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Jules buried her face in his warm neck, eager to reassure him that these were tears of relief. Her fever had broken. She pulled herself upright and, while still straddling him, ran her hands along his shoulders and
down his arms. The last time she’d had this intimate view of a man, they were on her couch and her kitchen was on fire—a less
than thrilling experience. Lying on his back, Leo was more handsome than the devil. His usual messy chestnut hair even messier
now that she’d had her way with it, his torso rising with his breath . . . Where was she going with this?
“My God, you’re beautiful,” she whispered. “I can’t think straight.”
“If you don’t tell me why you were crying,” he said, laughter adding some bounce to his words, “I’ll think you were crying
over me, and I know you don’t want that.”
She spilled onto her side next to him. “Think what you like. You’ve earned it.”
“I can’t believe you’re still dodging my questions. Is this our future?”
“Maybe.” She glanced his way. “Would that be so bad?”
Leo blinked and focused on her. “Hold on. What spell is this?” he asked. “What exactly did Elvira do to you?”
“Her name is Beverly, and the cards were clear,” she said. “I’m a fool on a quest, but there’s someone fool enough to come with me, and all signs indicate that it’s you. Honestly, you called this upon yourself. All you ever had to do was walk away.”
He absently drew circles on her hip while he puzzled this out. “I thought we were fated lovers,” he said. “Now we’re on a
quest?”
“You get my point.”
“No,” he said. “You left out pertinent information. What sort of quest is this?”
“Never mind,” she said. “You bring the charm, and I’ll take care of the rest.”
“I’m ordering dinner and pouring you a bath, then I’ll need a look at those cards,” he said. “I’ve got a feeling it’s more
involved than you’re letting on. If there’s a greater role for me to play, I won’t settle for less.”
He joined her in the bath this time. They sat facing each other, warm sudsy water to the rim. Jules rested her feet on his
chest and wiggled her toes while he quizzed her on the meaning of the cards Beverly had drawn. Earlier, they’d retrieved the
deck from her room along with her toothbrush, her night creams, a change of clothes, and her bag with her wallet, keys, and
lighter—all things she rarely left behind. Leo studied the deck, grouping and comparing the cards. She figured he was guided
by simple curiosity. Soon it became apparent he was driven by grim determination. If the cards could deliver her to him, he’d
commit himself to mastering their power. And he was a quick study, able to commit complex information to memory in a blink.
“Let’s start with The Fool,” he said, “symbolizing a journey of some kind. What’s our destination?”
“How would I know?” she asked. “It’s a leap into the unknown.”
“You must have some idea.”
“I don’t.”
“July, how am I going to assist you if I have no clue where we’re going, what we’re doing, why we’re doing it, and why it
even matters to you?”
“It’s not that serious,” she said. “You’ve already fulfilled your end of the bargain. Nice job, by the way. No notes.”
“Then tell me what’s going on in the garden.”
Jules shivered in the warm bath. Their lighthearted discussion had taken a sudden sharp turn. “Nothing is going on,” she said.
“You’re out there every single night,” he insisted. “Late at night.”
“Heaven forbid a woman takes some time to meditate and clear her mind,” she said.
“July, we’re not going to make it if you keep hiding things. Don’t you trust me?”
The answer to that question was more complicated than she cared to admit. Coming here tonight was likely the biggest mistake
of her life. She might not walk out of his room as breezily as she’d walked in. She worried that she was locked in, that whatever
went on in the garden late at night was less consequential than what was going on in here right now. She wanted to cry again,
but he’d know she was crying over him.
“Plot twist,” she said, forcing a cheeky smile. “I see dead people.”
“Excuse me?”
“I saw a ghost in the garden,” she said. “And now that you know I’m crazy, could you please let it go?”
“I don’t think you’re crazy,” he said. “You keep using that word. I don’t understand why.”
“Because I’ve struggled with my mental health for several years after my mother died, that’s why. I’m struggling now.”
“I don’t know why that would make you crazy,” he said. “I wish you would stop saying that and stop forcing that point of view on me. If you say there’s a ghost in the garden, I believe you.”
“You can’t mean that,” she said through clenched teeth.
“One day you’ll realize that I say what I mean.”
“Leo! You can’t go around believing every random person who tells you that they see and hear things.”
“The cards say we’re fated lovers,” he said. “That means you’re my soulmate, not a random person.”
“You didn’t believe in tarot two hours ago.”
“But I’ve always believed in you.”
“Well, you shouldn’t!” she snapped. “I see my mother in the garden, okay? Not some shadowy figure or the spirit of Hemingway
or a drunken pirate, not Casper the Friendly Ghost or the usual cast of Disney characters. My mother! Get it now? See how that makes me crazy?”
Jules sank deeper into the bath until the water grazed her chin. There was no point arguing with the man. If he was auditioning
to be her soulmate, she could only wish him luck.
“Your mother,” he said. “Are you sure?”
“How can I be?”
“Go on. Tell me more.”
“It’s like a hologram. That’s the best I can describe it. And she doesn’t look like my mother, but somehow, she does.”
“When did you see her?”
“Twice over the weekend. I was drawn to the garden our second night here. I couldn’t sleep.”
“Was she waiting there?”
Jules shook her head. “No, she materialized.”
“Is that why you came back? To figure this out?”
“I hoped that with no one around, I could get some answers.”
“Have you gotten answers?”
“Beverly gave me some insight on how this works.”
“Has your mother returned since?”
“No,” Jules replied. “I don’t feel it anymore. It might be over, whatever it was.”
“Over?” He rested his head back, deep in thought. “That would be too easy.”
“It’s possible I was so desperate to see her that I made up the whole thing in my mind. At least that’s one working theory.”
“I doubt it,” he said. “Are you telling me you wanted to encounter your mother in the garden of a Key West inn?”
“No,” she admitted. However, her most ardent wish had been to see her mother again, and she wasn’t about to get picky on logistics.
Recent events having made a mockery of that wish, the suspicion that she may never see her mother again tore at her gut. Jules
couldn’t stand it. She had to believe that the mother she loved was waiting for her somewhere to take her by the hand and,
together, they’d walk the rest of the way.
“What did Beverly say about this?” he asked.
“She said I should be cautious,” Jules said. “Spirits are intelligent, and this one, perhaps, is using my memories against
me.”
“I like that theory better,” he said. “You say she doesn’t look like her.”
“She’s far younger than when she passed away,” Jules said, looking for details to support this theory that they both liked
better. “Her eyes are . . . different. But it’s more than that.”
“Yes?”
Jules shivered again, reliving the second and final time Ruby had confronted her, because that’s what it was, a confrontation—not
the loving, joyous reunion she longed for. “She doesn’t know me. Does that make sense?”
He nodded. “It does.”
For some reason this upset her. “You’re not questioning this at all. You’re just taking it at face value.”
“Why wouldn’t I?” he asked. “I haven’t seen any ghosts, but something is going on with this property. We’ve heard enough stories, and I’m not willing to dismiss them because I haven’t experienced it firsthand. I’m a fiction writer, July. I believe in stories.”
Now she worried she might disappoint him. “Leo, there’s a good chance it’s all in my head.”
“If it is, we’ll find out,” he said. “You came back for answers and found me instead. If I’m meant to be your sidekick, I’m
going to be as useful as possible. I know the deal. I’ll get you where you need to go and likely learn a lesson along the
way. Then I may take off on a hero’s journey of my own. Who the fuck knows? But I’m not going to let you down.”
“Leo White, I don’t understand you.”
“I think you do,” he said. “I think you have from the start.”
Her heart rate, her breath, even her thoughts all slowed and steadied. She was in the right place with the right person, and
they were doing the right thing. It all felt right. “Will you take me with you on your hero’s journey?” Jules asked. “I may
need an adventure after this.”
His face softened. “I came to Key West for you.”
“No, you didn’t!” she balked, instinctively pushing back.
“Yes, I did,” he said. “I had no qualms turning Daphne down. Then I saw the list of attendees. You were at the top of that
list.”
“Leo, why didn’t you say?”
“First, you looked at me as if I wasn’t there, then as if I didn’t matter to you. Do you think I was going to tell you that
I followed you to the southernmost point of the continental United States to get to know you better? How well do you think
that would have gone down?”
“Not well,” she agreed. “It’s just . . . I didn’t see it.”
“See what?”
“A way to make it work.”
What she meant was, she didn’t think she could experience happiness, peace, contentment, and pleasure all at once in her lifetime,
that she’d have to choose one or the other and only in sample sizes, not the full buffet that life offered to others and so
often deprived her. Leo was everything that she could have dreamed of, but her dreams often morphed into nightmares. She wouldn’t
have allowed herself to believe that he wanted her with the same ferocity, the same single-minded obsessiveness as she’d wanted
him, feelings so intense she had to suppress and keep trapped in the attic of her mind.
“If you put into this a fraction of the effort you put into pushing me away, we’d be together forever,” he said.
“Forever? Is that what you want?”
His jaw tightened. “Haven’t I told you? I won’t settle for less.”
Jules couldn’t believe it. She’d told him everything, and still he looked at her as if she were the girl of his dreams. How
was that even possible?
She went to him in a swirl of sudsy water. She owed him an explanation. “I have trust issues,” she said. “Not because people
have let me down. I never let anyone get that close. But I don’t trust the world to treat me kindly. And I’m so sorry, because
you’ve only ever been kind.”
Leo cupped her face as he often did, as if she were a prize jewel found among rubble and ash. “I can be better than kind,”
he whispered into her ear. “I can be good to you.”
Jules kissed him with unabashed desperation.
Leo took her by the waist and drew her close, his erection hard against her inner thigh.
She guided him inside of her, pleasure shooting straight through to her heart.
They moved together, wet skin against wet skin, drawing slow, deliberate, ever-expanding rings of sensation.
Outside the bathroom window, night closed in on them.
It seemed to Jules that they were alone in the world.
Once again, the dam cracked embarrassingly quickly, and pleasure flowed through her shaking body.
She collapsed in his arms and wept. This time, there was no rationalizing it.
He’d cracked her open. All he had to do was collect the broken pieces. Anything he found he could keep.