Chapter Fourteen
Ravensmire
The Visitor
Morning Time
Well, call the whole situation crazy, but Elizabeth was pretty sure this topped the list with a drive-by psychic visitation without wanting one. This was absolutely new to her, and completely unexpected.
This was the last thing on her BINGO card for today—or any day.
A psychic stopping by to see her?
Unrequested?
What exactly was going on out in the world where the universe would call up one so willy-nilly, and for her, of all people?
Don’t get her wrong. She was accustomed to psychics. In her life, more often than not, she’d had people, mostly suspects, pop up saying they spoke to the dead.
And they didn’t.
Instead, it ended up that they caused people to be dead.
The only ones she legitimately trusted were the Littlemoons, and that was because she knew they were not only accurate, but Trey, Tori’s spirit guide, liked to haunt her house.
Way.
Too.
Much.
Come to think of it, she had a lot of haunted houses in her life, like three too many, at this point.
Glancing over at her, Sarah pointed.
“Are you Elizabeth?” she asked.
Oh, boy.
Now, she had to ask questions.
“Maybe. Why do you want to know? And more importantly, who sent you?” she asked, going there.
She was pretty sure that no one there would have called a psychic, let alone told them she was there.
Then again, she had gone down into the village and wandered around. Maybe the sunglasses and hat didn’t hide her identity like they thought.
Well, shit.
From beside her, Gabby was both horrified and amused. With Elizabeth, this could go one of two ways.
A meltdown.
Or a bitch slapping.
Someone needed to get to the bottom of this, and fast.
Pulling out her phone, she rattled off a text to her husband to see if he called the psychic, because she knew it wouldn’t be her, Graham, or Michael.
They wouldn’t do Elizabeth dirty like that.
Oh, she prayed Finn hadn’t done this, or he was going to get his ass kicked by Michael and possibly Elizabeth.
The big man was staring, and he didn’t look amused. In fact, he had moved closer to Elizabeth, protecting her.
The woman sighed.
“I’m here because for two days now, this annoying spirit has been following me around, pissing me off. She won’t stop bothering me! She’s haunting my house, annoying my spirit guide, and I can’t get any work done. She’s being a pain in the arse, Lass.”
She said nothing.
At first.
Then, curiosity killed the cat.
“Who is the spirit?” she asked.
That’s when Sarah told her, and let’s just say, it wasn’t what Elizabeth was expecting.
Not.
Even.
Close.
“Apparently, her name is Catherine, and she’s telling me that she’s your mother,” she stated.
Well, that was a first.
If anyone, she fully would have expected Charlie to haunt someone’s house. He was the annoying parent in the pair.
That it was Catherine…
That was new.
Many times before, Tori Littlemoon had channeled her father, Sam, and Timothy, but Catherine…she’d never popped in. It was weird that she was around all of a sudden.
When Gabby’s phone chimed, she read the message and then held it out to Elizabeth to read.
And she did.
First, it was to her husband.
‘Finn, Sarah the psychic just showed up here. You didn’t tell her about Elizabeth being here, did you?’
Then, right after it, the reply came back.
‘Absolutely not, Lass. I haven’t seen or talked to her since the time we asked her to look around the castle. Do you need me? I can come get her out of there for Elizabeth.’
Now, Elizabeth was pretty sure this wasn’t a setup by anyone she trusted.
There was no doubt this call came from outside the house, so to speak.
For now, Elizabeth saw all she needed to see.
Did she believe her?
Well, no.
The woman could have recognized her and did a little internet research to find out her mother’s name. It wasn’t like the media hadn’t put it all over the place.
“Come in,” she said. “We can have a seat in the library to talk,” she offered.
That surprised everyone there, especially Ethan. The last thing he expected was for Elizabeth to listen to this woman. After the last case, where her mother and father were dug up by Devon Slater, she wasn’t entertained by anything involving them.
So, this would be interesting.
And hopefully, it didn’t get punchy.
At the invite, the woman took off her coat and took the coffee right from Michael’s hand to drink.
That appalled him.
“Hey!” he said, slightly amused, but still wary. “Boundaries aren’t your thing, are they?” he asked.
She sipped the coffee.
“God! I hate this stuff, but I’m so tired from the spirit being up my arse.”
Well, okay.
Still…
Boundaries.
As they headed to the library, Sarah looked around the place, checking it out.
“You’ve completed so much more since I was here last,” she offered. “It’s beautiful. People are going to love booking their functions here.”
Graham lifted a brow.
Yeah, they’d not said a word about that and didn’t plan on advertising until after Ian and Gryphen’s wedding. At Christmas, they were going to begin hosting functions there.
“Uh, who said we were doing that?” he asked, not sure where she heard such a rumor, since very few people were aware.
Oh, it wasn’t like she was wrong, but still…
Did they tell people yet?
No.
There was a reason for that.
As of now, the castle wasn’t finished, and with this place, you never knew when something was going to go sideways.
Case in point, this.
To answer him, Sarah just laughed.
“If I tell you, you wouldn’t believe me, D’Artangnan,” she said, using his real name.
Yeah, and that was off settling enough. It also shut down the question, effectively by freaking him out.
As they walked, Elizabeth said nothing on the trek to the library. Once in it, she sat down on the couch, and Sarah joined her.
“Do you want to do this alone?” Gabby asked.
Elizabeth shook her head.
“No, you guys can stay. I’m good,” she offered, as Ethan sat beside her, and she leaned into his body.
Immediately, his arm went around her shoulders protectively.
The whole time, Elizabeth’s body language said it all.
His wife didn’t like this, and if this woman upset her, he wasn’t going to be nice. The days of being passive in protecting Elizabeth were over.
He was back to being a dick to anyone who offended her. Talking about her mother…that was dangerous territory.
For sure.
Elizabeth was very protective of the dead.
“I’d offer you coffee, but it seems you borrowed Michael’s. So, what can I do for you?” Elizabeth asked.
Sarah had really been trying not to do this. The last thing she liked doing was inserting herself into people’s lives, but this spirit was ANNOYING.
“As I said, your mother needs to speak to you. She’s been relentless for two days. I’ll say her piece, and then, I’ll be out of your hair.”
Elizabeth said nothing.
Why?
Again, people did shitty things to hurt others, and if this was some money grab, she was going to make sure this woman’s life was miserable.
Elizabeth was not playing around. The dead should stay dead and buried. This was rehashing things she didn’t need brought up.
PERIOD.
Sarah could feel the energy coming off of the woman, and it wasn’t good.
“You’re not happy,” Sarah admitted. “I can feel your aura going dark. That normally tells me that someone is ready to punch me in the face.”
She shrugged.
“Well, if you’re here to extort money, or hurt me, I’m going to do far worse.
Trust that it won’t end well for you,” she stated.
“I don’t dislike psychics, but I know that more are fake than not.
I have my own that I speak to when I want to talk to the dead—which I can tell you is not high up on my list of things to do. ”
There was a reason for that, but Tori was her personal psychic and bestie. When she called, Elizabeth kind of had no choice but to entertain the messages.
And if Trey came a haunting…
She made Tori recall him back to her neck of the woods.
For.
A.
Reason.
The dead guy was funny, but no one wanted a haunted house. Again, the irony was NOT lost on her.
“What do you want to know in order to prove it’s her?” she asked. “I’ll jump through the hoops for you, since I barged in here, and you’d not asked to speak to me. That’s only fair.”
It wasn’t lost on Elizabeth that the people here had used a psychic before, and she’d even toyed with bringing her back to see what the hell was going on.
She’d thought it.
Not said it out loud.
“Ask her about my least favorite car memory,” she stated. “If you’re actually channeling my mother, she’ll know it.”
Oh, well, Ethan knew what that was going to be.
Catherine LaRue died in a car accident.
WITH Elizabeth in the car.
Sarah listened and gave her an answer.
“It was a red minivan, you were ten, she died, and you’ve been traumatized since. You left your uniform at home, and your mother had turned the car around to go back. The drunk driver came across the lane and killed her rather quickly. You heard her last breath, and it’s haunted you since.”
Well, that was all fine and dandy.
As Ethan held her, he kissed her on the neck, willing strength into his wife.
She’d been through a lot this last week, and now this?
If it was a game, this was cruel.
“Where are their remains?” she asked.
Sarah turned her head, like she was looking at something they couldn’t see, and that’s when she gave them an answer.
“She said she’s in a plastic tote in some lunatic’s lab.
He talks to them and is batshit insane. Oh, and she is curious why she has to share a small space with your father.
Apparently, he’s a space hog, and she’s not thrilled his femur is crammed into her head.
That makes no sense to me but do with it what you will. ”
Oh, it made sense to her.
At that very moment, her mother’s and father’s remains, which had been exhumed by Devon Slater, were in Tony’s lab, in a makeshift bone room until she could decide where to bury them.
Elizabeth didn’t flinch.
Again, she believed psychics were real, but they had to prove it. That this woman knew where they were, that was something NO ONE knew but her, Tony, Chris, and her other husbands.