one in charge, gestured this way and that, pointing at different areas of the house and landscaping. The young woman sighed, wishing she had known they were coming; she would have tried to set the front gardens to right.

As the men approached the porch, the woman put a delicate hand to her hair, checking for strays and stood, smoothing her hands down the front of her gown. She crossed to the door, but before she could reach for the knob, the handle turned, and she had to jump back to avoid being hit by the heavy oak-paneled door.

“You can see the house also needs some attention,” the smaller man was saying as they entered, his soft southern drawl sliding from between thin lips.

“Uh-huh, that’s putting it mildly,” his companion said, with an accent that was most decidedly that of a Yankee.

“But, if a person happened to have the time and money,” the speaker paused briefly, “then this place could be grand again.”

“Excuse me?” the woman said indignantly. It was simply unacceptable to walk into a woman’s home uninvited. There was a time when she would have lectured this so-called Southern gentleman on his manners. But, she supposed, that time had passed many years ago.

“Can I see the rest of the place?” The tall man asked. The woman studied this Northern stranger. He had hair past his shoulders, and an odd black banded hat pulled down low over his eyes. He doffed the hat as he looked around, revealing gorgeous soft-brown eyes – sad, beautiful eyes.

“Sure thing, Mr. Sambora,” the real estate agent said.

“Please, I insist you call me Rich,” Richie answered. He had spent the better part of the last three days with the Realtor, traveling from one end of the county to the other, and still the man would not call him by his given name. They had looked at small homes and large estates, but none of them was what he was looking for. When they pulled into the end of the lane at this latest house, Richie’s spirits sunk. The place was in such a state of disrepair, it would take him months or maybe even years to get it to where it should be. Richie was ready to give it up, and go looking elsewhere in the country. Then the Realtor started the property tour. And he saw the possibilities. More than ‘saw’, he ‘felt’ them. Something about this place spoke to him.

“EXCUSE ME!” the woman yelled angrily, stomping her foot. The men stopped, startled, and looked around the room for the source of their disquiet.

“Did you feel that?” Richie asked. A gust of cold air had blown across him, raising gooseflesh on his forearms.

“Feel what?” the agent responded distractedly. He tilted his head sideways and furrowed his brow, but made no further comments.

Richie shook his head. “Nothing,” he said. He must have been imaging things. Damned stupid stress. “Never mind. C’mon, let’s see the rest of the place.” He consulted his watch. “If we hurry, I can still get over to Leland and take in some of the Blues Festival.”

Marty Halstead breathed an inward sigh of relief, glad his client dropped the matter. He didn’t know too much about this Northerner, but he did know wealthy people, and no matter how ‘quaint’ a haunting may sound, he knew that in reality, a ghost was not high on the must-have list for any home buyer. He could only hope that this particular haint would leave them be – at least until the papers were signed.

Dear Readers...

2011-03-14T07:58:00.002-04:00

... I have let this story languish long enough. But when I went back to finish it, and read back a ways to get myself back into Angel Rose's shoes, I was dismayed to find SO much missing from the story!

Rather than just finish it to be done with it, or leave it forever in limbo, I decided to give the story a massive edit. Don't worry, the story, plot, and characters will still be the same -- there are just gaps to fill, inconsitencies to straighten out, and (of course) the "rest of it" to write!

I've taken the old story down (obviously) and will re-launch at 10:00 am Eastern on June 1st.

-- Hath