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Authors: K.J. Emrick

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BOOK: 2 Mists of the Past
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Darcy considered that for a moment. “But wouldn’t it be better to find out if the relationship is strong enough to withstand a closer proximity or not now instead of falling apart later when you are more invested in it?”

Sue shrugged. “Maybe. Right now I have work to do or my boss might get annoyed and give me the sack.” Sue smiled and Darcy could tell that she was using humor to deflect Darcy away from the conversation so she let it go. She’d had enough turmoil in her own life the last few weeks to last a lifetime and didn’t need to take on anybody else’s.

Thankfully things seemed to be getting back to normal in Misty Hollow. At least, a little bit. New people moving into town, Helen moving on with her life. Darcy herself hadn’t had a single nightmare in the last two weeks. No visions or signs of impending doom. And the mists that gave the town its name had stayed away as well.

The mists always came in when that special kind of trouble that Darcy attracted to herself was about to happen. She shivered as she got back to work tidying up the shop. She was happy that there hadn’t been any of that kind of trouble in a while.

***

Later that day Darcy and Sue were busy unpacking a shipment of books that had just arrived. Business had begun to pick up again after a small slump which Darcy had assumed was due to the fact that most people read their books from an electronic device instead of the real paper product these days. Darcy had been afraid that she might have to close the bookstore and sell up. She was relieved that the crisis looked like it may have been averted, at least for the time being. New shipments were coming in every other week now.

Darcy was on autopilot, her thoughts on Jon. A singularly embarrassing but nice thought about his lips was interrupted by the bell over the door ringing as someone entered. Darcy looked up to see who it was. She felt a little thrill rush through her when she saw it was Jon. It was like her thoughts had conjured him up.

He smiled at her and she felt her heart skip harder as she smiled back at him. “Hi Sue,” he called over as he walked in, keeping his eyes on Darcy. “Hello there, pretty woman,” he said very quietly as he drew her to him and kissed her lips ever so softly.

She’d been right about those lips.

“Oh you two are so adorable,” Sue said, watching them and grinning from ear to ear. “You’re making me jealous. I think I’m going to take my break now.” She grabbed her bag and with a last smirk in their direction she left the store.

Jon waited for the door to close and then swooped down and claimed Darcy’s lips again with his mouth and his tongue and his full attention. He let her take a full breath half a minute later. When he held her at arm’s length she looked up into his eyes and knew he was up to something. “You know what?” he said to her. “We’ve never been out to a restaurant. I want to take you out on a real date.”

Darcy laughed and said, “I would love to go out on a real date with you.” She lifted her head for a kiss but he pulled away from her sharply.

“Ouch! What was that?” He looked all around while rubbing the back of his head. There on the floor at his feet was a book. It had flown from its spot on a shelf a dozen feet away, through the air, to hit him.

“Millie, stop it!”  Darcy tried to find her great aunt’s ghost, but the woman wasn’t in a mood to be seen today. The bookstore had been her great aunt Millie’s back when she’d been alive. Now she haunted the place, always causing trouble and throwing things around the shop.

Jon laughed nervously, trying to act like what she had just done didn’t bother him, but Darcy knew that he was uncomfortable. As much as he loved her he sometimes had a hard time with this part of her life. He couldn’t completely accept that ghosts and communicating with those ghosts was real even though it had been her sixth sense that had helped solve the two murders just a month ago.

He went back to stroking her cheek and gently kissing her mouth, and finally it was time for him to get back to work. “I’ll see you tomorrow night for our date. Pick you up around six?”

“I can’t wait.”

***

“So your first public date with Jon, hm? What are you going to wear?”

Darcy had met her sister Grace at the Bean There Bakery and Café for coffee that afternoon and had just finished telling her all about her upcoming date with Jon. They sat together now in a booth, sipping coffee. Grace’s dark hair was cut shorter than Darcy’s, in a professional style and tied back away from her face, and the blue pantsuit that she wore was pressed and perfect. Darcy felt underdressed in her khaki slacks and yellow top. Other than the minor differences, however, no one would ever doubt that the two of them were sisters.

Grace was a long-time officer on the Misty Hollow police department. Jon was her partner.  They’d started together just before the troubles had hit the town a month ago, in fact. Darcy knew Grace and Jon had become close. She was hoping for a little insight.

“I don’t know what to wear, tell you the truth.” Darcy’s face puckered into a frown. What did she have that was suitable for a dinner date? Going out for dinner wasn’t something that she did on a regular basis. Or ever, for that matter. “Actually it might be fun to shop for a dress. It’s been a long time. And shoes. Maybe some new eyeshadow, too. What do you think?” Grace smirked at her. “What?”

“Nothing. It’s just nice to see this side of you.”

“Side? What side?”

Grace rolled her eyes. “The normal, girl falling in love side. I like it. You should let it out more often.”

Darcy grinned at her. “I haven’t felt like this for a long time. I really like Jon.”

Grace raised an eyebrow. “Just ‘like’?’”

Darcy felt her face flush. Darn it. She almost never blushed. She made sure to keep her eyes riveted to her coffee. “No, sis, it’s more than that. I really think I love him. He said it to me, you know. Just yesterday. It was really sweet.” She felt her face get hotter. “I’m not being silly, am I?”

Grace was quick to shake her head. “No, Darcy. You’re not being silly. You’re being a woman. Look, I know Jon pretty well now. I’d wave you off if I thought there was some reason for you not to go after him. This isn’t me telling you not to do this. This is me teasing my little sister about her boyfriend.”

She winked at Darcy and Darcy relaxed. Back when Anna and Jeff had been murdered, the whole investigation that Darcy had started into their deaths had gotten Grace’s husband arrested. She had thought at the time that it would be the end to their friendship. They’d come through it, though. It was good to know she still had her sister to depend on.

“Can I fill that for you Darcy?” Darcy jumped a little and knocked her empty cup over, the white ceramic mug spinning on the tabletop before she could right it again. She had been in another world and hadn’t heard Lily come up to them.

Lily Sutter had just started working at the bakery and was a young girl in her early twenties. Short blonde hair framed her delicate face and her pale blue eyes looked tired.
“Thank you, Lily.” Darcy held her cup out as the girl filled it for her. Darcy studied her as she turned to fill Grace’s cup.

“Do you like working here Lily?” Darcy asked, a sudden curiosity about the girl making her ask.

“Oh yes, I like it very much,” she answered. “It’s so much better than the restaurant where I used to work in Edgeport. I was really worried when it closed. It’s so hard to get a job these days, you know, and I thought that I might have to move to the city to find one. Helen has been a lifesaver for me.” Edgeport was a slightly larger town, nearer to the coast, a few miles east of Misty Hollow. Darcy knew that Lily had lived in Misty Hollow all of her life, and had commuted to Edgeport each day for her job at the restaurant, but other than that she knew hardly anything about her.

She smiled at the girl. “You know I don’t think you and I have ever had a chance to chat. How are things going for you?”

“Things are going fine, except I got into a big fight with my brother, Robbie, this morning. It’s tough having him live with me.”

Darcy didn’t know that Lily had a brother. “Is he an older brother?”

“Yes, though you’d never know it. He couldn’t get a job after he finished college so he decided to come back here to live with me for a while. Lucky me, right? Problem is now that our parents are gone and the family home was sold he didn’t really have a home to come back to. So I couldn’t just turn him out on the street.”

“That was good of you to take him in.” Darcy hadn’t even realized Lily had a brother. “I hope your argument with him wasn’t anything too bad.”

“Nah, just typical sibling stuff,” she said dismissively as she left and went back behind the counter to serve some other customers.

 

Chapter Two

 

Darcy peered at herself in the bathroom mirror as she painstakingly applied the new eyeshadow and blush she’d purchased. She almost never wore makeup. It felt so strange to see her face like this. She was quietly humming a tune to steady her nerves. She had a few butterflies in her stomach which she thought was quite ridiculous. It wasn’t as if she didn’t know Jon. Not like she’d never gone on a date before.

Her cat Smudge came into the room and sat stoically watching her for a moment. Then he jumped up onto the vanity and tried to rub up against her. She gently pushed him away. “I can’t have you getting your fur all over me.”

She stared at the cat, willing him to understand. Smudge flicked his tail violently from side to side, annoyed at her. “Well, I’m sorry that I have a date tonight, but I do.” Smudge mewled at her and jumped down from the vanity. He stalked out of the room and Darcy rolled her eyes.

Finally ready she went into her room to grab her purse and then headed downstairs to wait for Jon. When she was half way down she heard a knock at the door. He was early. Her breathing stalled and her heart kicked hard in her chest. She admitted to herself that she was more than a little nervous.

Opening the door to Jon she couldn’t help but smile. He looked magnificent in his dark blue suit, a white shirt and a dark maroon tie. Her mouth watered a little at the sight of him. He looked gorgeous.

“Hello,” he said softly as he leaned in to kiss her gently. He studied her for a moment. “You look great. Are you ready to go?”

She definitely was.

***

“This is a nice restaurant,” Darcy said as she looked all around. They had driven to the next town over, Meadowood, because Misty Hollow didn’t have a restaurant of the kind that Jon had wanted to take her to, a sit-down restaurant with waiters and gentle orchestral music playing over the speakers.

The restaurant was dimly lit and very romantic with long, white table cloths and candles. While they waited for their food to arrive they sipped wine and talked about their childhoods. Jon was telling her about when he broke his leg while riding his bike.

“I was showing off for my friends. I felt like such an idiot when it happened but all my friends thought it was hilarious.” Darcy laughed at his story and Jon pretended to be annoyed with her, frowning ridiculously which set off another bout of laughter from her. Darcy told him a couple of stories about when she and Grace were just kids. She chose a story that happened before she was such a disappointment to her mother.

Before their food arrived Darcy excused herself to visit the bathroom. As she was retouching her lipstick in the mirror she suddenly felt cold. A chill washed over her and sent shivers down her spine. It was growing dark in the bathroom.

Her sixth sense had her in its grip.

Suddenly she was catapulted into a vision. Like most of her visions everything came to her in pieces. The vision was from the point of view of a man and she was in an unrecognizable apartment. She felt really sick, almost to the point of vomiting and her stomach was cramping with vicious pain.

There was a knock at the door of wherever her vision was occurring and another man entered the room. Darcy realized in shock that the other man was Jon. He looked younger. This wasn’t happening now. It was in the past. When? Where? Then she felt another sharp pain. In the vision she, as the man, was on the floor and Jon was hovering over her. He reached out for her.

And then the vision snapped away like someone had changed the channel and she was back in the here and now.

She found herself on the bathroom floor. Yuck. She picked herself up and brushed off her clothes. What on earth was that all about? Where had it come from? And why was she having a vision of something in Jon’s past?

Jon. She remembered that he was just outside waiting for her in the restaurant. She couldn’t face him. She couldn’t go back to that table and pretend she hadn’t seen what she just saw. Worse, she couldn’t just sit down and start asking him who the badly sick man from his younger years was. He still wasn’t very accepting of her sixth sense. There was no way she could see him. Not right now.

She left the bathroom and fled the restaurant out of the back door.

***

After the cab dropped Darcy home she ran inside and slammed the door behind her. She leaned up against the door panting, her heart racing. She took a few deep breaths to try and calm down. The vision in the restaurant’s bathroom had really rattled her.

Smudge rubbed up against her leg as soon as the door closed and she bent to pat him. “I’m fine old fellow. Just a bit shaken up.” She headed upstairs, with her cat following her, and got changed out of her nice new dress and into her bathrobe. She was still jittery, still on edge.

She went into the bathroom to scrub at her makeup. Staring at her reflection in the mirror she was alarmed at how pale she looked. Her green eyes were almost luminous and her dark hair stood stark against the white of her skin. She looked deeply into her own eyes and asked herself for the hundredth time why she saw these things when no one else did. Was it hereditary? Something passed down from her mother or her father? No. Grace didn’t have this issue. Darcy was the only one in her family blessed, or cursed, with it.

Loud knocking brought her out of her reverie. She knew it would be Jon. She grimaced and shook her head. “Oh for Pete’s sake,” she muttered. She should have just faced him at the restaurant.

BOOK: 2 Mists of the Past
2.96Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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