Treasured Legacies (A Mary O'Reilly Paranormal Mystery) (20 page)

Mary was silent as they maneuvered their way up the side of
the gully and back to the car.
 
Before he
opened her door, Bradley pulled her into his arms and held her tenderly.

“He was so young,” she cried softly.

“And now he gets the girl and gets to cross over,” Bradley
reminded her. “You did your magic again, Mary the genie.”

She snuggled into his embrace and leaned against his chest,
enjoying the warmth and security of his arms. “Don’t you ever wish for a happy
ending, just once?” she asked.

He kissed the top of her head. “Darling, they are all happy
endings,” he said. “We just happen to be sitting on the wrong side of the
curtain.”

She smiled up at him. “That was the perfect thing to say,”
she replied. “Thank you.”

He opened the car door and she was about to get in when she
noticed a small patch of dandelions in a sunny spot near the road. “Oh, would
you mind helping me fulfill another promise I made?” she asked.

“Then will you feed me?” he begged.

She laughed out loud. “Yes, I promise.”

The house Dr. Springler lived in was a small modest home
located in the Willow Lake subdivision just north of Freeport.
 
Bradley drove down the streets named after
familiar birds, Robin, Mallard, Swan and Finch, until he finally reached
Eagle.
 

“The house is just down here,” Mary said.
“In
the middle of the block.”

Bradley pulled the Roadster into the driveway and Mary
hopped out, the small bouquet of dandelions in her hand. “I’ll just be a
minute,” she promised.

She hurried across the lawn and knocked on the front door. A
moment later the door was opened and Dr. Springler stood on the other side.
“Oh, Mrs. Alden,” she said.

“Mary, please,” Mary invited. “I’m sorry to bother you at
your home, but there was one more thing I needed to do.”

Dr. Springler shook her head. “No, you don’t have to
convince me any longer,” she said. “I don’t know how you do it, but I believe
you have a unique ability to communicate with those who have passed on.”

“Dr. Springler,” Mary began.

“Karen, please,” the other woman offered.

“Karen,” Mary said with a smile. “I’m so glad you believe in
what happened yesterday. Not for my sake, but for your own.
 
What Brandon was able to do was very unusual
and I know he must love you a great deal in order to come back and find you.”

Karen nodded and wiped away a tear. “He was right,” she
said. “I’d hidden away and hardened my heart.
 
His death was so hard on me; I didn’t think I could ever survive loving
and losing again.”

“It is very hard,” Mary said. “And no one can understand the
pain of losing a child, unless they’ve had it happen to them. But I know those
same loved ones would want us to live our lives to the fullest until the time
we can be with them again.”

“Well, I’m going to try,” Karen said. “I’m going to live and
laugh, the way Brandon would expect so if he ever comes looking for me again,
I’ll be in those places we used to love.”

“Speaking of Brandon,” Mary said, holding up her bouquet of
flowers. “He asked me to deliver these as a favor.
 
He said they were your favorite flower.”

Karen took the wilted bouquet and held them to her heart.
“We used to pick them all the time,” she said, “especially when he got too weak
to play in the park.
 
I would push him to
a sunny spot and we would sit together and make flower chains with dandelions.
He said he liked dandelions because they were brave enough to be flowers where
people walked and ran.”

Mary smiled. “I never thought of them that way,” she said.
“But he’s right. They don’t stay safely in the flower beds; they venture out to
lawns and roadsides.”

“And they bring joy to others because they’re accessible,”
she said. “You don’t think I should plant the whole front yard in dandelions,
do you?”

“Well, your neighbors might not be very happy when they all
go to seed,” Mary laughed. “But I’d make sure there are at least a couple of
patches in there, just for a reminder.”

Karen stepped down from her doorway and gave Mary a hug,
surprising Mary to no end. “Thank you,” Karen said, stepping back and taking a
deep breath. “I feel like a weight has been lifted off of me.
 
I feel light and…,” she closed her eyes for a
moment. “Happy.
 
I feel happy.”

“Well, actually, it was all Brandon,” Mary said. “And since
you raised him to be the brilliant young man he is…actually, it’s you
you
should be thanking.”

Karen laughed. “Well, before we get even more confused, I’m
going to stop while I’m ahead,” she said. “I think.
 
Thank you, Mary. I look forward to getting to
know you and your family even better.”

Mary nodded. “And you still owe me a lunch date at Union
Dairy,” she said. “Brandon told me about your ice cream tasting combinations
and I think you and I have a lot in common.”

“That’s sounds perfect,” she said.
“Perhaps
next week?”

“That would be great,” Mary agreed. “Have a great weekend
Karen.”

Mary turned and hurried across the lawn to Bradley. “So, how
did that go?” he asked.

“Great,” she said.
“Actually, better than
great.”

“Well, good,” he replied, putting the car in gear and
backing out of the driveway.

“So, Bradley,” Mary asked. “What would you think about a
patch of dandelions in our flower garden?”

Sawyer Gartner pulled on his chore jacket and grabbed the
flashlight from the hook next to the door.
 
Even though the days had started to get longer, it was still dark in the
chicken coop and he needed to make sure they were locked in for the night and the
coop doors were securely closed against predators.
 
He stepped out onto his back porch and jumped
when the door slammed behind him. Turning he stared at the door. “Must have
been a draft,” he muttered slowly, still eyeing it.

Dale Johnson grinned and glided along Sawyer. “Am I getting
to you yet?” he asked.

Sawyer stopped and looked around, but saw nothing and no
one. “Who’s there?” he called out, sure he had heard someone’s voice.

“No one here but us chickens,” Dale taunted. “Oh, and the
guy you murdered.”

The word “murder” hung on the wind and wrapped its way
around Sawyer a number of times.
“
Murder.
Murder.
Murder
,” the breeze whispered into his ear.

Sweat broke out over his body and his heart began to race.
“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” he stammered. “I didn’t kill anyone.”

He stomped down the porch stairs and, with a determined
gait, walked to the corn crib that also housed the chicken coop.
 
He unlatched the long crossbar that secured
the door, turned on his flashlight and pulled the door open.
 
Once open, he secured it to another latch
attached to the side of the corncrib that held it ajar.
 
Lifting his booted foot, he stepped carefully
over the tall threshold and entered the outbuilding.

He had gone no further than five feet with the wooden door
slammed shut behind him.
 
Startled, he
dropped his flashlight and was plunged into darkness.

“How does is feel?” Dale asked him, whispering into his ear,
“To be locked in, all by
yourself
, in the dark?”

Grabbing a handful of corn, Dale levitated above Sawyer and
dropped the pieces of grain on his head. “Remind you of anyone?” he asked.

Shaking his head in terror, Sawyer stumbled back against a
wall. “Who the hell is doing this?”

Dale chuckled softly and then opened the corncrib door once
again, allowing light to pour inside the building.
 
“Can’t get you too worked up,” he said
softly.

Pulling a red and white kerchief out of his pocket, Sawyer
mopped the sweat from his brow and took a couple deep breaths.
 
“Get a hold of
yourself
,”
he grumbled. “No such thing as ghosts.
 
Damn girl just got you thinking about it, that’s all.
 
Just a loose latch on the
door.”

He bent over to pick up his flashlight and saw the pieces of
corn scattered all around him.
 
Several
tiny pieces of dried corn lay on the flashlight case. Staring at the grain, he
pulled his hand back, unable to touch them.

“It’s a terrible way to die, Sawyer,” Dale whispered.
“A terrible way to die.”

Sawyer’s body shook in fear and he stumbled away from the
voice and towards the open door.
 
Forget
the damn
chickens,
he had to get out of here.

He ran out of the corncrib into the farmyard.
 
The sun had just set and a silvery purple
light cast its glow on the fields and buildings around him.

“Why did you do it?”

Sawyer nearly screamed aloud when the figure stepped out
from the shadows surrounding his own grain bin. It was Dale Johnson, he
recognized him immediately, even from this distance.

“You’re dead,” he cried, shaking his head. “You are not
here!
 
You are dead.”

“You killed me,” the figure said, slowly moving further
towards Sawyer, but staying in the shadows. “You were my friend. We grew up
together. How could you?”

“You don’t understand,” he pleaded. “Your father, hell even
your grandfather, they were penny-pinchers. Couldn’t squeeze an extra two cents
out of them if they thought there was a cheaper way to do things. Not like my
dad who had to have the newest and the best and the most expensive.
 
My legacy was debt.”

“You killed me,” the ghost repeated. “You took me away from
my family.”

“I was desperate,” he pleaded. “I needed the money from the
sale and there was no sale without your property.”

“You cheated that company.”

“No. He approached me, the vice-president,” he said. “He
knew I needed money.
 
Somehow he knew and
we were going to pull a fast one on the company. No big deal, he told me, the
company had insurance for that kind of thing.”

He took a deep breath. “We could have all been rich if you
had just listened to me,” he yelled at the shadow. “If you had just sold your
property…”

“You wouldn’t have killed me?” the ghost asked wryly. “How
long did you plan it?”

“I didn’t,” he said, lowering his voice. “I didn’t plan it.
I got a copy of Quinn’s letter from the vice-president.
 
The one Quinn wrote telling him that it was a
no go with you. He told me I had to make it happen, that he had too much at
stake.
 
I had to make you sell.”

“So you killed me.”

“No!” he screamed, and then he took a deep shuddering
breath. “I was just coming over to talk to you… explain to you …convince
you.
 
Then you came out of the house and
went over to feed the calves.
 
You were
so caught up in those animals, you didn’t even see me. At first, all I wanted
to do was trap you in there, make you listen to me.
 
But then…I don’t know
,
I knew I could talk Josh into selling.
 
Without you around, things would be so much easier.”

“So you killed me.”

“Yes, dammit, I killed you,” he screamed. “I hit you over
the head with my old flashlight. I knocked you out and then I closed and locked
the door.
 
I cleaned up the buckets, so
no one would think to open the door. I killed you!
 
I killed you! Is that what you want?”

“No, I want my dad back, but since that’s not going to
happen, this is good enough,” Josh said, stepping out of the shadows. “But
sending you to jail for the rest of your life is going to have to do.”

Bradley stepped out from behind a parked truck, his gun
drawn and pointed at Sawyer. “Sawyer Gartner, you are under arrest for the
murder of Dale Johnson,” he said, as he came towards him. “Please kneel on the
ground with your hands on your head.”

The cruiser pulled in at the base of the driveway and Mary,
Jessie and Abe piled out.
 
Jessie and Abe
ran over to Josh and they all embraced.
 
Mary slowly walked towards them and Dale appeared by her side.

“Thank you,” he said.

She shrugged. “Josh got him to confess,” she said.

He shook his head. “No, I don’t think my staying here was as
much about finding my murderer as it was about getting my family back
together,” he said, looked at his children embracing each other. “Look at them.
They’ve found each other again.”

“You’ve got a great family,” she said. “You have a lot to be
proud of.”

He nodded. “Yeah, it took me awhile, but I finally figured
out my legacy wasn’t the farm, it was my kids.”

He paused and looked around. “Well, damn,” he said. “I can
see that light you were talking about.”

“They’re going to miss you,” she said.

“Yeah, well, tell them I’ll be watching over them,” he said
with a tender smile, as he gazed at his children one more time. “Tell them to
be good to each other.
 
And tell them
that I love them.”

Mary
nodded,
her throat too tight
to speak. “I will,” she finally said, tears rolling down her cheeks. “I will.”

“And that baby,” he said with a grin. “If it’s a boy, Dale’s
an awfully fine name.”

Mary chuckled softly. “I agree, but I might let Jessie and
Quinn
have
that one.”

“Good idea,” he agreed. “Good idea.”

He turned, walked towards the open field, and slowly faded
away.