Wanted: One Ghost (13 page)

Her mother sat quietly in the chair. Her pale features were pinched in concentration as her fingers probed along her temples.

“Are you all right, Virginia?” Grandma Dottie asked.

“I’m fine, Mom, just give me a minute,” she exhaled deeply, clearly trying to dispel the pain.

Reaching for her purse, her mother took out a vial of pain relief, shook out a couple, and downed them with the rest of her milk. April knew she was in the beginnings of one of her migraines. The symptoms were common now. Was being around James causing her to suffer?

Her mother waved her grandmother on. “Go ahead with the questions, Mother. I’ll be fine in a few moments when the meds kick in. We need to find out what we can to help, April.”

Grandma Dottie nodded slowly, keeping a trained eye on April’s mother before turning back to the interrogation. April looked to James for guidance. So much of yesterday afternoon was like a weird dream. She explained the incident, what she could remember, as her grandmother pondered the situation. She revealed the sights, sounds, smells, everything in essence to what her grandmother might need as evidence in her metaphysical inquiries.

Grandma Dottie wrinkled her brow, deep in concentration. She turned to James. “What about you, James? What do you remember?”

“Pain. For the first time in over two-hundred-thirty years, I felt pain, heat. A warm rush of water filled me while my muscles cramped and seized. Then scents and sounds engulfed my senses.” He laughed. “I wonder if it was anything similar to how Adam felt when God created him from the Earth.”

April cursed herself. She hadn’t asked him what he’d gone through. They hadn’t really talked about the situation after it happened. She had been too shocked.

She nibbled nervously on her bottom lip. “What did I do, Grams?”

“You did what you were meant to do. It’s not for us to question.” Grandma Dottie smiled and reached over to pat her hand. “All I can think of is your acute sense of psychometry has manifested with your joined spiritual essence. We are all made up of energy. It never leaves us—even in death. When two forces of equal levels of live energy interact, the connection is complete. It’s probably a one in a billion chance—or as your Aunt Vickie would say, ‘fate.’”

Sighing, April slumped back in the chair, defeated. “Aunt Vickie said the same thing this morning when we talked.” Was this as simple as the combination of energy, metaphysics, and fate? Could she accept it as gospel? She turned to the only other woman who might be able to help her. “Mom?”

Sweat beaded her mother’s brow. Her eyes closed tightly as if shielding her from pain.

Going to her side, April leaned over and checked her forehead. “Are you okay, Mom?”

The pinched expression hadn’t left her mother’s face. The migraine was getting worse if her color and the spring of tears sliding from behind her closed eyes were any indication. She stood up on shaky legs as she held her head in pain.

“I need to go outside. The voices are hurting my head. There is so much anger and fear…” her mother’s voice trailed off as she paced frantically, clutching at the sides of her head as if trying to keep it together.

“I’ve got her, April.” Grandma Dottie took her daughter by the elbow and guided her towards the front door. “I need you to find my vial of gardenia essence in my tote bag. Bring it to me, and then fix a cup of chamomile and mint tea. Let it steep,” she instructed as she grabbed their jackets on the way out the door.

James appeared concerned. “Is your mother going to be all right?” he asked softly as they began to clear the tea dishes.

“My mother can hear ghosts. Aunt Vickie seems to think a woman’s ghost still resides in the room upstairs next to mine, but I wonder if there are others, too.” April busied herself with rummaging through her grandmother’s tapestry tote bag where she kept all her herbal remedies. “Can you sense them or see them?”

She noted he was looking around as if he could possibly see one floating nearby. “No. I never saw one when I was a ghost. Why would I be able to see one now?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “I guess I just assumed you could.”

His other hand came up to caress her cheek. “I’m sorry for taking advantage of you earlier. If it wasn’t for your family’s arrival, I don’t know what I would have done. Can you ever forgive me?” April’s insides shivered with the friction. Such a simple gesture but she felt it all the way to her toes.

Damn, he was apologizing for kissing her when all she could think of was taking it to the next level. “There is nothing to forgive. I don’t remember telling you to stop.”

His smile was kind but his eyes bore a troubled sadness.

“Your eyes are saying way too much, Dr. Branford. You haven’t the experience to deal with a libertine like me. I’m used to loose women, a quick tumble with no commitments. You are innocent and young. If I were any less of a man I would take you up on your unspoken offer. You tempt me as no other woman has. But I am a gentleman, first and foremost. I won’t slake my lust on your innocence and kindness. You mean more to me than a quick tumble in the sheets.”

He was back to calling her by her professional name. Damn him! His touch drifted away from her cheek and he nodded towards the vial in her hand. Right, she needed to get this to her grandmother.

“Let me get the water for tea. Your mother needs your help right now.”

She nodded in agreement and went to deliver the vial of gardenia essence to her grandmother. Of course her mother needed her help. Her ghost-man was probably causing her headaches.

James Addison thought she was innocent and young? Did he not realize how old she was? In his time she would be considered an old maid by now. And what did her innocence mean in his standards? Innocent as in virgin or innocent as in unknowing what she was up against with a man of his breeding? She wasn’t a virgin in the physical sense. But she had a feeling she’d never experienced a man like James Addison, either. Making love with him would probably be equivalent to a first time experience. He was high potency absinthe to the simple beers and occasional pitcher of margaritas with friends. One sip of him would either put her under the table or make her an addict. She wasn’t sure she was ready for either but wondered what it would be like to try.

***

April woke up to find herself mummy-wrapped in her sheets. She disengaged herself from the linen shroud and grumbled. Why couldn’t she have made love to James last night? Would she be waking up entangled around his body instead of the sheets if her mother and grandmother hadn’t shown up when they did? This was the infamous scoundrel and seducer James Addison. Well the history books were wrong—he wasn’t a scoundrel, he was an honest man. Here she was expecting God only knows what but
nooo
, she went and fell in love with an honorable ghost. Great! Just effin’ great!

April stopped herself. Had she fallen in love with James Addison? Was it even possible? She’d only known him for a few days, as her mother stated so vehemently last night. Dear God her head hurt. For being a practical professor of history, she had acquired some fantastical, personal issues to work out.

She’d dressed casually and met her grandmother in the hallway.

“Good morning, dear.” The old woman’s voice was low and quiet.

“’Morning, Grams.” April watched her grandmother walk around the landing and hallway with her crystal dangling on its leather lanyard. It remained motionless until she neared the steps and then it spun in perfectly concentric circles. The older woman nodded, sighed, and then smiled thoughtfully.

“So, how did last night go?” A knowing twinkle lit up her grandmother’s eyes.

She could play coy and dumb or just get it over with. There was no fooling Dottie Evans. “It didn’t. He’s honorable and didn’t wish to dishonor me with my family present.”

“Oh dear, I am sorry. I just figured with the way he kept looking at you all through our little snack he was ready to devour you body and soul, family be damned. And since his appearance when we arrived was a bit, shall we say—rumpled, I assumed some positive return of affections. Ghost or no ghost, I have a feeling making love with him would be a total mind rush.”

April couldn’t believe this conversation with her sixty-seven year old grandmother. The only thing April wished to discuss with her grandmother was paranormal activities. She’d learned not to discuss her sex life with the members of the Wilton women clan. They could take an idea and run wild with it. Knowing James and his history, they might be pretty accurate with their assumptions, and she really didn’t want to think about their reaction. “Your mother is up and ready to go. Rough night for her last night, but she woke up hungry this morning. I’m famished. James is famished. Vickie is taking us all out to the diner for breakfast, and we have tons of things we need to do, discuss, and figure out.”

Grandma Dottie stopped and looked behind her. “There’s something unsettling here, Vickie mentioned it last night, but I sense it too—so it must be strong. We need to help these poor people. They’re caught in a residual time loop within their worst moments and because of it, they can’t move on.”

“I can’t worry about the other ghosts. I need your help with James, Grams. He’s what I’m focused on.” April knew any paranormal experience would be an issue to her family, especially if there was unrest among lost souls. But her issue with James was paramount. Everything else could wait.

Aunt Vickie slowly made it up the stairs, joining them in time to overhear their conversation. Shaking her head, she looked around at the emptiness surrounding them and then closed her eyes. “No. There is a message here. Something combined with you, James, and these entities.”

“This place is really haunted? Is it the woman you say haunts the bedroom?” April asked.

“There are two, I think. One is a man and the other a woman. I don’t know the specifics.”

April watched her aunt walk around the landing hallway with her eyes closed. She walked close to the stairs and stopped.

“Dottie, I need you and Virginia to work on finding who we are dealing with. I haven’t had any one on one interaction with them. I just feel the connection.” Aunt Vickie came out of her trance and shivered. This was a sign April knew her aunt used to shake off negative energies. April hugged her arms feeling a chill coursing through her. Had Aunt Vickie transferred the negative energy to her before heading back downstairs?

“Don’t fret, April. We have time,” Grandma Dottie soothed, placing a hand to her brow. Her grandmother’s touch gave her a sense of calm. More than any salve could do. “I’m not worried. The spirits will be here until their souls can be cleansed. As I said, we have much to do. A good breakfast should help us get going. We need to find out what abilities your gift has so we can learn to control its power.”

“I need to check my email messages before I leave in case Mr. Miles has sent me anything.”

“We’ll be downstairs.”

***

The room felt chillier than it had when she’d left it a few moments ago but she’d just taken a hot shower. The humidity had probably dissipated in the time she’d been talking with her grandmother and aunt. She went to her laptop and powered it up, knocking over some research books along with the bag from the gift store. The book on the excavation site opened up to James’s picture. How could she not have seen the resemblance between the two?

This was the same man she’d brought to life. She should have known her tour guide had been
the
James Addison. She’d had all the facts given to her by her aunt, the photo she’d taken, even the image of him at the mill site. This picture was him to a ‘T’. There was the look she’d fallen for the first night she met him. What had he been thinking when the portrait was painted? She smiled and placed the book on the bed. She picked up the package from the gift store again. The magnet, ‘
Believe in Fate’
fell out.

“Okay, Aunt Vickie, I get the hint.” She wasn’t talking to the woman but she might as well have been. She re-packaged the magnet and stuffed the brown paper bag into her duffle. There! The damn thing wouldn’t fall out again to be a constant reminder of things she didn’t want to acknowledge.