6
My heart froze at a primal scream coming from up the stairs. I had just come from my room on a hunt for my boots and had descended halfway down the stairs when I heard it. The boots dropped from my hand, and I rushed back upstairs. From the sound of her screams and the thump that came from her room, I worried for her safety.
“What happened?” I asked, barging into her room.
Seeing her bare legs, I realized I should’ve waited at the door. She covered up quickly but remained wide-eyed and silent. Her rapid breathing prevented her from forming a coherent word. The room appeared as it should be. The curtains pulled back, letting in the minimal light. The bookshelf sat like normal. Nothing was out of place other than her wet clothing near the fireplace and her suitcase at its side.
I crossed the room to the bedside, knelt and took her hand. “Jessica? Jessica. Calm yourself, love. Tell me what happened.”
Her eyes stayed glued to mine. Staring at me seemed to calm her breathing. After a few calming breaths, she swallowed, covering her eyes with both palms. “I don’t know. I thought…”
“You thought…”
Her voice lowered as if speaking to herself. “I couldn’t have. It must be a trick or the mirror…”
“Did something happen with the mirror?” I stood, moving toward the mirror. My toe caught on something on the floor. While keeping my eyes locked on the mirror to study it, I bent to pick the object up. The silkiness of the fabric brought my eyes wider and my head darted down to see what I held. I yelped and flung the brazier to the bed, suddenly feeling twelve again and the brunt of a bad joke.
It wasn’t my fault that the resident bully at Skegness Junior Academy, Jimmy—whatever his last name was—enjoyed stealing the older girl’s underwear, then attaching them to the younger, helpless boys he’d pick on. I had only had time to detach it before a girls’ fist momentarily blinded me with a hit to my face. There were a few things I remembered from that incident, one of which was the fact that it had been my first time touching such an item, and it was silky soft.
I turned to see Jessica watching me, her eyebrows squished together as if I was mental. I swallowed the lump in my throat and pointed at the mirror over my shoulder. “Th—th—the m—m— mirror…” I’m an idiot. I exhaled and tried to disguise the fact that I was indeed a blundering fool who couldn’t handle women’s underwear by straightening my shoulders and picking the bra from the bed where I had flung it.
With the brazier pinched between my fingers, I lifted up a metal vase upon the mantle to hold the item above the fireplace. The second I let go, it toppled over, and the purple and black bra fell to the ground. I tried a second time and came up with the same result.
On the third attempt, I used a candlestick, but to my dismay, everything dominoed to the floor. I’m truly an idiot.
In defeat, I stopped and turned to the door, wishing I could disappear through it. “I’m s—s—s—” I gave up apologizing and sighed heavily.
“You don’t need to apologize. You just brightened up what was just a confusing and terrifying ordeal.” There was a hint of laughter in her voice.
Even she thinks I’m an idiot.
I took two giant steps to exit the room, but stopped when she called out to me.
“Don’t go.” Her hand shot out, and she took hold of her pants on the bed. Her leg moved out from under the blanket from the knee down. She flinched and whimpered from shifting. “Ouch.” She moved the blanket from her leg a bit more to reveal a streak of blood. “Oh, shoot.”
“You’re hurt!” I moved to the bedside and knelt once again. I reached out, then paused, fearing she might become alarmed at me touching her leg. “May I examine?”
“Uh, sure.”
“How did this happen?” I asked while I used the sheet to wipe around the wound.
“Wait! You’re getting blood on your bedding.”
“D—d—don’t worry.” My voice sounded higher than normal, probably due to the fact that I sat next to a gorgeous woman while gawking at her leg. “The g—g—gash appears deep enough that it might need stitching, but if done right it could heal with several butterfly strips.” I stood and cleared my throat, hoping my voice would return to normal. “Where did you get hurt?”
Her cheeks were a nice shade of pink. She pointed at her leg. “You just looked at it.”
I shook my head. “No. Where did you get the injury from?”
“Oh, right. Uh, it must’ve happened when I stumbled into the bed,” she said, pointing at the end of the bed.
I stepped around, finding a piece of decorative iron that shouldn’t have been bent, stuck out from the footboard. “How long ago have you had a tetanus shot?”
Her brows pulled together. “I think I got one three years ago. Why?”
“It looks as though a piece of metal tore you open. I—i—is that why you screamed?”
She shook her head. “I saw ... well, I don’t know what I saw.”
Crystal’s voice came down the hall, “Jessica, you better be okay because I’m not going near that room.”
“I’m fine! Just bleeding all over!” Jessica responded with a wink to me.
Hurried footsteps pounded in the hall seconds before both Ron and Crystal entered the room with worried expressions. “Bleeding? Where?” Crystal asked in a panic.
“She’s going to be fine. Ron, will you grab the first aid tin?” I asked, then helped wipe away the slowly dripping blood from her cut with the end of the sheet.
“Sure thing.” Ron left the room after looking over Jessica’s wound for himself.
Crystal stood at the doorway, not moving an inch into the room. “What happened?”
Jessica glanced at the mirror again. “I saw ... I saw myself aging.”
“Happening right before your eyes, is it? You aren’t eighteen anymore,” Crystal teased.
“Ha. ha. You’re a real comedian.” Jessica leaned back onto her hands and rolled her eyes at Crystal. “I saw myself age and then decompose right in that mirror.”
“I told you there were ghosts here!” Crystal sounded triumphant.
“It wasn’t a ghost,” Jessica said.
“Then how do you explain it?”
“Bad lighting,”
“Right.”
Ron returned with the tin and water bottle and then stood nearby with a flashlight to brighten the dim room. I cleaned the wound as best I could with the water and solution in the kit. With the butterfly strips and a bandage wrapped around her leg, I claimed her mended.
“Thanks, Doc. Can I have a lollypop now?” Jessica’s smile brought my attention to her lips.
I cleared my throat and stood. “Only if you don’t pop it back open again.”
“Well, as much fun as it is to have a bunch of people in my room and me with no pants, I think it best you all leave now.” Jessica flashed a cheesy smile.
Ron and Crystal laughed, I only grew hot in the cheeks when I thought of her nice legs. Those legs! Stop thinking about her legs!
Jessica
Completely embarrassing!“Could I be more pathetic?” I asked myself once the three of them left the room. I was grateful I had a shirt on, but I felt like a vulnerable three-year-old sitting on the bed with the blanket just covering my underwear. My right leg slid into my tight jeans easily. My left, not so much. It became clear that I couldn’t wear jeans with as many bandages as I had wrapped around my leg. “Shorts it is.” I pulled a pair from my suitcase. I brushed through the mess of hair piled it into a messy bun, then paused to pick up my damp bra and other fallen items.
I couldn’t help but giggle when I thought of Dan fumbling with my bra. I wished I had it on video to repeatedly watch his cute cheeks blush. His reaction was adorable.
The idea of getting close enough to look in the mirror kind of freaked me out—not that what I saw was real—but seeing myself as an old rotting corpse again didn’t appeal to me. Instead, I draped my clothing across my bed and placed the items that once stood on the mantle next to a small writing desk.
Feeling guilty over ruining the sheets, I pulled them off the bed to see how I could clean them and carried them out into the hall. Turning to shut the bedroom door, I heard a slight ruffling sound to the left of me. The hall felt cooler than it had before. Odd.
I turned around and caught sight of a woman at the end of the hall.
“Oh, sorry!” I said automatically. I opened my mouth to say she had startled me when I noticed the woman’s feet were off the ground. Her hair stood tall, and her eighteenth-century dress extended out to both sides of her hips. I didn’t have time to examine more about her before she came flying straight at me with anger in her eyes. Her arms lifted toward my neck.
“Ahhh!” I dropped the bloodied sheets, and ran full speed down the stairs.
At the bottom, Dan caught me, and my momentum spun us around, nearly causing us to topple over. My screams turned into hysterical laughter. I pointed up with one hand and clasped Dan with the other. “There’s a freaking ghost up there! And it scared me silly!”
“I told you!” Crystal said beside me. Ron just stood there, bewildered. Dan matched Ron’s expression.
“I saw a ghost! A real live—well, dead—ghost!” I clapped my hands and laughed then folded my arms to prevent my hands from shaking out of their sockets.
“What did you see?” Ron asked, keeping his hand at the small of my back.
“A woman. She looked like Maria Antoinette with her big hair and big dress. She wasn’t happy with me, that’s for sure. It looked like she wanted to strangle me.”
“The ghost I saw looked more like someone from Jane Austen’s movies,” Crystal stated. “Well, now that we’ve proven there are ghosts, we can leave.” Crystal took Dan’s hand and shook it.
“Thank you for your hospitality. It’s been nice knowing you.”
“We can’t leave,” I said. My adrenaline hadn’t lessened any.
“Watch me,” she said.
“You can’t exactly leave yet,” Dan said, still watching me as if checking for injuries. “Both cars still won’t work, and it’s raining hard again.”
“Frag-nabbit!” Crystal threw her head back and moaned. “All I want to do is call my husband. Is that too much to ask?”
“Does your phone still have b—b—battery life?” Dan asked.
“Yes,” she responded, pulling her phone from her jeans pocket. “But no signal.”
“Ron, there’s a long raincoat and umbrellas in the—”
“Take her to the top of the hill?” Ron must have understood Dan’s train of thought.
“She’ll get reception there,” Dan added.
“Brilliant. I’m on it.” Ron turned to Crystal. “You’ve got your phone on you?”
“Ahhh, yes.” Her eyes shifted between me and the men. “How far are we walking? And what about Jessica? She promised to stick to my side.”
I batted her worry away. “You’ll be fine with Ron. Besides, I don’t want to walk too much and bleed everywhere.” I pointed at my wounded leg. It would probably be fine, but it did still hurt.
“The walk is about two miles. We should leave now before the storm hinders us,” Ron answered and gestured for her to follow him.
The two started walking toward the back of the house.
I waved to Crystal. “Be safe.”
“You too,” she said over her shoulder. “You’ll need to try harder than me. I’ll be on a ghost-free walk.”
“Are y—y—you okay?” Dan’s soft eyes watched mine carefully once we were alone.
“I’m better than okay. I just saw a ghost. This is so awesome and freaky at the same time.” I stopped myself from saying more, afraid I might come across as psycho.
“How’s your leg?” He pointed to my bandaged leg.
I held it up to examine it. “It hurts but not bad. The run down the stairs didn’t help.” My face grew warm, and I thought about how his fingers touched my leg back in my room. It took great effort not to sigh or melt into him while he bandaged me up. I’d never reacted like that to someone’s touch—ever.
“Do you want to go on a ghost hunt with me while they’re gone?” My usual grin for such mischievousness spread across my face.
“Do you really believe you saw a ghost, or were you putting on a show for Crystal?”
“Oh, I saw one. You don’t believe me?”
He shrugged.
“You mentioned once that you used to see the ghosts—why don’t you now?”
“I’m unsure.”
“Well, I’m not leaving until you’ve seen one again. It’s too amazing not to.” I took his hand in mine. At first, I’d only meant to pull him toward the stairs, but the warmth of his hand moved through my body, giving my heart a jumpstart to the landing above. I hurried to catch up to my hyper heart. The sensation felt empowering, comforting, tender, and full of desire at the same time. I didn’t want to let go.
“Should we start in that room?” I nodded toward the room I’d stayed in.
He shrugged with his eyes locked on our clasped hands.
I loosened my grip to let go, but he tightened his and smiled at me. I shyly smiled back and continued on with him at my side. I pointed with my free hand. “I saw her there, and I dropped the sheets—wait. The sheets are gone.”
“The sheets from your bed?” Dan asked.
“Yep. I dropped them here by the door and then ran.”
“That’s odd.”
“Is Bridgette in the house?” I asked.
“Possibly. I thought she was preparing dinner.”
“Dinner? But it’s not yet ten in the morning.”
“She’s m—m—making something in the Dutch oven that will need to cook all day. I hope you like Cornish game hens.”
“I’ve never had them.”
“You’re not vegetarian, are you?”
“Never. I love bacon far too much to give it up,” I said and pushed the door to my room open. Nothing in the room had changed. The dust particles moved lazily in the window’s light, undisturbed. We stood in the doorway, observing the mess of clothes I’d left piled on my suitcase.
“Do you like fish?” Dan asked.
“Love fish—especially sushi.” I proceeded to give my best Gollum impression, which wasn’t the greatest. “I eats it raw and wiggling.”
His laugh warmed me to my toes.
“How’d I do?” I asked.
“Y—you—you could use a bit more practice.”
“Yeah, Gollum is a difficult one to master.” We continued down the hall together, in a portion of castle I had yet to travel. On the walls hung tapestries, paintings, old weapons, and armor that once adorned short men.
“Maybe we should have brought a torch. W—with the power out the h—hall beyond will be pitch as black.”
Torch? What. He means a flashlight. “All the more fun.” I kept going to where it forked to the right and left. “Which way?”
“It’s said that the blue room is where most of the hauntings happen.” He indicated to the left.
“What’s that way?” I pointed to the right.
“One of the towers. There’s one both ways.”
“Let’s go left, then. We’ll go that way next.” I paused, noticing a staircase to the side not far down the dark hall. The light from a stained-glass window at the landing sent colorful light down toward the hall.
“That leads to the third and fourth floors. Th—this part of the castle reaches higher than the front.”
“Is that where the blue room is?”
“No. The blue room is part of the house where the family would reside—if I had a large family—the second floor is the guest’s and the nursery. The top is servants—at least in the olden days. There’s also an attic.”
“Cool.” Jessica’s smile widened. “Do you ever go up there? I mean, with how big your place is I imagine you don’t visit all the rooms that often.”
“Once a month, I walk through to inspect the windows to make sure they aren’t broken and nothing is out of place.”
“What room is this one?” I asked and pointed to a large door.
Dan stepped forward and opened the door. “The orange room.”
“Are all the rooms color-coded?”
“For the most part, yes.” His thumb moved across my knuckles once, which jump-started my heart again. I wondered if he’d noticed he’d done it and if it caused the same reaction in him, as well. “This is where the Lord of the castle would reside. The door there,” he pulled me in a few steps and pointed to where the light from the window shone on a grandiose doorway, “is where it directly connects to his wife’s chamber room.”
The room held a huge canopy bed complete with faded drapes. There were more wall tapestries hung around this room compared to the rest of the castle. Different sizes and shapes of hardwood furniture sat against the walls. The color of orange that gave it its name, the orange room, must’ve been extremely dark, almost red. The dim light made it difficult to see.
“Aren’t you the Lord of the castle?” I asked.
“I—I—I am, but I wouldn’t want this for m—m—my room. It’s too close to the blue room, which is the mistress of the castle’s bedchambers, and for some odd reason, it’s colder in this part of the castle.”
“Ooo spooky. The more I hear about this blue room, the more promising it gets.”
“You’re ruddy mad.” He winked and grinned.
Be still my ruddy heart.
I had to pause to steady my dancing heart.
When I turned my attention back to him, the dim light showed that his eyes were on me. He dropped his head and cleared his throat, looking guilty. Did I just catch him checking me out? Could he possibly be interested? If by some strange miracle he might be interested in me, then I needed to figure out more about him.
He stepped back out of the orange room, and I followed. “It’s getting colder.”
“Th—th—th—” The hall grew darker the further we went, but I could still hear his deep sigh and see the shape of his shoulders dropping. “I—I’m sorry. Sometimes I get stuck and can’t get it out.”
“You never need to apologize to me. I understand. My brother’s stuttering always worsened when he was nervous.”
He paused in the hallway and faced me. I couldn’t see his expressions. I could only tell the general position of his dark eyes and mouth. We should’ve brought that flashlight. Someone this good looking needed to be ogled at all times.
“Th—Thank you.”
“You bet.” The light from under the doorway changed, like someone had just walked past from inside the blue room. I paused and looked again. In the creepiest voice I could muster I said, “Someone’s in there.” My tone even gave me the chills.
Dan turned to the direction I faced. “Where?”
“Isn’t that the blue room?”
“Yes.” He reached out for a latch and pushed down. “It’s locked. It’s never locked.”
“That’s weird.” And like a disbelieving dope, I reached for the handle to see for myself.
He shifted aside, but still held onto my hand. My fingers wrapped around the cold steel of the ancient, iron door latch. It lowered easily, clicking free and the solid wood creaked open an inch. “Well, what do ya know? It worked.”
“How did you do that?”
“I dunno.” I wiggled my digits. “Maybe I got magic fingers.”
I pushed the door open more and found it creaked louder than any door I’d ever heard. I pulled the door back and forth, making it creak to a rhythm. Add some drums and we could make some music.
“Huh. You really need to oil this baby.”
“I’ll add it to my ‘to-do list,’” he said wryly.
“Do that. When I return to England to visit, Crystal and I will drop in on you to check this door and I expect it to be silent as the grave.”
“Will you? How delightful. P—P—Please do. You’re always welcome,” he said and squeezed my hand.
Oh, boy. Do not tempt me.
“Ooo. Do you see my breath? It’s so cold.” I tightened my grip on his hand and proceeded in. We kept to each other’s side and made it in about ten steps before we stopped. The room held the same type of canopy bed as the master’s room, but blue was the dominant color. The room reflected a French influence with swirly flower designs and matching fabrics. All in all it was a nice kind of eerie.
The only thing unusual for something so posh was the cobwebs and dust. Posh? I think England is rubbing off on me already.
“A bit neglectful in this room, I see.” The words escaped my mouth no sooner than a gust of wind tickled my neck. The door behind us slammed shut. I jumped closer to Dan. Something cold and creepy zipped up my back, causing my vulnerability to heighten. With a jerk of my arm, I yanked Dan’s body behind me to give me the sense of security I instantly craved. I held his arm around the front of me, wanting to keep him close. Rule number one when scared: cover the hind end.
Ain’t no way something is going to creep up behind me.
The curtains swished closed the next instant, plummeting the room into further blackness. The desire to flee grew, but my feet didn’t get the memo. Why am I torturing myself like this? What did I have to prove?
“Okay, this is officially awesome and scary.” I pulled both Dan’s arms tighter around me. It’s only as scary as you make it out to be. I repeated the mantra a few more times in a whisper.
I sucked in a squeaky breath that resembled the word “ghost” when an image formed in the corner of the room. The same Marie Antoinette ghost I’d seen earlier hovered above the ground. Her wide eyes and pursed lips gave me the impression she didn’t want us in the room. Her eerie glow lit the room enough to make out our surroundings. It’s only as scary as you make it out to be. Not scary. Not scary. Not scary.
When she raised her arms, a great gush of air stung my eyes, but I dared not blink. The objects around the room quaked and rattled. Dust fell from the writing desk, chair, and small chest of drawers. The door flew open and bashed against the wall. The ghost pointed at the door, giving me no apprehension about what she wanted.
“Blimy! Did you see that?” Dan asked, sounding more awed than scared.
I opened my mouth but couldn’t seem to find my voice. The ghost’s fists balled and then dropped as if she’d wished to hit something. The objects in the room jumped like she was giving a command. Not scary! The drapes attached to the bed lifted and snaked around my leg. I yelped, kicking the fabric away, and an ice-cold wind blew hard against my face, stealing my breath. The woman’s face changed into something hideous with fangs and red eyes. When my lungs filled again, I screamed and turned around in Dan’s arms to face him then climbed up his body.
I wrapped my legs and arms around his upper body and screamed, “Run!”
With his arms around me, he booked it toward the door, giving me a perfect view over his shoulder of the crazed ghost who followed us toward the door. Fury filled in her glowing, red eyes. I could feel the anger shoot to my toes. At the threshold of the door, Dan stumbled. My back hit the opposite wall outside the room, and the force of Dan’s body crashing into mine pushed another scream out of my lungs, sounding more like a humpback whale. The ghost woman’s arm swung just before the door slammed shut. She was gone, and Dan had me pinned against the wall—frozen.
“That was unusual,” he said as if commenting about the weather.
I gulped and tried to calm my heart. “That was freakin’ terrifyingly awesome! She looked like she was ready to tear our heads off!”
“Who?” Dan still held me against the wall, my legs locked around his middle. His eyes lowered to look at my lips.
“The—the ghost lady.” He nodded at the door, trying to pretend I hadn’t noticed where his attention had gone.
He stepped back to look at me, bringing our embrace to an end. I wondered if his expression was one of regret or if he was weirded out. My legs lowered to the ground, and his arms dropped to his sides. I straightened out his nice buttoned up shirt then jerked my hands away, feeling dumb for being so forward.
“I didn’t see a ghost, did you?” he asked.
“You didn’t see her? She hovered off the ground. You could see through her!”
“Really?”
I nodded and smiled stupidly at the door. “I’m not making it up.”
“I—I—I didn’t think you were.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I knew something was there by the way everything moved in the room, but I didn’t see a ghost.”
“Well, how come I can see them, but you can’t?” My chin quivered, and I folded my arms around me.
“I don’t know. You look proper chilled. Let’s go eat something by the fire.”
“Sounds perfect. Then we can figure this out. This is all too freakin’ awesome to leave it alone.”
“Regular ghost hunters, aren’t we?” he said with a gravely chuckle that had me weak in the knees. How about this, I thought: you be the hunter and I’ll be the ghost. I’ll let you hunt me all day.