Magic (5 page)

Carefully replacing it on the table, Rachel glanced at the snapshot held in a plain gold frame. A younger Bryan Hennessy stood in a cap and gown behind three smiling young women—a blonde, a brunette, and a redhead. At least he wasn’t prejudiced, Rachel thought with a strange spurt of something akin to jealousy.

Pushing the unwelcome feeling aside, she looked at the crumpled scraps of paper that had been tossed across the dusty surface of the nightstand. They were notes with odd messages like “Jayne says to eat breakfast tomorrow,” “Go to library—background, Drake House,” “Dinner with Faith and Shane, seven sharp. Get a haircut!” “Addie capable of hidden psychokinesis? That could explain object movement in grid nine.”

Was it possible Bryan Hennessy was truly a scientist of some sort? It seemed unlikely a con man would be so thorough as to leave notes like that last one on his nightstand on the off chance someone with a fully functioning mind might stumble across them. On the other hand, a ghost hunter seemed too farfetched for words.

Rachel couldn’t find it in her to believe in ghosts. Reality was proving tough enough to deal with; she didn’t have time to wonder about the supernatural as well. She knew she had to focus on the here and now. She had to concentrate on the grim practical aspects of her future and her mother’s future. In view of what had happened in the past few years, she knew it was pointless to waste time on dreams and wishes. There was no such thing as magic or happily-ever-after. There were no such things as ghosts.

As if to mock her, the image of Terence Bretton filled her head. Handsome, smiling Terence, as he had been when she’d met him at a coffee house located just off the campus of Berkeley. She’d been a sophomore, diligently studying classical music on a scholarship, dutifully pursuing the career in opera her mother had been grooming her for for her entire life. Terence had been a breath of fresh air to a girl who had lived a sheltered, structured life of voice lessons and practice and study. Terence, with his disarming, lopsided grin and twinkling green eyes. Terence, full of big dreams but lacking the ambition to make them come true.

Only she hadn’t know that at the time, Rachel reflected with a wistful smile. She had fallen for Terence’s charm and his dreams and his honest, untrained voice. He had offered her love and freedom, and she had embraced both.

Her initial attraction to him had been calculated. Terence, a folk singer who led a Gypsy’s life, was everything Rachel knew her mother would detest. She had loved her mother, but rebellion was a natural part of growing up. Rachel’s had come later than most, she knew. She had abruptly become fed up with the control Addie had wielded over her life. She had suddenly burned out on the hours of training, the discipline, the lack of a normal social life, the constant reminders of how hard Addie worked to secure her future. She had gone to the Coffee Mill out of defiance and had determinedly fallen for the handsome young man playing the guitar on the small stage there.

It didn’t seem like five years ago. It seemed like a lifetime ago. Another lifetime down a trail of broken dreams.

Terence had never made it big, and the burden of his mediocrity had fallen on Rachel’s shoulders. Terence didn’t like to deal with the realities of booking gigs and balancing books. Sensible and practical, Rachel had taken on the responsibilities. Their relationship had gradually cooled from lovers to friends.

Her love for Terence Bretton had slipped away until a part of her had almost come to hate him. According to Terence, it was always someone else’s fault he didn’t hit the big time. According to him, there was always another golden opportunity around the corner just waiting for him.

The news about Addie had been the final straw. Terence’s reaction had been no less than Rachel should have expected. Still, she had held on to the last of her hope that he would somehow redeem himself, would somehow make up for all the disappointments he had handed her over the years. All she had wanted was his friendship and his support. It hadn’t seemed so much to ask. What a fool she’d been.

“Put her in a home.”

“She’s my mother.”

“She disowned you.”

“She raised me by herself after Dad died. She took care of me. I should do the same for her.”

“If her mind is going, she’ll never know the difference, Rachel. Put her away someplace. We’ve got our lives to live. We’ve got plans. We can’t stop now. I’m going to make it big, Rachel. I need you there beside me.”

“So does my mother.”

Now Rachel sighed and hugged the spare pillow to her chest as sadness overcame her. Terence wasn’t going to make it big. He didn’t have plans, he had dreams, and he spent his time expecting them magically to come true with little or no effort on his part. Rachel had learned the hard way that there was no such thing as magic.

In the end her choice had been clear. In fact, there had been no choice to make. She had known the instant after Dr. Moore had told her the news that she would go to Addie.

Now she was there and Addie didn’t want her.

They would get over that hurdle somehow. Beneath the hurt and the uncertainty, Rachel had bedrock determination, no doubt inherited from her indomitable mother. She would reconcile with Addie somehow. She would deal with the reality of Addie’s condition somehow. As they had after Verne Lindquist had been killed, the two of them would get along … somehow. It wasn’t going to be fun. It wasn’t going to be easy. But they would manage it. Somehow.

And what about Bryan Hennessy?

A sharp pang ran through her, and she hugged her pillow a little harder. Bryan Hennessy was a stranger. He had nothing to do with their situation. He couldn’t. She had all she could handle with Addie. A relationship with a man was out of the question. Why she was even thinking about it was beyond her. She didn’t know Bryan Hennessy from a goose. He might have been a con man or a killer or another Terence Bretton. Judging from all his nonsensical piffle, he was probably worse than Terence. At least Terence aspired to something. To what could a ghost hunter aspire?

She was just overreacting to him because she was exhausted and he had been gallant enough to offer her his shoulder to cry on and his bed to sleep in. He wouldn’t want to get involved with her, at any rate. What fool would volunteer to take on the problems she was facing?

You have to help her
.

Bryan scowled. He shifted positions in the blood-red leather wing chair. The study was located in grid nine of his chart of the first floor of Drake House. Addie had told him she’d seen things move in this room—move with the assistance of Wimsey. According to her, Wimsey had twice rearranged the furniture because “he likes it the way he likes it.” She had moved it all around once, just out of stubbornness, but Wimsey had put it back.

Bryan had chosen this room to spend the night in because he knew damn well he wasn’t going to sleep, and he was hoping against hope for a distraction—the appearance of Wimsey, a book falling off the shelf by itself, a sudden cold breeze, anything. Anything that would help get his mind off Rachel Lindquist sleeping in the same bed he had slept in, wrapping the sheets around her slender body, burrowing her angel’s face into his pillow.

He groaned as his blood stirred hot in his veins. He could just imagine what she looked like sleeping: soft and tempting with her wild honey-gold hair mussed around her head. She was probably wearing a T-shirt, and the soft fabric would mold around her breasts the way his hands wanted to mold around them. The thought had him more than half turned on.

He swore under his breath. What kind of depraved creep was he turning into? There was poor Rachel, exhausted, frightened, hurt, trying to manage a few hours rest and escape from her troubles, and here he was lusting after her!

She’s very pretty
.

“Yes, she’s pretty,” he grumbled. “She’s very pretty. And she’s got a lot of problems, and I don’t want to get involved.”

For the first time he wondered about the folk singer Rachel had run off with five years before. Where was he? What kind of jerk was he that he would send Rachel to deal with this crisis on her own? Clarence something. “A common tramp” Addie had called him. Somehow, Bryan doubted Rachel would run off with a common tramp. Despite her casual style of dress, she radiated class. It was there in the way she held herself, in the way she moved, in the way she spoke.

There was obviously a lot more to the story than an “ungrateful” daughter taking up with a “cheap folk singer.” Bryan was a little disappointed in himself for so readily believing the worst. Especially since it had come from Addie, who was disoriented much of the time. Maybe Rachel Lindquist was rotten to the core, but it wasn’t his place to make that judgment without having all the facts. On the other hand, his life would be a whole lot simpler if he believed the worst and stayed away from her.

Even as he thought it, he had the sinking realization that it wasn’t going to happen. It wasn’t in him to judge people harshly. It wasn’t in him to stand by and watch a lady struggle with a load that was too heavy for her to carry, either.

He had always taken care of the women in his life. His sisters first, and then Faith and Alaina and Jayne. Then Serena. Now Serena was gone, and the three lovelier members of the Fearsome Foursome were being taken care of by their mates. Enter Rachel Lindquist with her big violet eyes and incredible pink mouth and stubborn pride tilting her little chin up.

Fighting an inner battle, Bryan flung himself out of the chair and paced the width of the room, head down, his hands combing back through his tawny hair again and again.

You have to help her. She needs help
.

“No, not me. I can’t help anybody. I can’t even help myself. She can get help from the doctor. She can join a support group. Just leave me out of it.”

He paced some more, feeling the pressure in a strangely tangible way, as if it were pressing in on him from all around. It was not unlike diving deep into the black depths of the ocean, a silky nothingness pushing in on him from all sides, threatening to crush his chest. To escape it, he threw open the French doors and strode out onto the stone terrace.

As it had earlier, the cool air calmed him. He dropped onto a bench and leaned over, his elbows on his thighs, his hands rubbing the back of his neck.

He had known Serena was dying when he had married her. He had loved her, and the thought of letting her face death alone had been incomprehensible. Her decline and ultimate death had been the worst thing he could ever imagine going through. He had endured it for her, but he had vowed to himself never to go through anything like it again.

Rachel isn’t facing death
.

“No, but she’s facing pain, and I’ve had enough pain to last me a lifetime.”

What about her? You could ease her pain
.
You could lighten her burden
.

“How?” he asked his inner voice as he pulled his glasses off and rubbed the bridge of his nose with a thumb and forefinger.

Magic
.

Bryan laughed at that. He wasn’t sure he knew what magic was anymore. Was he supposed to believe he could pull a rabbit out of his hat, and Rachel and Addie’s troubles would disappear? ft wouldn’t happen.

But it might help
.

After settling his glasses back into place, he reached into the breast pocket of his shirt and withdrew a short black wand, not more than five inches long and as big around as a cigarette. With a flick of his wrist, it became a silken red rose with a thin stem that abruptly drooped over his hand. A smile lifted the corner of his mouth.

“If I can’t dazzle her with my magic, maybe I can be a source of comic relief,” he said dryly, tucking the wilted rose back into his shirt pocket.

He hadn’t been able to perform the simplest of tricks for months now. Though he kept trying, deep down he was afraid he had lost his magic forever.

He pushed himself up from the bench and wandered back into the house. His broad shoulders sagging under the twin burdens of exhaustion and stress, he picked up the glass of whiskey he had left on the leather blotter of the walnut desk. He had hoped the excellent liquor he’d found in a bottle in a desk drawer would help him sleep. The glass was nearly empty. Bryan frowned. He could have sworn he’d left a good inch in it when he’d gone outside. He didn’t notice the stain near his feet on the old woolen carpet or the scent of liquor seeping up from the fabric. He noticed only that his whiskey was gone, and he didn’t feel like pouring another.

Shrugging, he dismissed the question and tossed back most of what was left of the drink. Remembering things had never been his strong suit.

The study was quiet. This room was supposed to be a hotbed of paranormal activity, but not one thing out of the ordinary had happened in the few days he’d been there. Worse than that, Bryan felt nothing unusual, sensed nothing whatsoever.

As he gazed around the dark room, he wondered morosely if he was losing his touch professionally as well as with his magic. He had always had phenomenal success seeking out psychic disturbances. He had always been able to tune in to the scene and feel things others couldn’t. His special sensitivity had led him to his career. Had it deserted him?

Too tired to think about it, he wandered from the room and down the hall to search for something comfortable to stretch out on.

Rachel awoke early from a fitful sleep. Soft gray light seeped into the room through the window. She struggled with the covers that were tangled around her, and pushed herself up in the bed so she could lean back against the headboard. She was exhausted. The mere idea of getting out of bed made her groan, and when she thought of what she would have to face, she almost crawled back under the covers. Not that it would have done her any good. She hadn’t gotten a moment’s rest during the night. Dreams had haunted her, one right after another, interweaving and intermingling until they couldn’t be separated. Even now emotions assailed her, panic chief among them.

The main theme of the dream marathon had been Addie. How were they ever going to get through what was ahead of them if her mother wouldn’t accept her help? It was one thing for Rachel to say she was going to take care of Addie. Accomplishing that task was going to be another thing altogether. Addie had never been the kind of woman who stood to the side, wringing her hands and letting other people run her life. She had always been so strong, so independent, such a dictator, running their lives like an admiral on a tight ship.

Rachel was a woman now and hardly the subservient, obedient little thing she had been in her youth. Because of Terence’s lack of responsibility, she had been forced to the role of leader. She had handled the job with the same grit and determination her mother had always shown. She knew from experience how to take charge of a situation.

But she didn’t know how to take care of Addie. It seemed completely unnatural to assume her mother’s role as head of the family and relegate Addie to second place. And she knew with a sense of dread that was like a lump of ice in her stomach that Addie wasn’t going to go down without a fight.

The first logical step was the appointment Rachel had scheduled with Dr. Moore. Perhaps he would be able to make Addie see reason. Hopefully Bryan had been right in saying Addie would be more composed in the morning, better able to understand and to cope with the changes that were inevitable.

A tiny flame of hope flared to life inside her, and it burned a little hotter as she continued to think about Bryan.

A strangely clear image of him waking up filled her imagination. His tawny hair would be tousled, his blue eyes bleary and heavy-lidded. He would rub his hand along the stubble on his strong jaw. She could almost smell his warm male scent, could almost feel his warm weight in the bed beside her. That warmth crept into her and swirled lazily through her body.

Rachel forced her eyes open wide and all but leapt from the bed.

“What are you doing, thinking that way, Rachel Lindquist?” she demanded, staring at her reflection in the cracked mirror. With her cheeks flushed and her hair a wild tangle around her head, she looked like a strumpet. A scowl turned down her pretty mouth. “What’s the matter with you? Bryan Hennessy is not now, nor will he ever be a part of your life. You are going to see to that first thing this morning.”

Whether he was a legitimate scientist or not didn’t enter into it. She couldn’t afford to pay him for his questionable services. She had things like doctor bills and rent to consider.

It still made her angry to think he would take money from Addie. Her mother was obviously not in full command of her faculties. This ghost business of hers was most probably some result of the Alzheimer’s. Rachel had read that some victims of the dementing illness experience hallucinations. This ghost, this “whimsy,” was probably just that—whimsy. The mother she remembered would no more believe in ghosts than she would believe in Santa Claus.

Rachel padded across the cold floor to the window for her first glimpse of the view from Drake House. Stepping over a large pair of battered loafers and around a bird cage, she peeled back one of the sheets from the glass. Fog obscured the view. She could hear the distant crash of the ocean, but she couldn’t see the lawn, let alone the cliff edge or the blue water beyond.

“How symbolic of my life at the moment,” she said dryly.

She turned away from the window and set herself to the task of preparing to face the day. With an eye toward pleasing her mother, she dressed in a conservative white blouse and a hunter-green jumper, painstakingly restored order to her hair, then turned to make the bed. That was when she found the rose.

A single yellow rose, slightly mangled, was peeking out from beneath the spare pillow she had hugged and punched and tussled with throughout the night. She picked it up by the end of the stem, staring at it in shock and disbelief as a petal dropped off and drifted to the bed.

Warmth surged through her before she could check it. A rose. How lovely. How thoughtful. How sweet. Then a blush bloomed on her cheeks and indignation rose up inside her. Bryan Hennessy had snuck into her room! He’d come into her room while she had been asleep.

Of all the low, strange things to do. How long had he stood beside the bed, looking at her? A minute? Five minutes? The very idea was mortifying! She might have been talking in her sleep or snoring or drooling, while this man she barely knew watched her!

Leaving the housekeeping for later, Rachel turned on her heel and stormed purposefully from the room to go in search of her midnight caller.

Bryan woke slowly, knowing Instinctively that he would be better off unconscious. All the clues were there as his mind reached cautiously up out of the depths of sleep: an ache here, the beginnings of a pain there. Still, his eyes came halfway open, and he rubbed his hand along his jaw, rasping a two-day growth of whiskers against his palm. He realty did have to remember to shave later.

The light in the billiard room was dim. It was early, he guessed, early enough for him to get to the bird cages before Addie did. Groaning, he pushed himself upright on the felt-covered slate of the old billiard table and swung his long legs over the edge. His body protested in more places than he cared to count.

“Maybe I’m getting too old for this kind of thing,” he reflected as he retrieved his spectacles from the cue-stick rack and put them on. He looked at himself then in the ornate mirror that hung on the wall, taking up a space equal to that of the billiard table. Even through a couple of decades worth of dust he looked bad. He looked like a vagrant. His shirt was rumpled beyond redemption, the tails hanging out of his equally wrinkled pants. His wilted magic rose drooped over the edge of his shirt pocket.

A shower, a shave, and clean clothes were the order of the morning, he thought as he slicked his disheveled hair back with his hands. But first, the bird cages.

He went into the parlor and unearthed the coffee can filled with bird seed Addie kept stashed behind a burgundy velvet fainting couch. Also behind the couch were a dozen unopened bags of bird seed and a foot-high stack of mail. Addie was notorious for stashing things away, like a squirrel hoarding nuts for the winter. And, like a squirrel, she often forgot where she had buried her booty. She never forgot her bird seed, however. She only forgot that she didn’t have a bird.

Bryan wondered what her frame of mind would be this morning. He hoped for Rachel’s sake Addie would be in one of her more normal periods. The two of them had a lot to talk over, a lot to settle between them, and not much time to do it. That was the one sure thing about Addie’s illness: it would progress. There would be no remission, no reprieve. What needed settling between mother and daughter needed settling as soon as possible.

“Not that I’m getting involved,” Bryan mumbled as he opened a wire cage and scraped the seed out of the little dish and into the coffee can. “I’m just here minding my own business, doing my little job.”

To distract himself from the inner voice that was trying to tell him differently, he began to sing softly to himself. “I got a ghoul in Kalamazoo—”

“Mr. Hennessy.” Rachel paused in the doorway of the parlor, ready to launch into her tirade, but the sight of Bryan brought her up short. He was crouched over a little bamboo bird cage—Just one of dozens of bird cages in the room—digging bird seed out of the tiny dish with one large finger.

“Addie gets upset if Lester doesn’t eat,” Bryan explained, his expression serious.

Rachel’s heart turned over in her breast. Not many men of her acquaintance would have catered to an old lady the way this one did. But then, he was getting paid for it, she reminded herself, steeling her resolve.

She marched across the room and thrust the bedraggled flower in his face. “Would you care to explain the meaning of this?”

Bryan rose slowly to his full height wincing absently at his stiff muscles. His gaze moved from the flower to Rachel and back again. He took a deep breath, pondering. His eyebrows rose and fell, and he pushed his glasses up on his nose.

“It’s a rose,” he said finally.

“I know it’s a rose,” Rachel said irritably. “Would you care to explain why I found it on my pillow this morning?”

She was staring up at him with fire in her violet eyes, as if finding a rose on her pillow were some horrible affront to her sensibilities. Bryan couldn’t stop the soft, thick warmth that filled his chest. She was lovely. There was no denying that. She had to have just combed her honey-colored hair back and arranged it at the nape of her neck, but already wisps had pulled loose to curl around her face. She was no doubt trying her darnedest to look indignant, but her features were too soft and angelic for her to quite pull it off.

“Mr. Hennessy,” she repeated, her tone clipped. It was the tone of an irate schoolteacher. “I’m waiting for an explanation.”

Bryan sighed a bit, dragging his gaze off the lush, kissable curve of her lower lip. He gave her a bright smile. “Is this a riddle? I do like a good riddle.”

“It’s an infringement on my privacy, and I don’t like it at all,” Rachel said, thumping the bedraggled flower against his chest. “I know I was sleeping in what is technically your room, but that doesn’t give you the right to just walk in—”

“I wasn’t in your room.”

“Then how did this get on my pillow?” she asked, shaking the flower for emphasis. Yellow petals floated to the floor.

Bryan’s broad shoulders rose. Behind his spectacles his blue eyes sparkled. He smiled his most engaging smile. “Magic?”

Rachel frowned in disapproval. “I don’t believe in magic, Mr. Hennessy.”

“My name is Bryan,” he corrected her soberly as he lifted the flower from her small fingers. “Everyone should believe in magic, Rachel,” he said. He held her gaze with his as he performed a little sleight of hand, making the rose disappear and a playing card appear in its place.

His eyes went wide. The trick had worked! He had his magic back!

Trying to swallow some of his excitement, he handed the queen of hearts to Rachel.

She looked at it and went on frowning, unimpressed. “Card tricks?”

“It’s the best I could do on short notice,” he said cheerfully. “I’m not the kind of fellow who keeps silk scarves tucked up his sleeve, you know. You must know, or you wouldn’t have thought I was the one in your room last night.”

“It had to be you,” Rachel insisted. “Who else could it have been?”

“Addie, I suppose.” He rubbed his chin in thought, and his eyes brightened suddenly. “Or Wimsey. Did you see anything, hear anything? Did you notice any change in the air temperature?”

“I don’t believe in ghosts, either,” Rachel said. “No sensible person does. Which is another reason I’ve come to see you. I’m going to have to ask you to leave, Mr. Hennessy.”

“Oh, dear.” Bryan sighed. “I thought we’d settled this. My deal was with Addie.”

“My mother isn’t … up to … making decisions like that,” Rachel said, avoiding the word
competency
and its legal ramifications. “Really, I think it’s quite cruel of you to play on her illness this way. I should probably report you—”

“Whoa there, angel,” Bryan said, a thread of steel in his soft voice and the glint of it in his eyes. His jaw hardened as he stared down at her, all traces of the innocuous magician gone. “Let’s get something straight here right away. I’m not taking advantage of Addie. I’m not taking a red cent from her, and I heartily resent that you think I would.”

“But you said you have a contract—”

“That’s right. Addie has agreed to let me stay here and search for the ghost.”

“There is no ghost,” Rachel said in exasperation. “Don’t you understand? Addie isn’t well. This ghost is just what she calls it—whimsy.”

Bryan stared at her, solemn and sad. “Just because you don’t believe in something doesn’t mean it isn’t true, Rachel. Trees fall in the woods all the time, and they make plenty of noise even though you’re not there to hear it.”

Rachel refused to listen. Her mind was made up. “My mother is a lonely old woman who has invented this whimsy to keep her company. There’s no reason for you to stay, Mr. Hennessy.”

“I’m going to start walking with a cane if you don’t stop that mister business,” Bryan grumbled, combing his hair back with his fingers. He took a deep, cleansing breath and started in again. “I am aware of Addie’s illness. Has it occurred to you what it must be like to know your mind is slipping away a little bit at a time and realize there’s nothing you can do about it? Have you considered what it must be like to have everyone in town think you’re some kind of lunatic and not believe a word you say?