10
Somewhere between waking and sleeping, I stretched my legs down to my toes. Something on top of my covers restricted my stretch in my right foot. I don’t remember leaving something on my bed. I pushed harder and heard a loud thump. My head jerked up, and my attention turned to the bottom of my bed.
Jessica’s droopy eyes and messy hair rose into view. My eyes grew, and my mouth hung open. She yawned and smacked her lips together.
“Jessica?”
Her eyes widened, and she fumbled to untangle herself from her blanket. “I’m so sorry!”
“W—what happened?” I stood and hurried to her side, helping her to her feet.
“Oh, um. Nothing big, really.” Her eyes got larger. “I’m chest—I mean—I’m fine.” Her cheeks pinked and mine warmed.
“Uh, let me put on some trousers.” She turned around and
fussed with the blanket while I fumbled in my drawer and slipped on a pair of trousers. I cleared my throat to speak, “Are you all right?”
She turned back around just before I slipped my shirt over my head. Her cheeks darkened to a rosy shade as she averted her eyes. “I’m fine. I guess I had a nightmare that felt all too real last night, and I needed someone close by. I hope you don’t mind.” Her shoulder rose, and she bit her lip.
“N—no.”
“I mean ... after what you said last night, I know you wouldn’t want me to climb into bed with you, but I didn’t have any other choice. It really creeped me out.”
I never said I wouldn’t want you to—stop that train of thought.
“N—n—no. You can sleep with me anytime.” What did I just say! “I mean—th—that’s … not in that sense, but y—y—you can sleep by me—for protection.” I sighed and rubbed the back of my neck.
“Shall we meet downstairs for breakfast?”
Her delightful lips pulled into a smirk that she tried to hide behind her hair. “Yeah. We can check the tape and see if we caught anything.” She tucked her pillow under her left arm and clung to the blanket in her right. “Again, I’m sorry.”
“No need to b—be s—s—sorry, Jessica.”
She nodded, waved, and closed the door behind her.
Great. The day’s just begun, and I’m already fumbling my mouth.
Fifteen minutes later, after a hot shower I entered the kitchen to find Bridgette stirring a pot of porridge. “Good morning, Bridgette.”
“If you say it is.” She grumbled.
“You’re not your normal chipper self. What’s wrong?” I pulled out a few bowls and spoons and set them on the counter.
“Something is upsetting the spirits here, and I can’t quite put my finger on it. They were restless all night.” She tapped the edge of the spoon on the pot a few times, then set it aside. “Porridge is finished.”
I leaned over the pot and nodded once. “Good, you’ve made enough.”
“Too much is more like. I always make too much.”
“Well, this morning, it pays off.”
“Why?” She placed her hand on her hip and cocked her head.
A lock of silver hair fell into her eyes. She blew it back.
“Jessica is back. She stayed the night.”
Her brows rose nearly into her hair. “Master Dan! If your Ma knew—why she’s probably turning in her grave!”
I held up my hands to calm her. “No! Good heavens! It’s not like that. She stayed in her own room.” Well, mostly.
“Even so, she shouldn’t have come. Tha’ would be why the spirits are agitated. You should throw her on the street right away if you knew what was good for ya. Mark my words, this will only end badly.” She wagged her finger at me then threw up her arms.
I chuckled and put my arm around her. “Oh, Bridgette. Nothing can go wrong. She’s playing it safe this time and searching with a video camera.” I tried to comfort her, but I couldn’t ignore the uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. Or maybe I was simply hungry.
“Well, if you won’t listen to me, then I’ll stay out of it.” She stepped out of my arm, filled a bowl of porridge for herself, and headed toward the door. “There’s hot water for your tea on the stove. I’ll be in the cottage if you need me.”
“Have a good day, Bridgette.”
She grunted and shut the door behind her.
While I waited for Jessica to join me, I set the small kitchen table with dishes, honey, sugar cubes, tea, nuts, and raisins. I stood back to assess the table. It looks as though a bachelor set it. I snapped my finger. “Flowers. It needs flowers.”
As I spun around to head outside, in search of the perfect flower, Jessica entered the room. “Uh … hi.” Her hair had a slight wave around her face and curled in every direction on her shoulders. Upon her T-shirt I quickly read Bad spellers, untie! I chuckled once before clearing my throat. I considered mentioning how drafty it would be in the castle to be wearing short shorts, but decided against bringing it to her attention that I’d noticed her fine legs.
“Good morning. I set us a table, and Bridgette fixed us porridge.”
“Really? Is porridge just hot oatmeal?”
“Y—yes.”
“Perfect.” She bounced over to the chair I held out for her to sit. The smell of shampoo and flowers followed close behind. I sat across from her, wishing I had set my place closer so I might continue smelling her fresh fragrance.
“I like protein in the morning,” she said with a hint of blush on her cheeks when she noticed my attention drawn to her rather large pile of nuts on her porridge. “It makes you full longer.”
“Good to know.”
Halfway through her meal, she sipped her tea, then rested her elbows on the table. “I was thinking, since you’re so nice to let me stay, I’d like to make you a special meal for dinner tonight.”
“I’m game.”
“Most likely, you won’t have everything I need, so I wondered if we could go to the grocery store.”
“Of course. What do you need?” I asked, taking my last bite.
She listed off cheeses, sauces, herbs, and the like.
I stood and opened the icebox to look over the items inside. “I have parsley in the garden, but we’ll need to buy the Italian sausage and cheeses you mentioned.”
“Great. I’ll need to start cooking it this morning. Do you have a slow cooker?” She carried her plate to the sink to rinse off as she spoke.
“I think we do.” I opened a cupboard. “Ah, yes. We do.”
“Great. When can we leave?”
I thought about the emails and phone calls I needed to check off my list for the workday and decided it wouldn’t hurt to postpone it until this afternoon. “Right away, I think.”
“Let’s go, then.” She clapped her hands together. “Let me run up to get my purse. I’ll meet you in the entryway.”
I rushed to put the food and breakfast items away, and a few moments later, I found her waiting at the door with a purse over her shoulder. “I have an idea. Since it’s a nice sunny day, I thought we might ride into town. It’s not terribly far, and I’ve always w—w—wanted to try my father’s tandem bike. What do you say?”
“Tandem, like a double? As in it has two seats?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, goody!” She bounced on her toes and followed me out to the shed at the side of the house, where we kept all bikes, lawnmowers, and gardening tools. We came around the corner to the door of the shed when I stopped short at the sight of Ron. His hand held the door handle, but he didn’t move to turn it. It was as if he were frozen.
“Ron. You didn’t come in for breakfast.” I stated.
He shook his head as if dislodging something from his thoughts and squinted at me. His eyes brightened when he saw Jessica at my side. “Miss Jessica! I’m happy to see you’re back. When did you arrive?”
One side of her upper lip pulled higher and she looked at him with confusion in her eyes. “Uh, you saw me when I arrived. Remember?”
“Uh, no. Sorry. Sometimes my brain gets a little muddled.” He slapped his chest. “But I’m still as strapping as I ever was.” I lifted my brow at him. Odd.
“Well, good.” Jessica shifted from one foot to the other and glanced up at me.
“Well, Ron, breakfast is waiting. Jessica and I are going for a bike ride.”
“You’re coming back?” Ron seemed panicked for a moment with eye bugging.
“Of course, we’re coming back,” I said and opened the door, careful not to knock Ron in the head with it. I leaned closer to his ear and whispered, “What’s got into you, man?”
He blinked at me as if not fully understanding my question.
Odd. Very odd.
Jessica
“Let’s try this again, shall we?” Danny asked over his shoulder while leaning on his handlebars.
“We shall. I won’t make us crash this time. I promise.” I hope.
“Right leg first on three. One ... two ... three.” His body shifted forward, and I mimicked his actions. The bike propelled in a fluid motion. A bend in the country road neared, and I pulled and pushed on the handlebar out of instinct to make the turn. The bike wiggled.
“Hold on.” Danny sat up and put his foot down. The bike tipped to one side, and I dropped my feet to keep us from falling over again.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
“Jessica.”
“Yes?”
He twisted around to smirk at me. “Remember, I’m steering the bike. You don’t need to worry about it.”
“Sorry. I’ll try harder. Instinct. Sorry.” The heat in my cheeks had nothing to do with the sun beating down on me or the exertion of the activity. It had everything to do with feeling stupid and incompetent.
“Jessica?”
The softness in his voice brought my head up. “Yes?”
“You’re doing fine. It always t—takes time getting used to new things.”
My lips split into a smile, happy he’d be so kind and gentle to help my embarrassment. “Ready?”
“Only if you’re glutton for punishment,” I responded.
He chuckled. “On three.”
Counting to three, we started off again with ease and continued to progress in a smooth fashion.
“Brilliant! Keep it up.” Danny’s voice flew back to me in the wind.
“Ha ha! Whoa!” I laughed and relaxed my white-knuckle grip on the handlebars. “I feel like a movie star!”
Danny’s chuckle found my ears. “A movie star?”
“Yeah. Don’t movie stars ride bikes like this?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“Well, we rock anyway.”
The location of the small store appeared to be in the center of town. Several old brick buildings lined the street, squished so closely together. The town of Wrenthal seemed to be made up of under a hundred buildings, including private houses, bed and breakfasts, and tiny shops.
We stopped successfully and parked the bike outside. When we entered the shop, a bell chimed over the door. I grinned at the sentimentality of the place. Inside, the store was full to the rim with some familiar and some foreign grocery items. It couldn’t be bigger than a convenience store at any gas station in Wyoming. Near the back, I spotted the refrigerated section.
“Dan! Good to see you!” A short, plump woman in her forties with curlers in her hair came to the checkout counter. “Oh, and I see you’ve brought a lass along with ya. What a pretty thing you’ve caught.” She clasped hands with Dan and patted my cheek to the point my head shook with her enthusiasm.
“Hello, Susan. We’re just here for a few things. Tell me, do you have any Italian sausage?”
“I do in the back,” she said, walking toward the back with us following behind. She turned a few times to look at us as she spoke and knocked a package of toilet paper from the shelf. “What’s your name, dear?”
“Jessica.”
She grunted when she bent to pick up the paper and continued, “Oh, that’s a fine name. Do you live close by?”
“I live in Washington state, but I’m originally from Wyoming.”
“Oh, I can hear the accent now. So far from home. What brings you here?”
“Here to England or here to Wrenthal?” I asked.
“Er…”
“Or—or—originally, she came to England to visit a friend.” Danny jerked a thumb in my direction.
“Yep. And what brought me to Wrenthal Castle was the ghosts.”
Susan’s hand froze as she reached for the back door handle.
“Ghosts? You mean the ghosts of Wrenthal?”
“The very same,” I said.
“So, they’re real?”
Both Danny and I nodded.
“Heavens! Those ghosts go way back. My great aunt Doris— do you remember Doris?” she asked Danny. He shook his head. She continued, “Well, Doris worked for your grandfather as a maid there. Anyway, she told me once she found an old journal of a young woman who died in that castle many years ago. Said she was murdered. She said she could hear things when no one was around.” She opened the back door and stepped into another room before I could voice any questions.
“Did you see how excited she got when I showed up? You’d think I haven’t stopped by in a while. I was here only yesterday.” Danny said with a grin, then grew quiet when Susan returned with packaged meat.
“Do you want ground or linked?”
“Both, please,” I said, and took them from her.
“Oh, you’ll need a basket.” She started for the front of the store again.
“Uh, Susan. Did your aunt mention where she found the journal?” I asked. My free hand shot out to catch the same toilet paper roll she’d knocked off again. I returned it to the shelf.
“No. I’m afraid not. Here’s a basket for ya.”
Bummer.
“Need me to fetch anything else?” Susan asked.
“No. We’ll look around,” Danny said, placing his hand on the small of my back and guiding me to the cheese.
My body reacted pleasantly to his touch. “Did you hear that? Do you know about the journal?”
“No. But I’m not surprised. There are thousands of books tucked away in the castle. Nearly every room has some. Is this the cheese you need?”
“Yeah. And that one too.” I pointed to the ricotta. “Could I look for them—I mean, would you be alright if I snooped around?”
“Of course. Make yourself at home and stay as long as you need.”
“Thanks.” I’m going to stay as long as it takes to solve this mystery and catch it all on tape, too!