Chapter 9
“Do you think we’ll find the ghost tomorrow?”
Jo glanced at the downtrodden little girl at her side, her pink sandals dragging across the waxed parquet floors.
She hadn’t anticipated Annie actually wanting to find the infamous ghost of the Hotel Bellwether, but with each allegedly haunted location they’d visited that day—the library, the top floor of the Shelley tower, the poison plant garden near their cottage—Annie had grown increasingly discouraged.
There were still a handful more locations on the list Jo had found online—“Ghost sightings at the Hotel Bellwether: A Practical Guide”—but if she was going to run Midnight Storm’s social media account properly, she needed to get some content from the panel they were speaking on that afternoon.
The last few spots on their wild ghost chase would have to wait.
“Why do you want to find this ghost so bad?” Jo asked. “Seems to me that if a ghost doesn’t want to be found, we should leave it alone.”
Annie sighed theatrically. “I guess.”
Jo held open the small door at the end of the hall, flashing the badge Derek had pressed into her hand that morning. The security guard posted at the door nodded, his blank expression never wavering and his broad shoulders straining the seams of his suit jacket.
“Have you seen any ghosts, Giddy?” Annie asked the man.
“No ghosts here,” he said, keeping his eyes straight ahead.
“No ghosts anywhere,” Annie wailed.
The security guard dropped his eyes to Annie, frowning, clearly distressed by Annie’s impending meltdown.
“Hey, Giddy,” Jo said, pulling his attention.
His eyes darted to her. “Gideon, ma’am,” he corrected her.
“I heard a rumor that ghosts like to hang out after dark at ice cream shops.”
His brow furrowed in confusion. “Like Sweet Beginnings?”
“Exactly like Sweet Beginnings. You’ve heard that rumor, too, haven’t you?”
Annie spun to face him, wide-eyed and hopeful. “Have you, Giddy?”
He glanced between the two of them before resuming his stoic expression, eyes straight ahead. “I might have heard something like that.”
Annie grabbed Jo’s hand, bouncing up and down as she tugged her through the door. “We have to go! After the boring talking thing—”
“The panel,” Jo said, tapping Gideon on the arm in thanks as they passed.
“We don’t even have to get ice cream. Unless you want to. Then I would be okay with getting ice cream. And maybe the ghost will be there!”
“Maybe they will be.”
Letting her hope only put off the inevitable, but Jo was pretty sure that with enough ice cream and sugary toppings, Annie wouldn’t be able to stay disappointed for too long.
“You have an eyelash on your cheek,” Annie said, pointing at Jo’s cheek.
“Will you get it?” Jo knelt down beside the little girl.
“Make a wish.” Annie held the eyelash out to Jo, balanced on the tip of her finger.
“I’m all out of wishes, kid. Why don’t you make one for me?”
Annie bit her lip and scrunched her eyes closed tight. “I wish we would find a ghost so I can prove to Lainey McKenna that they’re real.” She drew in a deep breath and blew, the eyelash swirling out of sight.
“That was an excellent wish,” Jo said, standing back up. “But who cares if Lainey McKenna believes you or not? It’s about what you believe.”
“You believe in ghosts, don’t you, Jo?”
“I'm not sure,” Jo said honestly.
“Then I extra hope we find one,” Annie said.
Through another guarded door, Jo and Annie found themselves in the wings of the stage that had been erected in the events center for NostalgiCon’s much-anticipated panels.
On stage, the members of Midnight Storm sat in emerald green club chairs opposite a reporter from Superfan Magazine with short black hair and an even shorter skirt.
Behind the curtain, just offstage, Kat turned and waved Jo and Annie closer. “Hey, they’re almost done. Only a few more questions to go.”
“How are they doing?” Jo pulled out her phone, framing up a shot of the band with some stage rigging visible at the edge.
“So far so good. No curveballs, only one question about Beckett’s injury—which he sidestepped beautifully—and Jackson’s mostly keeping quiet.”
“Why does Jackson need to keep quiet?” Annie asked a little too loudly.
“He wants to give the other guys a chance to talk,” Jo bluffed.
Annie nodded sagely. “Like Nico.”
Jo stifled her laugh. She snapped a series of pictures, selected the best one, and posted it to the band’s socials. “I’m going to try to get a better shot from the back,” she whispered, pointing upstage.
“Do your thing. Annie can stay with me, right?” Kat asked, taking Annie’s hand.
Annie smiled. “Right. Do your thing, Jo.”
Jo wound between stagehands and security guards in the overcrowded wing until she found a spot far upstage between the two backmost curtains.
From there, she could not only capture the profile of the band, but also the sea of adoring fans in the audience, many of whom wore Midnight Storm t-shirts or carried signs calling out to their favorite band member.
She switched her phone to video mode and aimed it at the audience, taking a slow pan of the crowd.
As she swung back around to the stage, she swept past Derek in the wings on the opposite side of the stage.
He leaned against the back wall, arms crossed over his chest, scowl firmly in place.
He looked so much like he had the first time she’d seen him, complete with the starchy, white button-down with sleeves rolled up.
Biting the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling, she pulled a still from the video, cropping it to focus in on Derek.
Before she could think better of it, she attached it to a text and fired off a message.
On the other side of the stage, Derek dug into his pocket and retrieved his phone.
As he read the message, his stern expression faltered, his lip twitching.
It was so subtle that most people wouldn’t have noticed. But Jo did.
Jo: What’s the matter, daddy fox?
Derek: You’re supposed to be photographing the band, not me.
Jo: I’m ALSO photographing the band.
She attached several photos, including one of Zach mid-laugh and another of Beckett blushing, a sign demanding he put on his “slutty little glasses” caught in the background.
Jo: See? Everyone’s having a good time. Except you.
Derek: I’m having a good time.
Jo: Nope. Not buying it. I know what you look like when you’re having a good time. This isn’t it.
She snapped a selfie, an exaggerated scowl curling her lips downward and her eyes squinted nearly shut, and sent it. On the other side of the stage, she thought she heard Derek cover a sudden burst of laughter with a cough, his lips pressed together to smother the smile spreading across his face.
Thumbing through her photos, she selected a selfie she’d snapped for her own social media account earlier in the day.
The golden light filtering through the palm trees dappled her skin and t-shirt, the clear blue ocean rippling behind her.
She’d reapplied her lip gloss right before taking the photo and her mouth looked especially kissable if she did say so herself.
The airbrush filter she’d applied didn’t hurt either, smoothing out the uneven skin tone under her eyes and making her platinum blonde hair seem almost silver.
She attached the photo to her next message.
Jo: This is what it looks like when a person is having a good time.
Derek: I prefer this photo, actually.
Jo’s breath caught in her chest as an image of herself filled her screen.
In it, she was reclining on the queen-size bed in Annie’s room amidst a truly ridiculous number of pillows, her young charge curled into her side.
Jo held Annie’s copy of The Phoenix Princess, the little girl stabbing a finger at the open page incredulously as Jo tilted her head back, laughing.
She recognized the moment from the previous night, right before Derek had returned to take over the bedtime story.
The lighting was all wrong, the bedside lamp casting shadows in strange places, and her thighs, pressed against the bedspread instead of lifted as she would have done on a photoshoot, put her cellulite on full display.
Her hair was a mess, and her lipstick had worn off.
It would make a horrible social media post, with its inelegant framing and her mouth open too wide mid-laugh.
And yet.
Jo glanced up from her phone to see Derek watching her from the other side of the stage, his gaze intense, as though he were poised to spring into action at any moment, to rush across the stage and—
And what? Hands to ourselves, remember?
But the look on his face didn’t say ‘hands to ourselves.’ That look said ‘remember how it felt when my hands were on your skin?’ And, Lord, did she ever.
She thumbed through her phone, selecting another photo and sending it before she could think better of it.
She watched as he tore his eyes away from her to check the new message, the slight flare of his nostrils, the intense concentration as he dragged his hand over his mouth.
It was one of her favorite photos of herself, a boudoir shot Kyla had taken when she was first starting her photography business, all saturated colors and deep shadows.
In the photograph Jo knelt with her back to the camera, her face turned, light limning her profile.
The wide expanse of her bare back was arched to accentuate the dip of her waist, the light falling perfectly to highlight the firm curves of her ass, the cheap lace thong looking expensive under the dramatic lighting.
She felt the moment their eyes met like a thrumming through her veins, the tumblers of a lock clicking into place the moment before a door opened, clockwork pieces rearranging as cogs and wheels shifted into alignment.
His eyes darkened, scanning her from head to toe and back again, washing her with heat, as though her lipstick hadn’t worn off and her hair wasn’t seven kinds of tangled from hours spent on the beach chasing Annie.
Something tugged on her sternum, an invisible string urging her to cut through the maze of curtains and rigging at the back of the stage to get to him.
The audience burst into applause as the members of Midnight Storm got to their feet, waving their goodbyes. But Jo couldn’t look away from Derek, the intensity of his stare penetrating the shadowy wings and pinning her in place.
A second later, Annie appeared at her side, Kat trailing behind her. “Ice cream time?” the little girl asked.
Jo blinked away from Derek. “Sure.”
“I know that look,” Kat teased, waggling a finger at Jo’s face.
“Who is he? One of the security guys? Is it Gideon?” She craned her neck around the curtain, scanning the opposite side of the stage.
“There’s no one there except Derek.” As though she’d just heard herself, she snapped her eyes to Jo. “You’re not—”
“Going to get ice cream? We sure are,” Jo interjected with false brightness. “Do you want to come?”
“Come with us, Kat! It’s not just any ice cream. It’s ghost ice cream,” Annie said.
“I’ve never heard of ghost ice cream,” Kat replied.
Jo barely heard Annie’s response. How could she be expected to focus on ghost ice cream when she could feel Derek’s eyes on her again? Their slow movement raised goosebumps across her shoulders as his footsteps drew closer. Each place his gaze lingered sparked under his attention.
When his hand landed on her lower back, she sucked in a breath, fire licking at her skin beneath his palm. “What’s this about ice cream?” The deep rumble of his voice slid down her spine, molten and liquid.
Kat looked between Derek and Jo, a smile splitting across her face. “Annie and I are going to get some ice cream.”
“And Jo!” Annie added.
“Why don’t we let Jo have the night off?” Kat suggested.
“Oh, that’s not necessary,” Jo said.
“We’ll all go,” Derek said.
“Go where?” Beckett asked as he and the band exited the stage and joined their little gathering, his sudden appearance jostling Jo closer to Derek. Her hip nudged his, and he swept his thumb in a line down her spine, the tenderness of it sizzling through her veins.
“To get ice cream,” Annie said. “You should come. Daddy, the band can come, right?”
“If they want to,” Derek confirmed.
“I never say no to ice cream,” Logan said.
“And we’re going to find the ghost. You can’t forget the ghost hunting,” Annie said sternly. “That’s the most important part.”
Zach glanced at the rest of his band mates. “What do you say, boys? Ice cream and ghost hunting?”
Nico scooped Annie off her feet, swinging her onto his shoulders as she loosed a delighted shriek. “I’m in.”
Beckett grunted, a sound which his bandmates seemed to take as agreement.
“Is the bossman buying?” Jackson asked.
Derek frowned and shot Jackson a sharp glare, but before he could respond, Annie wiggled impatiently on Nico’s shoulders. “Let’s goooooo. Ice cream, ice cream, ice cream!”
Nico and Annie led the group as they made their way through the wings towards the hotel’s ice cream shop, Derek and Jo lagging behind. His hand still lingered on her lower back as they fell into step with their raucous group.
“What kind of ice cream does a ghost eat, do you think?” Derek asked.
Jo huffed a laugh. “How should I know?”
“You’re the one who let her think ghosts eat ice cream at all.”
“Once she’s got a hot fudge sundae as big as her head, she’ll forget all about the elusive ghost of the Hotel Bellwether,” Jo said. “It’s all about distraction.”
His hand curled around her hip, fingertips lightly scraping across her skin through the thin fabric of her t-shirt. “You certainly are distracting.”
Her step faltered, her balance thrown by his quiet admission, and his hand fell away.
“Daddy!” Annie called from the front of their group. “What flavor are you going to get?”
“Oreo,” Kat, Logan, and Beckett chorused.
Annie giggled. “He always gets Oreo.”
A knowing gleam sparked in Kat’s eye. “Maybe tonight he’ll try something different.”