The Ghosts of Tullybrae House

by Veronica Bale

  “I don’t know how you can say something so outrageous with a straight face like that.”

  “It’s a gift. I’m blessed.”

  When they both agreed they were ready to go home, Dean paid the bill and they left, with the barman’s invitation for Emmie—no mention of Dean—to come back soon.

  “It’s good to see you smile again,” Dean noted as he drove them down the winding Highland roads back to Tullybrae.

  Emmie watched the stark white beams of the Cabriolet’s high-powered headlights part the curtain of night in front of them.

  “Lamb said the same thing this morning,” she answered eventually.

  “Less stressed or something?”

  “Something like that.”

  “Don’t take this the wrong way, okay? I don’t mean it as an insult, but I wouldn’t have thought curating was a particularly stressful job.”

  She grinned sideways at him. “No insult taken. You’re right, it’s a pretty low-key job.”

  “Something else going on, then?”

  “Yeah.”

  Dean gave her a long glance when she did not say any more—as long as he could afford while driving down a winding road in the dark.

  “Whatever it was, I’m glad it’s done. You had us all really worried.”

  “Yeah right. I’m sure Adam was practically pacing his hotel room.”

  Dean raked his fingers through his hair. “Adam’s an ass most of the time. But he’s a good guy underneath all that. He really cares about people deep down.”

  Emmie smiled to herself. “I know.”

  They made the rest of the drive in good time. It was a little after one thirty in the morning when Dean pulled through the gates onto Tullybrae’s drive.

  Immediately, a sense of extreme agitation prickled the surface of Emmie’s skin. She shivered visibly.

  “You’re not cold, are you?” Dean asked.

  “No. Just— No, I’m fine.” How could she finish that sentence any other way?

  He raised an eyebrow, but didn’t comment.

  The uncomfortable sensation Emmie felt was coming from Cael—he was not happy. But unlike her usual awareness of him, which translated itself into a localized sensation which allowed her to pinpoint his physical location in proximity to her own, the prickling was everywhere. It was all around her, thickening the air like a dense Highland mist. It was cloying. And Dean was blissfully unaware of it.

  He pulled the car up to the front of the house and turned off the ignition. When she moved to open her door, he called, “Stay where you are. I’ve got it.” Hopping deftly out, he trotted around to the passenger side.

  “Thank you,” she said, outwardly cheerful.

  There was a short walk to the front door. Dean hung slightly behind, his hand hovering at the small of her back. It was a possessive gesture, subtle though it was. Another kind of trepidation, one which had nothing to do with Cael, began to sneak into her thoughts. Dean was strangely quiet. Nervous.

  Please don’t let him be thinking what she thought he was thinking.

  She nearly groaned out loud when her suspicions were confirmed. As she unlocked the door and turned the handle, he put a hand out to stop her.

  “Em, wait.”

  Then he hesitated. Then smiled nervously. Then raked his fingers through his hair again.

  “Look, I know we said we’d just go out as friends and all—and I respect that. But I think you know by now that I like you.”

  “Um… yeah,” she said slowly.

  Despite her wariness, Dean pressed on. “I mean, what guy wouldn’t, just to look at you? Wow, that sounded bad—don’t get me wrong, it’s not just that you’re beautiful. You are beautiful, but I mean…” He laughed helplessly. “Jeez, I’m making a mess of this. What I mean to say is, you’re smart, down to earth, you know? Like, you really seem to have it together.”

  “I—” The statement took her aback. The notion that she’d been falling apart had been at the centre of her personal crisis for several weeks now. To hear him say she “had it together” sounded odd to her ears. Unnatural. Her unease over what Dean was trying to tell her lessened slightly as she grappled with his assessment of her.

  “Oh, Dean. No, I don’t. Not really.”

  “I don’t believe that,” he insisted, his gaze turning searching. “Have you seen yourself lately? I mean, objectively? A curator at your age, independent and sure of yourself. You know exactly who you are and where you’re going. Like no one can faze you. I mean, yeah sure, you wear hoodies and yoga pants once in a while, and you have stress to deal with. But everyone does, right?”

  Emmie stared at Dean, interested by the account of herself he was giving. With everything she’d learned over the past two days—about her mother, about herself, about Cael—she wasn’t sure of anything at all right now. Did other people see her the way Dean did, she wondered?

  “Look,” he finished, “the thing is—I was wondering if there might be some point in the near future that we could be… you know… more than friends?”

  There was such hope in his eyes that it broke her heart to have to refuse him.

  Then again, she didn’t have to refuse him. Not if she didn’t want to. The little old woman had told her to go out with Dean. Well, Emmie had gone. And she’d had fun.

  Unfortunately, while she was debating with herself about whether or not she would say no, her mouth had run ahead of her brain and was saying things she wasn’t sure she meant.

  “Dean. Oh my gosh. I’m flattered, really. And you’re really cute. Believe me, I’m not oblivious to the fact that you’re a hottie. It’s just… I’m really not in the right headspace to think about dating just now.”

  His face fell a fraction, but he kept his hopeful smile in place.

  “It’s not you, it’s me, huh? Universal code for ‘I’m not into you, I’m into someone else.’”

  “That’s not it. I’m not seeing anyone else.” It wasn’t a lie, per se. “And I swear, at any other time of my life, I’d totally be into you. I’m serious,” she insisted when he made a playfully dismissive gesture. “If I were on the market, I would jump at the chance to go out with you in a heartbeat.”

  He looked at her for a moment, considering her sincerity.

  “All right,” he allowed. “I’ll believe you. You’re not trying to soothe my ego, and you don’t really think I’m a gargoyle.”

  Emmie released a surprised laugh. “Gargoyle?”

  Her stomach flipped nervously when his expression grew serious.

  “So I won’t ever bring up the subject again, I promise,” he said, his voice low and sensuous. “Just… please don’t be mad at me.”

  “For what?” Her own voice was a whisper.

  “For this,” he whispered back.

  Dean leaned forward, slowly, hovering a moment.

  Emmie knew he was giving her the opportunity to back away. To say no.

  She didn’t. She remained still, and let Dean kiss her.

  There were so many reasons why. Guilt, pity, curiosity. Even annoyance with herself. After all, there was no logical reason why she should turn him down. His lips, when they touched hers, were warm and soft. Real. His kiss was gentle, respectful.

  Amid the turmoil her mind was in, one thought surfaced above all the others:

  This is nice.

  Or it was almost nice, could be nice if she would just let herself enjoy it. But she couldn’t. Emmie was already starting to think of what she’d say or do when the kiss ended. And it angered her that she couldn’t just enjoy what was right in front of her, when it wasn’t Cael.

  If it were Cael…

  Suddenly, Dean pulled away from her. A sharp hiss escaped through his teeth.

  “Ah! What the—”

  He reached his right hand over his left shoulder and rubbed at it. Then he turned a circle to look behind him.

  “What?” Emmie asked, somewhere between alarmed and dazed.

  “Something just… Jeez, tha
t frickin’ hurt.” He turned another circle. “Something just scratched me.”

  “Scratched you? What, like an animal?”

  “Bat, maybe?”

  They looked at each other, neither of them convinced by the possibility.

  Emmie inclined her head towards the house. “Here, come inside so I can look at it in the light.”

  She pushed opened the heavy front door and led Dean into the foyer, where she flipped the light switch on the wall.

  “Turn around.” She put her hands lightly on his shoulders, and when his back was to her, she pulled aside the neck of his shirt. The start of three distinct scratches marked his skin at the base of his neck, and there was a smudge of blood on his shirt.

  “You’re bleeding. Come on. We’ll get some Polysporin on that.”

  “Nah, don’t worry about it. I’m sure it’s nothing,” he said half-heartedly. Predictably, he made no objection when she led him up the stairs.

  “Sorry for the climb, but my first aid stuff is all on the third floor,” she apologized as they entered the servants’ staircase.

  “So this is where you live,” Dean observed. As they headed to the bathroom, he took in the surroundings with interest. “Man, it’s like stepping back through time, isn’t it?”

  “This whole house is like stepping back through time.”

  “Lamb up here too?”

  “He’s on the men’s side.”

  “Why doesn’t that surprise me?” he said wryly. “A proper British butler. That man belongs in another time, too.”

  When they reached the bathroom, Dean took a seat on the closed lid of the toilet, and turned away from Emmie so she could attend to his injury.

  Delicately, she pulled at the hem of his shirt, lifting it up. He followed her lead, pulling the garment the rest of the way over his head. She made an appreciative note of the fact that he kept his arms in his sleeves, instead of eagerly shedding the whole thing as some amorous would-be suitors might do.

  She also couldn’t help but note his back. It was smooth and muscled. An elaborate tattoo of a fierce-looking American bald eagle covered his right shoulder, and spread down to the bottom of his ribs.

  “Nice ink,” she offered. “Very Americana.”

  “When in Texas,” he quipped. “What would be the Canadiana version, I wonder?”

  “A ninja beaver.”

  Dean laughed, and so did Emmie. She was glad of it. The moment of joviality helped to dissolve some of the tension that had flared up at that kiss.

  She examined the scratches closely. They were long and harsh, and like his tattoo, they extended from his left shoulder down to the base of his ribs. The blood that had smudged his shirt was superficial, but it could still use a disinfecting. One never knew—it might have been a bat after all. Though Emmie didn’t believe that for one minute.

  She took out the plastic Rubbermaid container with her first aid supplies that she kept under the sink, and fished out a box of gauze pads. Running one pad under the tap, she dabbed away the blood, following the scratches from top to bottom.

  “What does it look like?”

  “Like… claw marks,” she answered begrudgingly.

  Dean was silent for a moment.

  “I think there’s definitely something to the theory that this place is haunted,” he said uneasily.

  “I said there was. I wasn’t making it up when I told you about what I’d experienced. Remember, at The Grigg?”

  “Yeah, I remember. But didn’t you say you thought it was, like, a benevolent spirit? A comforting one?”

  “I did.”

  “Well?”

  She huffed. “I’m not a ghost expert, am I? No one’s ever scratched me before. Maybe they’re anti-American.”

  He twisted back to look at her, humour quirking the edge of his lips. “Wouldn’t they have tried to scratch through Hubert then?”

  “You named your bald eagle tattoo Hubert?”

  “It was either that or Agamemnon.”

  Emmie snorted. “I’m not even going to ask.”

  She finished dabbing Dean’s back, and attached the gauze pads with surgical tape. When she was done, she stepped back and let him put his shirt back on. Clothed, he stood up, smiled warily, and shoved his hands in his pockets.

  “I should probably go.”

  “Yeah. Thanks for tonight. I had fun.”

  “Me too. Thanks for letting me take you out.”

  He leaned in again, but this time he kissed her on the cheek.

  “I’ll walk you out,” she offered.

  He nodded, smiling wryly. “I’d say no need, but hell, I’m not sure I want to be walking through this house alone right now. I’m not sure I like the idea of leaving you alone here, either.”

  “I’m not alone. I’ve got Lamb.”

  “Yeah, right.” He rolled his eyes. “If you scream, it would take him a year just to make it to you from the other side of the floor.”

  “Aw, leave the poor man alone. He’s spry enough… for his age.”

  They left the third floor in silence, and made their way through the darkened house to the front door. Dean got into his car, and with a final wave, drove back out to the main road. When she could no longer see his tail lights, Emmie shut and locked the door.

  It was two in the morning, but she had no intention of going to sleep. She had a Highlander to find. Cael had crossed a line, and whether he liked it or not, she was going to have it out with him.

  “CAEL? CAEL, WHERE are you?”

  Emmie climbed the grand staircase, feet hammering into each carpeted step.

  “Cael. Stop hiding, we need to talk.” She stopped, shook her head, and muttered to herself, “Well, not ‘talk,’ per se—you know what I mean. Cael!”

  There was no sign of him. No tingle, no inkling, nothing. Still, she charged through the darkened corridor on the second floor, hoping to pick up on where he was hiding, and knowing it was probably a futile exercise. After all, how did one uncover a ghost if that ghost did not want to be found? It wasn’t hide-and-seek. She couldn’t just look in a closet or under a bed and, Aha!—There you are! Nope, in that respect, Cael definitely had the upper hand.

  After much stomping, Emmie was fairly certain the second floor was empty. So was the third floor. There was still the ground level and below stairs, but she had little hope those areas of the house would prove any more successful.

  Frustrated, she wandered back to the grand staircase, her ire markedly deflated. She paused in front of the enameled Rococo mirror mounted above the upper landing.

  “C’mon Cael,” she implored in a whisper. “I don’t know what you want from me, but you’ve got to help me figure it out here.”

  A small, almost imperceptible movement to her right caught her attention. Emmie stared ahead, eyes wide, tracking the movement in her peripheral vision. She did not want to turn her head, to look on the source directly.

  Because, on her right… there was nothing but the mirror.

  Someone was in the corridor behind her. Coming towards her. Inch by inch, Emmie turned around, breath suspended, to confront whomever was there.

  The corridor was empty.

  Yet, when she turned back to the mirror, there most definitely was someone there. Cael. He was standing about ten feet behind her, directly beneath the plaster arch that separated the corridor from the landing.

  The sight of him took Emmie’s breath away, and she forgot all about being upset with him. She stared, in awe of the figure before her, reflected in the mirror.

  He looked apologetic. He knew he’d done wrong to Dean, and he was sorry for having displeased her. Funny thing was, Emmie couldn’t recall the reason why she was displeased with him. She was like an animal caught in headlights, blinded, and powerless to turn away even though the consequences might prove disastrous.

  She dared not breathe as he walked forward. His eyes were trained on her, watching her through the glass. And at some point, though she couldn’t quite
determine when, the glass was no longer there. It had sort of melted away along with her reflection, and Emmie hadn’t even noticed until Cael stopped directly in front of her. He held out his hand, solid and three-dimensional, inviting her to take it.

  He was inviting her to step through the mirror—or, through where the mirror had been. He was asking her to come with him into that other world, the one of memory, illusions and half-truths. Incomplete truths which prevented a man from understanding his own death.

  This wasn’t like last time. It wasn’t a dream, nor was it being forced upon her. She was being given a choice. She could take his hand and follow him, or she could turn around and walk away and remain at Tullybrae. Instinctively, Emmie sensed that her choice, whichever one she made, would be significant. It was the answer to an ultimatum he’d given her the first time he’d brought her into his world. Either she belonged to him, or she did not.

  There was no deciding for Emmie. She already knew that she would let him take her wherever he wanted. She knew even before her arm lifted and her hand slipped comfortably into his.

  When his fingers tightened over hers, the hope, the expectation and the fear that had written themselves on his rather expressive face blossomed into an aura of joy.

  She stepped forward, her own heart joyful, and as she passed through the invisible boundary that separated her reality from his, the world as she knew it fell away. In its place, the walls of a castle took shape. The close, creaking interior of Tullybrae morphed into the drafty passageways and flagstone floors that she’d seen before. Around them, echoes of the past rippled on the currents of air that made the lit torches dance and undulate.

  Cael led them. Though Emmie did not know where he was taking her, or what he meant for her to see, she trusted him. Through the narrow passageways, down steep stone steps and along smoke-filled corridors she let herself be led. Farther and farther down they went until she thought they must be descending into the bowels of the earth, and then back up again, into a large, cave-like space. It had high, wide, uncovered windows, and it was very clearly the kitchens.

  If only she knew what castle this was. Did it still exist, or was Cael’s memory all that was left of this place?

  The chambers—several open spaces that were linked together by thick stone columns like honeycomb—bustled with life. The kitchen staff, mostly men, were engaged in preparing all manner of food. They darted between tables and countertops, punching pastry dough, preparing meats, chopping root vegetables and greens, onions and herbs. A spit boy sat by the large open hearth, looking thoroughly miserable as he cranked an iron handle slowly and mechanically.