15
After getting on our shoes and tying our jackets around our waists, we headed out through the kitchen. I walked far enough away from the castle to know what direction Karina might have started in. Shielding my eyes from the sun, I got a good look at the castle to get my placement. A flicker caught my eye, and for a brief moment, I saw the sickening image of a man hanging in the confines of a cage.
“Whoa!” I latched onto Danny’s arm.
“What?” He turned to look at where my attention was drawn.
“It’s gone. Did you see?”
“See what?”
I pointed to the top of the roof with the post protruding off the end. “There was a cage, like the one people used to put bodies in, hanging right there.”
“You mean a gibbet?”
“I guess so. I don’t know what they’re called.”
“You saw one?”
“Yeah. I thought I saw one the morning after I first came here, but I believed it was a trick of the light or something but this time I saw it for a longer period of time. I think I just saw a different ghost. Are you sure you don’t have male ghosts?”
“I’ve not heard of any. Just women ghosts.”
“Well, it could have been a woman. It was hard to tell because it was so…” I paused to keep myself from gagging at the thought of their deteriorating body.
I stood for a few minutes longer, watching the spot where it had hung. What exactly did I see?
A gentle nudge from Danny helped me shift my attention back to reality. “Sorry.” I fell into step beside him, pushing the grim thoughts of dead people from my mind. We chatted along out walk, and I asked about the different plants and flowers I don’t normally see in the western states. As we walked toward the morning sun, I searched for anything familiar from my dream. We discussed politics and vacations we’d wish to go on and begin a long conversation about education—something I’m passionate about. It was pleasant to find that we agreed on almost everything important.
Maybe a relationship might go smoothly with him.
After a couple miles through green fields, pastures, and across narrow country roads, I stopped. Something seemed familiar. With my hand on my hip and the other shielding my eyes from the daylight, I scrunched my nose, searching my surroundings.
“Are you lost yet?” Danny asks with a smirk.
“Wise guy.” I roll my eyes. “Did there used to be a stream here?”
“Possibly. This road ahead could be running along the top of it.” He slid a backpack off his shoulder, retrieved a water bottle from inside, and handed it to me.
“Thanks. In my dream, I remember that they crossed a small— nearly dry creek then traveled up an incline for another mile before stopping.”
“Then that way?” he pointed with his water bottle.
“Perhaps.” After gulping down half my water, I started in the direction that he pointed. If I hadn’t been tired and a little winded, I might’ve rejoiced out loud after the sun went behind a cloud and the air cooled a little. We walked for another two and a half miles when we came to a neighborhood surrounding a wooded area.
I slapped my empty bottle against my leg and huffed. “Now what?”
“Perhaps she’s buried under one of these houses?”
“Oh, don’t say that,” I moaned and kicked a rock out of the middle of the street. A creak from a door opening brought my attention to the nearest house. The red brick matched almost all the other houses on the street, but the potted window plants at each window made this house stand out.
An older woman, possibly in her seventies, exited her house and picked up a pile of mail that hadn’t been put through the mail slot on the door.
“Good morning.” She waved.
“Good morning!” I waved and started for her house.
Her face brightened when I came closer. She stepped down her steps to greet me. “Blessed morning, isn’t it?”
“Delightful,” I said. “Hi. My name is Jessica, and this is Danny.”
“Dan.” He corrected and shook hands with the woman after I did.
“Viola,” the woman said and pointed over her shoulder.
“Would you like to come in for a cuppa?”
A squeaky break of a car driving down the road, stopped in front of the woman’s house.
“I was wondering if you could tell me anything about this neighborhood and when it was built.”
“Oh, it was so long ago, and I didn’t live here back then. This is my grandson’s house,” she gestured toward the young man getting out of his car with a bag of groceries, “and he lets me live here.”
“Oh. Okay. Well, thank you.” I stepped out of the way when the man drew closer.
“I’m sure he could tell you a few things about it,” Viola said, nodding toward her son. “He’s lived here most his life. Hi, Kip.”
“‘ello, Gran,” Kip said and stopped to kiss his Gran. His shaggy hair blew straight up and waved at us, giving him a younger look than the crow’s feet at the corner of his eyes.
“These nice folks are wondering about the neighborhood and when it was built.” She reached for the bag of groceries, but Kip shooed her off.
“Let me help you with that,” Danny offered and turned to me. “You go ahead and ask your questions and Viola and I will take care of these.” He headed into the house with the lady. “If that offer for tea still stands….” His words were cut off from the door closing behind him.
“Can you tell me about when this neighborhood was built?” I asked the man named Kip.
“Are you and your husband looking to buy a house?” he asked and slapped a hat over his head.
“No. He’s not my husband.” Wouldn’t that be nice, though? I shifted my feet and continued. “I’m trying to figure out if the builder might’ve found any bodies buried in a hole.”
“Bodies? That’s an unusual sort of thing to go lookin’ afta’.” He folded his arms. “Do you have reason to believe there are bodies here?”
“Well, it’s kind of a weird, haunting story, but I had a very vivid dream that someone was killed here and her body might still be here.”
His brows momentarily lifted and then his lips turned to one side. “Well, I can’t say as I know tha’ there were any bodies, because it was built just before I was born, but I can tell you tha’ there was something strange about the forested area through there.” He pointed over the rooftops of the neighbors to the right. “The older chaps I grew up with always told stories of a ghost that would wander about during the harvest. One year—when I was but a lad—a group of kids went poking about, trying to catch the old ghost. One of them returned with a broken leg from tripping over a hole.”
My heart skipped. “A hole?”
“Yeah. It’s just off the path that winds through the trees. Someone put chicken wire over it to keep anyone from bustin’ up a leg again.”
I held out my hand to shake. “Well, I thank you for your time.”
“Anytime,” he said with a tilt of his hat.
Danny and I said our goodbyes and thanked the nice people. I relayed the news of the hole as we meandered toward the trees.
“So, do you think it’s the same hole? Crumpet?” Danny asked, handing over a buttered English muffin the old lady must have shared.
“Thanks. I bet it is. I hope. Things have changed so much in the last couple hundred years,” I said, then took a bite. The muffin’s chewy edges and soft, moist middle satisfied and rejuvenated my spirits almost as much as the news of possibly finding something.
My elation died the moment I heard the thunderclap and tapping of rain all around us. I slipped into my jacket, pulled the hood over my head, and frowned at Danny.
“Another time, perhaps?”
“I guess so.” With shoulders slumped in defeat, we headed back to the road. “Now what? We’ll be soaked through before we can get to the other side of that field.” I nodded in the direction we’d come.
“Let’s take that road back and see if someone will give us a lift.” He took my arm and jogged toward it. We caught a ride, but not before we were already soaked. When we arrived back at Wrenthal, we laughed at our soggy selves, stomping our muddy feet just outside the door. We both agreed to put on warm clothes, pour ourselves a hot cup of coffee, and meet back in the sitting room.
The second he walked into the sitting room after changing I raised my hands in the air. “I won!”
He chuckled, rubbing his beard. “I didn’t know we were racing.”
I shrugged. “I’m always racing.”
I ran my brush through the damp knots of my hair and then sat back against the arm of the sofa. “I’m starting to wonder if the video will catch anything at all. Do you think ghosts can be captured on tape? I mean, all I ever see on the TV shows are smudges and flickers of light that they pass off as a ghost.”
Danny sat beside me and pulled his laptop closer. “I—I wouldn’t know.” He clicked away on the keyboard but rubbed his chin when he paused.
The expressions he made when pondering made my heart putter like the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang car. I wanted to reach out and touch his lips. Oh, I’m just torturing myself.
I stood and set my empty coffee cup aside. “Well, I’ll let you get some work done while I look for any other journals lying about. I’ll scream if I need you.”
He sat taller. “Do you want me to go with you?”
My gaze dropped to his defined chest. The air thickened in my lungs. I swallowed. Did he have any idea how hot he was? “No. No. You need to work. I’ll be all right.”
I headed back upstairs, checking each room as I went. I discovered two books that seemed somewhat promising in the orange room, but found nothing anywhere else. When I reached the blue room, I paused, not daring to go in alone. The mere thought of entering that room without strong arms surrounding me gave me goosebumps. Before any ghosts attacked, I left it be and headed back to the library. I needed time alone to pour over the books and knew I’d only end up staring at Danny if I sat in the same room as him.
A basket in the corner gave me a much-needed blanket to cuddle with, and I gathered all the pillows I could find in the library. Using one of the oversized chairs to prop my legs with and the other to slouch in, I had a study corner.
Thirty minutes went by, and my eyes began drooping. Deciding there wasn’t anything in the first book worth looking over, I set it aside and closed my eyes. All I need is a short cat nap.
I almost knew the moment I switched from conscious thoughts to dreams. I had fallen to sleep with thoughts of Danny—mostly of his arms around me—then the dream shifted. There I stood before a mirror, but it was not my own reflection. My hair hung loose and long over one shoulder. Thick lashes shadowed my dark eyes. The metal brush in my hand felt cold in my palm as I ran it through my hair. Someone behind me shuffled toward the door.
“That will be all, Molly,” I said and watched a maid leave the room. A flutter of nerves erupted deep inside, and I smiled at my reflection. I pulled a thin robe off a hook and draped it over my shoulders. The nightgown brushed against my feet as I approached the fireplace.
My hand clasped the wing of a statue of an angel and pulled downward. The wall to the right clicked and swung open to the darkness beyond. Without a pause, I stepped into the black. Each chilling step was lower than the next. My fingers ran along the walls on either side until I stopped at a dim light seeping through a crack in the wall. With a gentle push, the way before opened. I blinked once and found myself in what looked to be a study. A desk took up most of the room, with books on the walls and papers on the desk.
“Walter?”
No response. I entered the room and closed the wall behind me. I ran my hand along the arched chair facing the desk. I shrugged off my robe and sat in the chair, pulling my knees up and covering my toes with my nightgown. I froze at the sound of the door creaking open behind me.
“Hello?”
I smiled and stuck my head out around the chair.
“Mirabella, my love. I got your note to meet here. You little vixen, you.”
I stood when he came to me and let him pull our bodies close. I shook my head.
Oh, crap! I don’t want to kiss some dude I’ve never met! No, it’s a dream. This isn’t me! I’m someone else!
Our lips met in a rage of passion. His hands moved about my back and down my leg.
“Oh, Walter.” I found myself saying.
Oh, brother, wake up! The man’s not even that good-looking! You could do better!
The man stopped and held me back by the shoulders. “Wait. We cannot.”
“Yes, we can,” I said with a pout and heavy accent.
“No. We only need to wait one more night—the night is halfway through. Surely, we have enough willpower to make it through one more night.”
“You might,” I said and tried to lean in for another kiss.
He moaned as if battling himself over whether to kiss me or not. “No. We will be wed in the morning. We can wait.”
“But we will have hours after that where we will have to entertain your family. We won’t get to be alone for so long!”
“Shh, my love. You must go back to bed.” He turned me around and swatted my bum. “Go. I will see you at the altar.”
“You are cruel,” I grumbled and folded my arms.
He went to the wall and opened the hidden passage. “I will love you forever, my Mirabella. See you in the morning.” His gentle hand at my back led me into the darkness.
“For this, I will make you wait for a long time at the altar,” I said in a teasing tone, kissing his cheek one last time.
He chuckled and kissed my neck. “Good night, my love.”
“Good night.” The wall closed behind me, and I proceeded up the stairs in pitch black, feeling my way. I licked my lips, savoring the kiss we’d just shared. “Tomorrow, I will become the happiest woman alive.”
Halfway up the stairway, my left arm fell into nothingness where the wall should have been. My heart zipped up into my throat. I couldn’t be at the end already. I’d not gone far enough! I reached my hand out again, and my fingers clamped down on a piece of cloth. At the same time, hands came down over my nose and mouth and an arm around my ribs lifted me off my feet.
“Cry out, and you shall not draw another breath.” The voice sounded croaky yet familiar within the mind I occupied.
I couldn’t breathe from fright. He carried me to the left, my body jarring against his with each descending step he took. Stone ground on stone, sounding like another secret door opening. A dim candlelight lit a small stone room with a wooden door and chair.
He removed his hand and whispered another threat in my ear of keeping silent. He turned me around, and I got my first look at the bearded handsome face.
“Mr. Tilton! How dare you. Let me go!”
“Keep quiet, or I will silence you.” He bent slightly to pick up something long from off the floor.
A club? I shut my mouth but held my chin high. “Why are you doing this?”
“Did I not warn you against marrying that overstuffed arrogant fool? I warned you what I would do to you.”
“You cannot tell me what to do.” My voice deceived me and became weak. I stepped back and held out my hand in defense as he inched closer.
“You belong to me.” He pounded his chest, continuing forward.
Oh, no! Knock him across the head! There’s a chair! Knock him over the head with it! Kick him in the family jewels! I tried to change the course of the dream, but things played out against my will.
“No. Please. You must let me go.”
“I will let you go if you go with me.”
I shook my head, not trusting my voice.
“You belong to me.” His harsh whisper became laced with anger.
“Please, no.”
“Say you’ll go with me?”
The image of the man I’d kissed minutes ago flashed in my mind, and a warm pressure in my bosom poured through me. At that moment, I knew I felt her love for him, and she could never pretend to love anyone else.
“No. I love Walt—”
“Do not say that name again! You will forget him and go with me.”
“Mr. Tilton, you don’t know what you say. Oh, il cielo me!” My back hit the wall, and I whimpered in fright.
“You will not go with me and love me?” The anger in his eyes ebbed for a moment, then flashed into madness when I refused.
“Then I’m sorry, Adieu mon amour.”
He lifted his arm that held the club, and my scream was shortened by the flash of light behind my eyes and the pain that only hurt for an instant.