Chapter 7 #3
She remained bent over, her butt in the air. God help him. “Ah, I bought a new bodywash from the superstore outside town that’s citrusy.” She straightened, gathered the waves with deft fingers, and twisted them back into a ponytail.
The door opened, and Penn, Colt’s dad, poked his head into the studio. He scanned the interior, and when his gaze landed on Dane, he lifted his hand and moved it in a desultory wave. “Still here, dude,” Dane told him.
Penn, scowled, shook his head, and pulled the door shut with an emphatic bang. Dane shrugged and looked at Wren. “You’ve got to give him points for consistency.”
The clatter of teenage footsteps told him the studio was about to be invaded. Wren glanced at him, her expression softening as she handed him a small smile. “Shall we dance?”
Well, she would. He’d do … something else.
* * *
“Dr. Tragic and the dancer…” Lila said, inspecting her nails in the corner of the dance studio.
Silas, leaning on his good leg—mostly a habit because he didn’t, being dead and all, need to worry about balancing his weight—scowled at the writhing, sweaty crowd of dancing teenagers.
“More bare flesh than in a house of ill repute,” he muttered.
Lila adjusted the feather in her hat and cocked an eyebrow. “Tell me about brothels in your day. I’d wager the essence didn’t vary much from my time to yours.”
He kept his gaze fixed forward. “Mechanics of the transaction … unchanged,” he muttered, feeling the burn in his cheeks.
Silas watched The Reverend looking like he was about to pop a vein. “All that hip thrusting! Why are they on the floor looking like … looking like they are…”
Lila just cocked her head and laughed as the teenagers scooted their chests an inch to the floor, dipping their backs and pointing their bottoms to the ceiling.
Silas watched the interaction between Wren and Dr. Tragic, and Silas noticed, as Wren did, the quick shake of his head.
Wren pulled a face, clapped her hands, and vetoed the move.
“As a dancer myself, I understand the thrill of shaping a routine, of bending it to one’s will.”
Silas heard the jealousy in Lila’s tone and watched her hummingbird gaze skipping over the room.
Unable to help herself and obviously envious of their energy, needing eyes on her, she dropped into a split and lifted her arms above her head.
“I used to be as good a dancer in my day. I was definitely better than Wren.”
Silas shook his head, annoyed at her attention-demanding ways when there was a much bigger issue at stake. When was Dane going to return his attention to work and what he needed to do?
Lila pulled herself up and sighed. “What is upsetting you, dear heart?” she asked.
Silas spared her a glance. “He’s here, dancing, wasting time.” He pointed at the door. “He should be out there, saving people. He’s neglecting his duty.”
Lila sniffed. “Lord, you are so dutiful, and so boring.”
Yes, he was sober, thinking, principled. “As a man of medicine myself, he offends me. He took an oath to save people.”
“Blah, blah, blah,” Lila said, rolling her eyes. “What do these young people say? Lighten up, dude.”
He had no idea what that meant.
“I do so enjoy the storm brewing in your normally stoic eyes, Captain.”
And he didn’t trust the flicker of mischief he saw in hers. “Lila, whatever you are considering, don’t—”
Then, maybe to annoy him, maybe because she was someone who still needed to have eyes on her, always desperate to be noticed, Lila gathered her energy and projected herself onto the mirror behind Wren.
A few seconds of mayhem passed and then she collapsed, in a graceful heap, at Silas’s feet.
* * *
Wren screamed, slapped her hands over her face, and screamed again.
Who the hell was in her mirror? She was about to scream again when Dane pulled her into him, his hand holding her head to his chest, his back to the room, shielding her from the kids’ what-the-eff gazes.
She opened one eye, saw that the mirror was empty of whatever she’d briefly glimpsed, and gripped Dane’s shirt in her hands, feeling like an absolute idiot.
Heat flowed into her cheeks and warmed her goosebump-covered skin.
She heard the rising murmurs of the kids behind her and banged her forehead against Dane’s hard chest. Man, she was losing it, big time.
“Tell them I am okay,” she asked Dane. “I just need a moment to gather myself.”
Dane did as she asked as Wren eased back a fraction, but her grip on his shirt refused to loosen.
She needed him like air—his solidity, his realness, was the only thing keeping her from spinning.
Her chest heaved, her mind thrumming. She couldn’t allow herself to become attached.
She’d decided, after getting the message that the men she loved always left her, that she was going to live in the present, in the fun.
Clinging like this wasn’t fun; it was embarrassing.
But … what the fuck was that?
Because there was no freaking way she’d seen a ghost in the mirror.
Because despite the numerous ghost sightings and the lore and the town’s active promotion of everything spooky—people wanted to believe there was an afterlife, but ghosts were a figment of society’s collective imagination—ghosts didn’t exist. Not in H-Town, not anywhere.
So the quick flash of a woman with black hair cut into a blunt bob—wearing a leotard sparkling with sequins, silk stockings hugging giraffe-long legs, and dyed ostrich plumes behind her head didn’t happen.
Not really. Sure, she’d looked utterly fabulous—wild, untouchable, and defiant—but she hadn’t been real.
Wren turned her head slightly, closed one eye, and squinted at the mirror.
As expected, there was nothing there but her holding on to Dane’s big frame, his expression puzzled, his confusion echoed by the kids.
The music still pumped, but they stood around, obviously wondering why their dance teacher released a banshee-worthy scream in the middle of practice.
She wouldn’t mind knowing the answer either … but it definitely wasn’t because she’d seen a freaking spirit!
Wren swallowed and sent them an embarrassed smile. Still gripping Dane, she grimaced. “I’m really sorry, I didn’t sleep well last night, and I got a fright. So silly.”
Dane steered her over to the bench. “Sit down,” he told her. He squatted down in front of her and placed his fingers on her inner wrist. “Your pulse is a bit fast.” No shit, Sherlock.
“You had quite a bit of caffeine before practice. It can raise your pulse, trigger anxiety, and nervousness.”
She’d lived on coffee for years now and knew she was nowhere near her limit. But if she admitted that, then she would have to find an alternate explanation for her brief hallucination. And she didn’t have one, so she latched on to his explanation as an excuse. “That must be it,” she quickly agreed.
Dane narrowed his eyes at her, before glancing at his watch.
Then he swiveled around, looked up at the curious group gathered around them, and took control.
“We only have about five minutes left, why don’t we call it?
” he said, and everyone in the room, including Wren, knew it wasn’t a suggestion.
They all nodded, turned away, and started gathering their belongings.
But Hadley didn’t move; she just looked at Wren with big eyes and shifted from foot to foot. Wren, her wrist still in Dane’s grasp, sent her a smile. “I’m fine, Hads,” she said.
Hadley didn’t look convinced. “Your scream was really loud, and you turned white,” she said, frowning. “You are still a bit pale, actually.”
“I didn’t eat much this morning,” Wren lied, not wanting to worry the girl. “I’m going to go home, eat, and rest, and I’ll be fine.”
Hadley didn’t look convinced. “Okay, not eating might be one explanation,” she said, lifting her foot to rest it against the back of her calf. “The other could be the ghost you saw in the mirror.”
Wren stilled. What the—? Her brain tried to catch up, but a dozen thoughts collided and tripped over each other.
Had Hadley really seen a woman in the mirror?
How was that even possible? Especially if the figure was just a trick of her imagination.
Besides, how could she possibly have glimpsed something that had flashed for no more than a heartbeat or two?
“Hadley…”
“Have you forgotten I’m an indigo kid?” Hadley asked.
“An indigo kid?” Dane asked, seemingly unaware his hand was resting on Wren’s knee.
“Kids who are said to possess special, unusual, and sometimes supernatural traits or abilities,” Hadley explained.
Pfft. Okay, Hadley had an excellent imagination, and as a kid had a couple of imaginary friends. That didn’t mean she saw ghosts. Oh God, Wren hoped she didn’t. Being a teenager was difficult enough. A teenager who saw ghosts was next-level-hard. Not that she believed in ghosts…
Aarrgh!
“You are special, but there are no such things as ghosts,” Wren assured her, pleased that she sounded calmer than she felt.
She knew this; she’d spent a great deal of time with Luna, and she’d watched, sometimes in disbelief, sometimes in awe, how her godmother floated between being the most fervent of True Believers and manipulating the supernatural trope to create a booming small-town economy.
Hadley looked at Dane. “The adults around me have been telling me that since I was three,” she told him. Yeah, Hayes hadn’t wanted Hadley’s already active imagination stoked by a town that embraced the supernatural a little too hard.
“I’m just tired, Hadley,” Wren said, standing up. She wrapped her arms around Hadley and gave her a quick hug. “Thank you for caring, but I didn’t see a ghost.”
Hadley pulled back and handed her a smile that was far too knowing and far too adult. “Pity, because her ostrich-feather headdress was seriously cool. Also, she wore an amazing shade of red lipstick.”