“No, Chase. I’m not a ghost. I’m a real woman. I’m…I’m still your wife and duty-bound to care for you.”
“Susanna, there are things I must say to you.” The whiskey had put color back in his cheeks and had loosened his tongue as well.
“Doctor, perhaps you can come back later. Or, if you prefer to stay, which you are welcome to do, you could go down and take some breakfast and coffee. Ingrid has made plenty.”
“Oh, that sounds delightful. Thank you, thank you, lady.” This was not the doctor who had cared for me, but he was also from the Ramparts and I liked him from the little I knew about him. Once he was gone, Chase grabbed my hands. That frightened me; I hoped he wouldn’t tear open his wounds again.
“Kiss me, Susanna. Tell me you have forgiven me. All I could think was to come see you. I don’t know what happened to me—I must have been shot when I got out of the carriage that night. How long have I been here?”
“Just a week,” I said as I gave him another shot of whiskey.
“I suppose I went mad for a little while. My father told me that you and Ambrose had planned for months to steal our fortune, and at first I didn’t believe him. But the night…that night, something within me snapped. I believed him that night, and I was a fool for doing so. I love you, Susanna. I should have known that this was all Ambrose’s doing. He hates me beyond reason. He’s always hated me. That’s why he stole you from me. But then I heard that he was toying with Athena’s cousin, Coquette, and I knew he must have tired of you. Whatever passed between us, let it end now. Let it end. I love you, my darling. I am sorry for what I have done to us. I let you spend time with him knowing that he was an evil man. Please, my own love, forgive me. And may our daughter forgive me.”
He rambled on and cried, and my heart believed him. It was nine o’clock in the morning; the windows were open for anyone to see us here on the third floor. Sunlight filled the room, and all I could do was cry. I climbed into the bed with him and cried. He held me close and whispered, “My own, Susanna, my darling, my love. I promised to honor and protect you, and I failed you. I listened to my father, and I lost you. Please tell me. I haven’t lost you forever, have I?”
I couldn’t answer. I could only cry. Chase held me for a long time, and when the door creaked open I didn’t care who found us together. All was right in my world once again.
“Miss Susanna, I am leaving for the shop now. Do you need anything? Should I set your tray here?”
“Yes, Ingrid. Thank you.” I noticed that she smiled at me, and I smiled back. It was a rare thing to see her smile. “You can send the doctor away too. We don’t need him anymore.”
“Very well. Rest well, Mister Chase.”
He nodded but never took his eyes off me. After she left he whispered, “Are we alone, Susanna?”
“Yes, I think so. There may be a housekeeper downstairs, but she won’t come up unless I summon her.”
“I scarcely dare to ask what I am about to ask. Make love to me, Susanna. I want to see my wife, to love her, to keep her, to have her. Please don’t deny me your love, not one more day. Have mercy on this poor, wretched creature.”
I got up and closed the door. He had a serious wound, but I could see that other parts of him worked perfectly, for he’d pulled the cover back to show me his strong body. I locked the door and shed my clothes too. What would it be like to lie with Chase after being with Ambrose for so long? Ambrose knew every curve of my body and knew exactly which ones needed attention. I felt an unexpected twinge of guilt as I walked to the bedside.
But this was my husband, the man I married before God. This could only be right.
“Let me see you, my beauty, my own wife. You’ll have to help me, Susanna.” Chase’s beautiful face held such desire for me that I could not deny him. I would not! For I wanted him too.
“And will you stay with me, Chase? Are you going to cast me off again? I don’t think my heart can take such torment again.” I lay beside him in the sweaty cotton sheets. The day was warming quickly.
He kissed my forehead softly, and the whiskey on his breath smelled spicy and sweet. I kissed his lips, and in that instant the hardness of my heart faded away. It was gone. I loved Chase Dufresne with all my heart, it was true. What I had with Ambrose had been a dream only.
We are soul mates, Susanna… I seemed to hear him whisper in my ear. I spun about in the bed but saw no one there.
“What is it, love?”
“I thought I heard a voice.”
The whiskey made him woozy, and he smiled flirtatiously, “Listen to my voice, my darling. We are one, you and I, just like the priest said. Please make love to me. Let us reconcile in truth, Susanna. I care not what happens tomorrow. I care only about you and me and right now.”
And I obeyed him. We made sweet love. We lost ourselves in the beauty of our bodies, and once a desire was sated, another arose. The love we made love was a kind of healing love, and when we were finished we were spent.
“Only once more, my love. Once more. I must feel you again.” He’d drunk more whiskey and was feeling no pain now. As our frenzied desire again drew to a conclusion, the door to the room swung open. I could not see who it was; Chase’s back was in the way. Then I heard a gunshot, and Chase fell off me and onto the floor in a heap. When the smoke cleared and I stopped screaming, I could see that the bullet had grazed my shoulder and I was covered in my husband’s blood.
His murderer stood in the doorway. It was not who I expected at all. It was Chase’s right-hand wife, Athena Pelham Dufresne. Her freakishly large eyes stared at me, and they were full of hate.
After a few seconds she put the gun down. The shot never came. She lowered her weapon, then walked over to him and shot him again. Then she turned to me. “I will not kill you, for death is too good for you. Besides, tonight my cousin Coquette will do away with Ambrose Dufresne. He will be dead too. And then we women will be free!” She laughed so hard that she slapped the table under which Chase’s body lay. It was then that I noticed she was pregnant. And had been for many months.
“I never want to see your face again, Susanna. Do not come to Sugar Hill, or I will kill you. Just as I killed my unfaithful husband—and yours. You should thank me, you know. All these Dufresne men are devils. Even Ambrose. He would have seduced me too, if I had let him. Told me I was his soul mate, if you can believe that.” She waved the gun around as if it were a toy. “Goodbye for the last time, Susanna.”
She walked out of the smoke-filled room, glancing at our husband’s corpse one last time. When I thought it was safe, I slid down to the floor besides Chase. He was dead. He was most assuredly dead. I curled up beside him and held his body until Nicole finally came upstairs with the sheriff. The next few hours were a mist of despair.
I was shaken from my reverie when Ingrid appeared, back from the shop and terribly upset. “Miss Susanna! We must leave here! The Ramparts are on fire—that madwoman Coquette and her cousin Athena have set the place on fire. They want to kill us all! Grab your bag and let’s go! They are evacuating our street.” I stepped out on the porch and could see she was telling the truth. The family in the Black House across the street was packing in a mad rush and screaming in fear as the fires inched closer to our street.
“What about Chase? I can’t leave his body here.”
“Fine, we’ll bring him with us, miss, but we have to go.”
We raced into the house, and the two of us dragged Chase’s body to the carriage, where my driver helped us get him inside. I had my purse, my ledger and not much else. We rode away and left the Ramparts before the fire destroyed everything. Hundreds of men appeared with pails of water, attempting to save the buildings that were already blazing. Grainger drove us deeper into the Ramparts. Didn’t he know we had to get away?
“What are you doing?” Ingrid called to him.
“I’m not leaving without Mister Ambrose. It’s not far!”
Ingrid began to argue, but I told her to let it go. T
here had been too much death recently. Too much of everything. I laid Chase’s head in my lap and kept him close to me as the carriage banged across knots, stumps and whatever else it could find. Soon we were stopped in front of a house. Grainger hopped down and ran toward the building.
“Oh goodness. This will kill old Grainger. He loves Ambrose like a son.” How did I not know that? “He’s surely dead, if he’s inside there, miss.” I got out too. I stood in front of Coquette’s house and waited for some sign that Ambrose was safe. None came.
Then I heard him whisper in my ear, “You are my soul mate, Susanna Serene. You always will be.” I collapsed on the ground before the little white two-story house that burned. Someone picked me up and put me back in the carriage and we rode away to Sugar Hill.
I don’t know what I expected to happen, but I didn’t expect to find that Athena had abandoned the place, that she’d admitted to her father she had killed her husband. No, I didn’t expect that at all. We took Chase inside and laid him out in the dining room. There would be many funerals tomorrow. From what we heard from the servants at Sugar Hill, the fire had all but destroyed the houses on the north end of the road. Thorn Hill alone had survived. But I would never return there. As much as Chase might have wanted me to, I wouldn’t. I would never leave his side again. He would lie at rest here, at Sugar Hill. And when I died, I would go with him. At last.
You are my soul mate, Susanna Serene. You belong to me.
I closed the front door and pretended I did not hear him. I closed my heart to him completely. He’d lied to me about a great many things, I soon discovered. I found a plethora of information about Ambrose in Arthur’s old desk. For example, I never knew until much later that he had been Chase’s half-brother, the son of Arthur and his left-hand wife. And to think, the old man had told the world that his son was his nephew. Shameful. Just for that, I burned his mausoleum the same night the Ramparts burned down.
Nine months later, I gave birth to twin boys; one was blond, with pink skin and a serious nature, and the other had dark, shiny eyes, olive skin and a mouth that never stopped screaming or searching for my breast. It was if the half-brothers were born again, and the thought frightened me. I would raise my sons, Dominick and Champion, to the best of my ability, and I would pray they would become better than their fathers. For I believed with all my heart that I bore a child to each man. Somehow, that had to be true. Their lines continued.
I prayed they would be better men than either.
Epilogue
Jessica Chesterfield
I volunteered to watch the grill while Jamie went in search of more ketchup. He was quiet, pensive, but who could blame him? He’d been under the influence of a determined spirit. It was good of Avery to give him a second chance, but my “sensitivity” told me that they weren’t quite right for each other. No. Something wasn’t quite right with Jamie. Not just yet.
And it was nice that Avery wanted to have this shindig for us before we rolled out of here in the morning. I lobbied to stay longer, but the Paranormal Channel had somewhere else quite a ways from here for us to explore. I never expected to explore a mine, but apparently that was where we were headed. Some haunted mine up at Ruby Falls in upper Alabama near the Tennessee state line. I hated the idea of leaving here. We’d only scratched the surface of the paranormal activity at Sugar Hill. What had we learned? What had I learned? I learned that there was so much more to paranormal investigation than classifications, shadows and whispers. At the heart of most hauntings there were people, some living and some dead. I hoped I never forgot that, no matter how high our ratings got—and believe me, they were high now.
Jamie gave me a thumbs-up, and I smiled proudly. It was nice to be me again, just plain old me. Not sensitive, psychic me. Just Jessica Chesterfield, plain-Jane girl, chronic doodler and aspiring artist. Jamie took over his spot at the grill, and I pulled my notepad out of my knapsack. I found a nearby bench and began sketching an early blooming azalea bush, but my attention soon shifted to the gazebo. I could see it quite clearly from here. It was old and in need of repair; it looked like it should be torn down, but it was still standing. I was glad to see that.
But I didn’t draw it as it was. I drew it as I saw it with my heart. I saw it painted white, the green vines wrapping around the lattice, the faces of stone children poking out from the topiaries. Yes, I could almost imagine being inside the gazebo. I could see the two together, the man and the woman. They both had dark hair, his face handsome and fierce-looking, his full lips longing to kiss hers. I saw her tremble as she removed the pins from her hair. With a look of pure desire, she slid out of her gown and stood before him.
And I sketched. He watched her, wanted her, desired her more than life itself…
My pencil shuffled across the page.
“Jessica! Have you gone deaf? Do you want one or two?”
“What?”
Megan was looking at me like I had two heads. She didn’t even notice the sketchbook in my hands. “One hamburger or two? Jamie wants to know.”
“Oh. One, please. No mustard.” She went off to tell him, and I turned back to my sketch. I stared at it like I’d never seen it before. What had I drawn? Where did that come from? I shook my head and rubbed my fingers over the pictures. Then Avery stood beside me and looked down at the pages.
“You see them too?” she asked.
“Yes, I see them. They haven’t left. I wonder if they’ll always be here.”
She smiled sadly and said nothing else as she examined the page. She touched Ambrose’s face with her fingers, and then Reed came to whisper in her ear. She forgot about Ambrose for a moment—that was good. She went with Reed, and they walked down a path to another part of the garden. Jamie didn’t appear to notice. He probably should have.
One day she would have to choose. And soon. I wondered if she knew that.
As surely as I knew my own name, I knew I would be back here. I would be back at Sugar Hill. One day, Avery would call me, and I would come back. Somehow, we were connected now. All of us were connected.
“Hello, Handsome,” I said to the older man as he slipped quietly into the party through a gap in the hedge. He carried a basket of peaches in his hands. Nobody else seemed to notice him. “Those look like delicious peaches. May I have one?”
“Yes, but just one. These are for Miss Avery. She likes peaches.”
I agreed to take just one, and as I reached for it, I listened. It was as if I could hear a radio playing somewhere, an old familiar song.
“You feeling all right?” Concern clouded Handsome’s face.
“Must be a radio playing somewhere, ’cause I thought I heard jazz. I think it was Billie Holiday.”
Handsome smiled so big I thought his face would split. “You heard her too! Yeah, she’s singing. Singing up a storm, like she always does when there’s trouble a-brewing.”
“Is trouble brewing?”
“Yes, ma’am. There’s always trouble brewing these days. But we’ll be here. Me and Miss Billie. We’ll be here.”
“I am glad to hear that, Handsome. And I’ll be here too. Whenever I hear the music, I’ll come. I’ll help.”
“You promise? Miss Billie don’t sing for everyone. She likes you, though. She sings for you.”
“Yes, I’ll always come. I will never let her down—or you, Handsome.” I dug in my pocket for a business card. This was the first time I’d ever given one away. “Take this. Call me if you hear her singing again and she mentions my name. I want to help you—and Avery. Please call me, Handsome.”
“I will, Jessica. I will.”
He hugged my neck and handed me an extra peach. We sat on the bench together, eating the juicy peaches and listening to the music. Handsome sang loudly, and soon I was singing with him.
There was no reason to pretend I couldn’t hear Billie. Let Mike and Megan think I was crazy. I didn’t care. Becker wasn’t around; he was undoubtedly saying his goodbyes to Summer Dufresne. No, that couldn
’t be right. She was over by the grill flirting with Jamie. I wondered where Becker had gone, but I didn’t bother to find him. I listened to the music and sang along with Billie.
I wouldn’t leave this place for long. Then I had a thought. A true thought. I knew it was true as soon as I thought it.
When I return here, I will never again leave.
It didn’t matter. Whatever that meant, it didn’t matter because at least I could finally hear the music.
Blood by Candlelight
Sugar Hill Book 3
This book is dedicated to Nancy Drew, Velma Dinkley, and Jill Munroe.
I hope I made you proud.
She comes not when Noon is on the roses—
Too bright is Day.
She comes not to the Soul till it reposes
From work and play.
But when Night is on the hills, and the great Voices
Roll in from Sea,
By starlight and by candlelight and dreamlight
She comes to me.
She Comes Not When Noon Is on the Roses
Herbert Trench, 1865-1923
Prologue
Susanna Serene Dufresne
Sugar Hill 1837
From the bright, empty Mirror Room, I watched the three of them, their three young heads together, laughing and walking, stopping at points of interest on the grounds of Sugar Hill. I couldn’t hear their voices, but I had been young once. These conversations would not be very different from the ones I had with Ambrose and Chase all those years ago, young and foolish as we had been.
I fought the urge to scream at them and force them out of that happy place, for it would do no good. Young hearts always believe they are the wisest. From my vantage point, I observed them as they navigated the wide swathes of the flower-lined walkways in the gardens below. Annalee walked in the center, and Dominick and Champion took turns linking their muscular arms with hers. They largely avoided one another outside of her company, but when she was with them, they appeared happy and animated. It was almost summer now, and the yellow verbena had begun to bloom, the heady flowers sagging in the afternoon Alabama heat. Had it really been sixteen years since we’d arrived at Sugar Hill? Sixteen years I’d been without Chase? I glanced at myself in the mirror. Yes, clearly it had been.
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