10. Cassandra
I fidgeted on the sidewalk,fingers flitting along the “Norwalk Tours” badge that hung on my neck. The sun set behind the high rises and the streetlights illuminated, casting a dark glow on the people walking down the sidewalk. Well past dinner, passersby hurried into nearby bars and theaters.
I reached for my phone to check the time and my fingers slipped over James Easton’s business card. I pulled it out, inspecting the heavy linen card with fancy script.
Realistically, I should have combed over the contract I signed that afternoon.
But once James had plunked the stack of papers in front of me, my eyes glazed over and everything looked blurry. Rather than get bogged down in minutiae, I read anything big and bold.
Tell anyone about the contract? Lose all my worldly goods. Say I’m only pretending to date Diego? First born gone. Give an interview years after the fact that discloses our relationship? Probably jail.
I signed and initialed all the boxes marked with a cheery yellow sticky note in seconds. Then, I drank free coffee and ate all the cereal bars set out at the conference until enough time had passed that I might have plausibly read the entire contract.
The contract was pointless. I had no intention of doing anything to hurt Diego and no intention of asking for anything he wouldn’t freely give. Hell, I would have done it for the free beer and the experience. Still, the formality of the arrangement made my decision slightly more real.
A family of five strode toward me. The boy pulled his mother’s hand, pantingly excitedly toward me as his older sister pocketed her phone with an eye roll and a sigh.
“You must be the Rogers. I’m Cassandra,” I smiled and extended my hand.
The father took it. “Sorry, we’re a little early. He’s really excited.”
“No problem. We’ve got another party joining us, though, so once they’re here, we’ll head out.”
I scanned the street for Diego.
True to his word, he’d bought out the tour and a few more besides. I appreciated the gesture, as unnecessary as that was. I didn’t expect the inaugural weekend of my ghost tour to pull the city out in droves.
Unlike Boston or Salem, I didn’t have a batch of friends ready to drive across the city or the state to support me. And while I’d mapped out the route, the possibility of getting lost still existed and I wanted as few people as possible to witness me flail in a new city.
“So, happy birthday!” I said to the kid. “I hope I don’t make this tour too scary for you!”
He grinned, ducking out of the way as his father attempted to muss his hair. “I’m thirteen. I don’t get scared anymore.”
His sister sighed, eyes meandering to her brother with a scowl before fixating on the space behind me. Her eyes widened and jaw dropped. “Is that…?”
I followed her gaze to find Diego striding in our direction and completely understood the awe. Not that there should have been anything awe-inspiring about how Diego looked. He wore a pair of faded jeans and a white t-shirt obscured by a basic black jacket. But the way he moved, the way he walked down the street like he owned it? No wonder people took notice.
“Hey, Diego.” I gave him a friendly wave, pushing away the surge of pure lust when his eyes landed on mine.
“Cassandra.” His easy grin warped into a smile as he wrapped his arm around my waist and pressed a kiss to the side of my head. The contact threw me for its own kind of loop, while my eyes stayed on the twenty guys behind him. “The offensive line does a team bonding day before the start of the season, so I added this to the itinerary.”
A giant of a man waved at me from behind Diego. “Hi, I’m Noa. Nice to meet you. I’ve heard only good things.”
My chest tightened. Only Diego would have said nice things. I’d fall on my ass if I found out Becca had ever talked to the players about me.
Diego hugged me tight, his face buried in my hair as he murmured, “we’re going past the Topaz, right? There’ll be some photographers out front.”
Right. Photographers. The entire reason Diego bought out the tour. He let me go and turned to the family. “Sorry to crash the tour with our giant group. I promise we won’t get too rowdy.”
The birthday boy looked ready to burst with excitement. And maybe his sister did too.
“Can I take a picture with you guys? The kids at school will never believe it,” he enthused.
Diego nodded. “Let’s get a group pic before it gets too dark and then let Cassandra do her thing.”
“I’ll take a couple of pictures before we get started,” I said, slipping my phone out of my pocket.
Diego shook his head, flagging down a passerby. “No, you need to be in the shot.”
The football players got in line, clearly used to being smashed together for group pictures. The family and I made up a dwarfed front line to the photo. I held my breath when Diego grabbed my waist, pulling me close to him while the agog pedestrian took a handful of snapshots with my phone.
I’d need to get used to touching Diego, clearly. In my stoic New England family, I was the touchy one. I made my parents and my sister uncomfortable with hugs and kisses and cuddles any chance I could get.
I loved contact, loved being close to people I loved, platonic and not. But lackadaisical touching felt a lot different with Diego. His touch felt charged somehow, frighteningly both familiar and new. And strangely sterile once I remembered that the touching was just for show.
I shook off the thought and the flutters in my stomach, reorienting myself to my job. “The year was 1647…”
* * *
Diego saved me from taking a wrong turn down a side street, and Noa established himself firmly as my favorite football player ever after he befriended the birthday boy. Hell, even his sister seemed thrilled with the tour at the halfway point, flanked by two players who answered all her questions and took photos with her at every stop. And everyone seemed to enjoy the tour. Or at least they were too kind to act bored.
“After Mrs. Haskins’ untimely demise, the house was sold fifteen times in the next two decades. The owners would only stay a year or two before the house would be back on the market. Rumors spread that her spirit haunted the house and residents claimed to see a Victorian era woman stomping through the house with a knife and a blood-soaked dress.
“In 1953, after sitting empty for nearly two decades, a commercial real estate company purchased the house, and converted the homes into storefronts. But rumor has it, if you’re in the basement at exactly 9:23, you’ll hear the cries of Mrs. Haskins.
“Now, inside, you’ll find a full-service bar and some snacks. We’ll take a twenty-minute break. The bathrooms are in the basement, and we’ll meet back at...” I looked at my watch. “9:35.”
I held open the door for the tour. The family filtered into the bar first, followed by the football players.
Diego hung back, a smile on his face. “Wow.”
“Is that a good wow or a ‘I can’t believe I brought my entire team to this’ wow?”
Diego held open the door, and I forced my way inside. Our group overwhelmed the tiny bar and his body brushed mine as we shuffled closer, his head dipping to be heard over his teammates. “An impressed wow. This is a lot of fun.”
I turned back, skeptical. My shoulder rested on his chest as his palm pressed into my hip, pulling me away from the door as a couple left. He tucked us into the corner of the room. “Want me to grab you a drink?”
I shook my head. “I’m fine.”
“Is it true about the ghost here? Am I going to get scared by some old lady when I go to the bathroom?”
“Guess you’re going to have to chance it and find out.”
“I’ll wait for the next stop.” His hand stayed on my hip, thumb running over the belt loop of my jeans and barely brushing bare skin. A jolt of electricity ran through my body, leaving goosebumps in its wake.
“You didn’t have to bring your entire team.”
“I called it a team-building exercise. Besides, Trent is really into ghosts. He’s having a great time.” Diego nodded back to the tall redhead ordering a drink from the bar. “Since he’s banned from nightclubs for the rest of the season, he’s dying for some entertainment. He jumped at the opportunity.”
“And the rest of your team?”
Diego shrugged. “They were excited to meet you.”
I lowered my voice, scanning the room to check for anyone overhearing. “Do they know that you and me…?”
“Aren’t actually dating? Noa knows. I’m not exactly shouting it from the rooftops, though. James said you stopped by his office.”
“And what a fancy office it is. You got yourself a real big shot agent.”
“And you read the contract?”
“I read the highlights. Apparently, you get my firstborn if I kiss and tell.” His grin faltered, tiny divots appearing at the corner of his lips. “Don’t worry. I’m joking.”
“And you told Becca?”
I grimaced, and he raked a hand over his face. “We need to tell her.”
“You mean I need to tell her.”
His grin crept back. “As I recall, you’re not afraid of her.”
“Alright, maybe I’m a little afraid of her. Very little. Minuscule amounts.”
Diego sighed, eyes shifting away even as his thumb hitched my belt loop, pulling me closer. “Tomorrow, we’re calling her.”
“We?” I asked, raising an eyebrow. “Did we have plans to get together?”
His lips turned up in a devilish grin. “I was going to wait until after the tour, but do you want to come with me to a team cookout tomorrow? It’s nothing fancy, just a barbecue before the season starts.”
His fingers grazed the bare skin of my waist, and I would have agreed to anything. Light larceny. Great white shark rides. Being launched out of a cannon. Barbecue was an easy ask. “I have a walking tour at one.”
“It starts at four. I’ll pick you up.” He bent his head, lips brushing my ear as he talked. “We can have a couple of drinks, get dinner, and then call your sister.”
I closed my eyes, wincing as I collapsed my head against his chest. “Ah, you ruined it.”
“I’m curious what she does if we both call. Because if it was just me, she’d get all disappointed and call me a moron.”
“Oh, trust me, she’s going to be disappointed. That’s just never bothered me.”
“You had the benefit of growing up with her disappointment. I only got exposed in college. It was too late for immunity.” His thumb unhooked from my belt loop as his palm drifted onto my lower back. I closed my eyes with a heavy sigh. Dating Diego would have been so easy. Too easy.
“Don’t worry, I’ll teach you all my tricks,” I murmured into his shirt, inhaling sun and turf. “It’s mostly avoiding her and using puppy dog eyes, but you’ll pick it up real quick.”
“Puppy dog eyes? Now, I need to see that.” The air between us felt cold as Diego pulled away with a smile.
“I’m not showing you everything at once. You’ve got to work to get this information.”
He grinned. “Well, I look forward to it, but right now, I have a date with a ghost in the bathroom. You coming?”
I shook my head. “It’s not as scary with company. Good luck though. Hope you make it back!”
I grimaced as Diego slid away, my eyes scanning the bar for a camera pointing in our direction.
Nothing, though that didn’t mean he hadn’t just been playing for the crowd. I sighed, frustrated more with myself than Diego. “Alright, everyone, ten more minutes and then the Norwalk Ghost Tour is taking off!”