His Haunted Heart

by Lila Felix

  “I’ll accept your terms. But you owe me. You do know the rules about owing me, don’t you?”

  A hand on her hip and a cut of her eyes—she knew the rules for sure. I could call in her debt anytime I wanted.

  With my forehead pressed against the rugged bark of the tree, I waited for her to ascend to the place I’d once called my second home, though it was little more than stray wood nailed into a tree.

  “You can look now, Porter.”

  Warmth radiated in my chest when she said my name. I made my way up the board nailed to the trunk, my makeshift ladder, until I reached the top. The stars shone brighter up here and the air was filtered, only allowing the purest of breaths and the clearest of dreams. The fog could be seen below, hovering, waving its hands over the surface of the pond, casting a cotton blanket over the land.

  And my wife, she was almost brand new to me here. Well, she was still new, but getting to know her was a joy—not the hassle I’d imagined. She swayed back and forth while perched on the edge of the unkempt flat, staring at the lightning bugs in the distance. A finger drew lines in the air, moving from one to the other. She was either drawing an invisible picture or counting them.

  By the light of the moon, she was no longer someone I tasked with saving my life or ridding me of my loneliness. She was beautiful, inside and out.

  “How many?” I asked, guessing that she was, in fact, counting them.

  Her shoulders sagged and a giggle escaped her mouth. “I lost count.”

  “My fault?”

  She shook her head. “No. I got distracted by their beauty. This place seems like a dream. The fog, the lights in the sky—like I stumbled into a fairy tale.”

  After a length of overthinking, I put my arm around her back and barely touched her waist. Delilah stiffened beside me and I thought I’d made a dire mistake.

  Until she scooted closer, resting her head on my shoulder.

  “How often do you leave?” she asked in a whisper.

  “Sometimes once or twice a week. Sometimes, I have to stay for longer trips.”

  I valued my trips away from The Rogue when I was engaged to Marie. Her constant nagging to go with me to buy her clothes, more clothes, and baubles than anyone ever needed, made it a vacation from my life and the fiancé that was more like an anchor than a sail.

  “Would you want to go with me sometime?”

  The proposition was out of my mouth before I could rein it in.

  She backed off enough to look me in the face but still remained in the circle of my arm. “Why?”

  “Why not?” I countered. “You’re my wife. My mother used to travel with my father. It’s a bit of a shock to the system the first few times. You don’t have to—I just thought…”

  She resumed her previous posture. It wasn’t a yes, but it wasn’t a no, either.

  “Would I have to wear different clothes?”

  I sighed. Most of the women of the outside weren’t kept to the older standards that women of The Rogue were. If the Constable or any male saw a woman dressed inappropriately, she would be reprimanded at once. Even the women who were known to work at The Plots dressed in a pious manner in comparison to those on the outside world.

  I would be the first to admit that the outside had a magnetism. The underlying slither of sinful freedom became a pull. I drank alcohol in the outside world, which was forbidden here. I smoked cigars and watched movies that made my mother’s books seem like nursery rhymes.

  Nausea rolled through my stomach at the thought of Delilah in that world. Her innocence and purity was something I’d expected, but over the course of the day I, had learned to cherish it. Delilah was how The Rogue began—she was this innocence that the founders had hidden away from the world to protect.

  My arm tightened around her waist at the thought of someone taking that away—dimming that iridescence I saw in her that I hadn’t seen in someone for a long time.

  It was my charge to protect it—to protect her.

  “Let’s forget about it for now. I’ve handled everything so that I could stay here for a week or so. There’s no rush for you to make a decision.”

  “A week is a long time.”

  “Is it? I bet it goes by like a flash. Today certainly did.”

  Movement in the distance caught my eye and I knew what it was before bringing it into focus. Just like her lover, Marie lurked in the distance, under trees, below the cover of rain. She’d always been a coward, but it had become worse in death. She had always appeared to me as a small child in her ghost form. I chalked it up to her obsession with age and beauty. If she was young in her after-life, then her shallow fears of growing old and growing ugly would never come to fruition.

  “You’re going to think me mad,” Delilah breathed next to me.

  “What?”

  “Do you see her too?”

  She didn’t point, but her eyes told me where she looked.

  “I see her every once in a while.” The fact that twice in one day Delilah had seen Marie scared me more than I had been the first time I’d seen the ghost for myself. She didn’t do much to me, simply floated around the grounds.

  “She changes.” My wife intonated the fact like she still didn’t believe her eyes. And I couldn’t believe my ears. I didn’t understand how Marie was appearing to Delilah or why.

  “How?”

  A shiver caused me to quake. I didn’t like that my former life and the one that I’d chosen were intersecting.

  “I first saw her when you were at my door—at my parent’s house. She was not more than a year old, standing in the rain. The second time was in the foyer, right inside the door. That was yesterday. She was a little older, maybe three or so. I could see right through her.”

  I leaned my face against her hair. She smelled like lilacs and lavender and I took the opportunity to breathe her in. “Why didn’t you tell me? Weren’t you frightened?”

  “Eliza was there. She said it was an older property. I thought things like that may happen all the time. And it was hours after our wedding. I didn’t want you to think you’d married a mental case.”

  “Look at me, Delilah.”

  Her thin body turned, but her eyes remained downcast. I placed my finger under her chin and tipped it gently, wanting to see her eyes when I told her. Finally her gaze traveled the length of my face until landing right where I wanted it to be. Her eyelashes were killer—making the brilliance of the blue come to life.

  “Delilah, I want you to know that you are safe with me. If this is going to work, we can have no lies or secrets. I’ve seen enough around here not to be surprised by anything you have to say. I know your life has been filled with strife, but I will protect you as best I can.”

  My body begged me to hold on to her closer, to press her against my chest and feel her heartbeat next to mine.

  “I’ve kept secrets all my life.”

  I sighed and thought of a way to get someone who barely knew me to believe what I had to say. “But we give those things up when we enter a marriage. Nothing you can say will make me forsake you—nothing.”

  I let the notion settle with both of us. She’d agreed with a nod of the head, but the proof would reveal itself in the coming days.

  Delilah resembled a fairy, dangling her legs back and forth over the edge—the slight wind fueling the dance of several strands of hair around her face. Her tomorrow eyes never missed a thing, flitting back and forth across the sky, considering every object that I’d taken for granted.

  A smile tipped at the corner of my mouth. She was exquisite beyond anything I’d ever known could be.

  There was no scar in this light—only her.

  “I almost forgot. I have something for you.”

  “You’ve given me so much. Please, not another thing.”

  “This one is more for me than you.” Her face canted, her doubt evident. “I’m serious. This one proves that we are married. It will relieve me of the guilt I carry for not bringing it to the churc
h.”

  I slipped two rings from my pocket. One was my father’s and one was my grandmother’s. The ring I intended to give my rose-faced bride was an antique. Its vintage styling was simple, yet elegant. A silver band met in a love knot underneath a sapphire. The color bowed in shame to the color of Delilah’s eyes. I presented it to her on an open hand, the only packaging I had.

  If I could’ve, I would’ve opened up my heart and offered it to her as well.

  Her gasp told me nothing. Marie had gasped as well, but hers was a gasp of repulsion. The ring wasn’t new or gold—expectations I hadn’t adhered to.

  “You don’t like it.” I came to the conclusion right away.

  “I love it, Porter. It’s the most beautiful ring I’ve ever seen.” Her voice didn’t falter—her words rang true.

  Her fingers, cold and slim, shook when I took her hand and pushed the ring onto her finger. The fit was perfect.

  “I have one too,” I told her for no good reason.

  I showed it to her for a brief second and then fit it over the top of my finger to show her my commitment to the deal we were silently making for the second time.

  “No, let me.” Her eyes widened.

  “Sure.”

  She pushed it into my ring finger and then turned it around a few times for good measure. I thought to call in my favor—to ask her to taste the lips that I’d watched talk and laugh the whole day through.

  No, I would hold onto it.

  Because when and if Delilah Jeansonne ever kissed me it would be of her own free will.

  Chapter Seven

  Delilah

  The first thing I felt the next morning was not the pull of a yawn in my throat or the sting of morning’s first light—it was the new weight wound around my ring finger.

  I’d been afraid to breathe too heavily the night before of fear that it might just all fall apart.

  I stayed under the covers with my eyes closed, allowing the fantasy to relive itself in my mind over and over until the promise of the day’s events pried me from them.

  Excuse after excuse popped into my head, explaining and rationalizing his behavior—his words—the glint in his eyes.

  He was drunk.

  He was caught in a fit of temporary insanity.

  He’d been infected by the plague and the fever was frying his brain.

  It went on and on until I’d convinced myself it was all a farce.

  I’d mentally declared it was time to put my thoughts aside and rise from the bed, determined to make this day anew instead of merely trying to extend that night.

  That’s when I felt it. A touch on my hand, so light and gentle that if not for the coldness it contained, I would’ve blamed it on a draft. My body stilled—including my heart.

  My eyes roamed the room against the will of my body, searching for the owner of a touch that could chill me to the bone. I saw nothing. Bits of dust floated in the air, the sunlight peering through the splice in the curtains making it look like tiny angels.

  Yet no one was in my room and nothing could explain the touch I’d felt.

  A giggle broke free of my mouth; what a silly thing to get scared over. The sheets had probably just brushed over the top of my hand.

  I heard noises below, making me think the house helpers were busy with their day. It made me feel lazy and useless.

  After choosing an empire-waist burgundy dress, I pulled open the wardrobe to get my new boots. Next to them were almost a half-dozen other pairs, all in different colors and skins.

  This was ridiculous.

  Porter was spoiling the wrong girl.

  I chose the same pair of boots he’d given me the night before in order to circumvent a discussion about them. This way I could pretend that I hadn’t seen the others.

  I just hoped to God that he didn’t ask me. I wasn’t a very good liar.

  After brushing out my hair and bundling it into a bun that made a few locks fall along the side of my face, I walked downstairs, bound and determined to make myself useful, setting my childish fantasies aside for the third time that morning.

  Pushing open the swinging door between the entryway and the kitchen, I heard the voices of my breakfast company from the day before.

  “There she is. Just in time.” I denied the flop of my heart at the absence of Porter. A good night’s sleep had probably woken him up and cleared his head.

  Or his fever broke.

  Or he took a pill for his temporary insanity.

  “I’m sorry. I slept a little too well.”

  Though I was told that my mother in law would be leaving the day after we were married, I was glad she’d never left.

  Eliza patted my shoulder and handed me a platter of breakfast, gesturing with her finger for me to bring it to the dining room. I ate in silence, sipping the lemony tea made entirely too sweet for my taste and listening to the chatter of the older women of the house.

  “He doesn’t eat breakfast. It’s just his way.”

  I looked up to find June had predicted the reason for my wordless behavior.

  “I remember.”

  “Looks to me like he gave you a lot to think about.” She gestured to my ring finger, holding up her own.

  “There’s nothing to think about. It’s done.”

  June and Eliza exchanged a glance.

  That morning, I was allowed to help with the dishes under the protests of June throughout the process. I had to find ways to occupy my time, didn’t she understand that?

  “What’s that noise?” Before I could register the noise Eliza referred to, she answered her own question. “Get Porter, now June, like the devil is on your heels.”

  I dried off my hands while Eliza shuffled us both toward the back of the house, near Porter’s office.

  “You decide what to do here. No one is forcing you to do anything.”

  I opened my mouth to question her state of panic, but Porter entered the hallway before I could.

  “Mother, June, stay in my office or the kitchen. Keep your ears open. Delilah, you come with me.”

  Grabbing my hand, he practically dragged me into the foyer and went about straightening his shirt and giving me a once-over.

  “What is going on?” I found my voice and demanded an answer.

  “Your parents are here. I suspected that they would show up. Your father hinted to the fact that the money I gave him might not be enough. I didn’t think it would be this quick or I would’ve gotten you out of here.”

  I shuddered at his first sentence. The rest of his words blurred out.

  “You gave him money? You bought me?”

  This wasn’t the time or the place to be angry, but damn it all to hell if I wasn’t furious.

  At the same time I understood and was grateful.

  “Listen to me.” Porter grabbed my shoulder with one hand and centered my chin with the other, his thumb and forefinger grabbing it. “This is your home. You are my wife. They cannot do anything to harm you here or I will show them the meaning of abuse. You do not belong to them anymore.”

  Finally coming to my senses, I grabbed his hands and implored him. “If you give them more money, they’ll never stop.”

  A smile brought one side of his mouth up and the hand which was holding my chin left mine and cupped my left cheek—the one with the scar. “I know. Thank you.”

  I stared at him; his gray eyes held the same caress as the night before. For a tick of a second, his gaze moved down my lips. I tucked them in on instinct, uncomfortable with the insinuations my mind was making about his change.

  But completely curious at the same time.

  His thumb left my face and trailed a frustrating path along my already sensitive bottom lip.

  “Another time, Delilah.”

  The sounds of horses snapped him out of our moment and into another mode. He held my hand and I trailed behind him while he surveyed the situation from a window.

  “Your sisters and their husbands are here as well. Run and get m
y mother and June. Tell June to get tea ready and I want my mother with us to distract from any confrontation. Go!”

  I did what I was told. It was the one thing I was good at.

  “He says to get tea ready and Eliza, you’re wanted with us. The whole family is here.”

  Eliza groaned. “Haven’t they done enough damage? The gall of these people. Oh, sorry dear.”

  “Please don’t apologize. I’ve said many a worse word about them inside my head.”

  We circumvented the niceties and went into the parlor and stoked the fire, ready for my wretched family’s descent on what was otherwise a piece of heaven.

  “Look at me, child.”

  My motherin-law was dead serious.

  “These people are visitors in your home—your home. They cannot make you feel like they did before without your permission. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to my Porter. A mother knows these things.”

  She winked at me at the same time I heard the front door open. I fisted the bunching of fabric on my lap at the sound of my father’s cantankerous cackle.

  Porter led the pack into the sitting room. Eliza and I rose but I couldn’t make myself meet their eyes.

  “What a sight!” my mother heckled.

  I kept my eyes firm on my husband. If it weren’t for his wink I wouldn’t have even remembered to breathe.

  “Looks like the ugly chit hit the jackpot.” I heard Adele whisper just quiet enough as not to be conceived as rude but loud enough to offend.

  “We didn’t expect your visit today. June will be in soon with the tea.”

  “You’ve got servants?” my father said, looking around the place like he was assessing the wealth of the wallpaper.

  “We have a few—not many. I tend to do a lot of the work myself, though I didn’t want Delilah to be bogged down with cooking or cleaning.”

  My left eyebrow pulsed toward my forehead in disbelief. He’d had the cook and the maid long before my arrival.

  “Well, it must be nice to have people to help with the housework. My wrists and knuckles are always swollen from the amount of scrubbing it takes to keep my home in pristine condition.”

  I tried not to snicker the best way I knew how, by grinding my lips between my teeth.