Just as Jefferson had predicted, the man from the front desk had been watching the security cameras and was now running in to find out why two kids had broken into the pool.
“Give that to me,” Jefferson whispered, pulling the paper from my hand and placing it in his pocket.
He put his arm around me and ushered me out of the stall, confusing me to no end before I remembered our little act from the tour earlier. It also didn’t escape my notice that he pulled the gold wedding ring from his pocket once more and slid it on.
Why the boy kept a wedding ring in his pocket, I’d never know.
“Are you sure you heard them in here, darling?” he asked me.
“Darling?” Deacon repeated in disgust.
“They’re married, stupid,” Brighton said.
“Excuse me, but what are you two doing in here?” Van, our tour guide from the ghosts tour asked. He looked like he thought dealing with a crazy woman twice in one day was way beyond his pay grade.
“I thought I heard children playing in the pool,” I answered, trying to look fragile. “I swore I hear them and I was so worried they’d gotten locked in here, just like I did on the tour, so I forced my husband to break in so we could get them out.”
The damsel-in-distress act seemed to work wonders when confronted with young men.
“Darling, why don’t you go sit down outside for a minute,” Jefferson said, giving me a meaningful look that I didn’t quite understand.
“I’m fine,” I said back to him, not wanting to leave.
“Trust me. Go sit outside.”
“Fine,” I mumbled, dropping the act the second I passed the tour guide.
I sullenly walked into the hallway and fleetingly wondered if Jefferson was murdering our poor tour guide and hiding his body somewhere. I then had to wonder what kind of weirdo that made me, since I had stopped for a split second and seriously considered, maybe, possibly, sort of kissing that sociopathic boy just because we’d found physical evidence of paranormal activity.
Jefferson was saying something to the tour guide, but I was too lost in my own self-analysis to listen.
Kicking at an uneven spot on the carpet and silently blaming Brighton and her crazy theories for my odd moment of insanity, I heard a giggle over my earpiece.
“What?” I asked them.
“Jefferson is telling that guy that you have night terrors and sometimes see things that aren’t there,” Brighton informed me.
“I know he’s good at what he does, but I’m going to kill that Parrish one day,” I said, just as the Parrish in question joined me in the hallway with Van.
The desk clerk gave Jefferson an understanding nod before turning to lock the door once more, and Jefferson put his arm around my shoulders, guiding his “unstable wife” up the stairs.
“Are you guys on your way back?” Deacon asked in my earpiece.
“Almost there,” Jefferson confirmed.
Neither of us spoke to each other, which was fine by me. I didn’t need a lecture about jeopardizing our investigation with my sudden burst of enthusiasm over possibly finding a clue. Of course, that was what had led us to the paper in the pool, so it seemed like any argument against me would be a moot point.
My guess was that the paper was the only thing that kept Jefferson from scolding me as we approached Brighton’s room, but even so, I was gearing up for a fight, knowing I was in the right on this one.
Stopping outside her door, Jefferson turned to me, locking his intense eyes on my face. He pulled his earpiece out and turned it off before reaching up and pulling mine out as well. I looked at him questioningly but didn’t speak, knowing it was best to let Jefferson play out whatever weird act he was putting on.
“It’s really good that we found this note,” he said slowly, keeping his voice quiet so that Brighton and Deacon wouldn’t hear us on the other side of the door.
“But?” I prompted, knowing I was about to get in trouble.
“No but,” he said. “I just want to stress to you how dangerous it can be to go running off after ghosts. I know you were excited, and your skills paid off. But you have to be careful.”
I balked slightly at the unexpected kindness, almost at a loss for words. Was Jefferson really concerned about my well-being? And more importantly, had the world’s least controlled man told me to have more self-control?
“I know it can be exciting sometimes,” he went on, sounding much too human. “Making contact with the other side. But you still have to take your own safety into account.”
“But they wanted us to find this paper, Jefferson,” I said, interrupting his rare moment of sweetness. “They led us to the pool to help us. I can’t just ignore a clue that’s literally been handed to me.”
“Just please promise me you’ll be more careful in the future. Try to show a little restraint.”
“Really?” I asked. “You’re going to lecture me on restraint? The guy with the shadiest ‘emergency kit’ I’ve ever seen?”
Jefferson opened his mouth to speak, but shut it again. My guess was that he had something rude he wanted to say to me but just didn’t feel like fighting with me anymore.
“Right,” he finally said. He turned away from me and pushed the wedged-open door to Brighton’s cabin, leaving me to glare at his back before following him inside.
“Have you looked at the paper yet?” Deacon asked.
Brighton was sitting in her normal position on the bed, surrounded by computers and Xanax.
“Of course not,” Jefferson said, sounding indignant that Deacon thought we’d look at our clue without him.
I sat next to Jefferson but tried not to touch him, still a little miffed about our disagreement. Really, he had been making sure I was okay and I should have appreciated that. But the fact that all three of my friends thought I was slightly crazy for doing what needed to be done to find this clue made me mad. Where would we have been if I hadn’t been so “unrestrained”?
“This note,” Jefferson began, looking down at the crisp white paper and studying it. “Looks brand new. I’m not sure it’s our clue.”
I sighed. “Just because it’s new doesn’t mean it’s not what we were sent here to find.”
“Well, don’t just sit there,” Deacon practically shouted. “Read it.”
Our anticipation was suffocating.
“I need to go and collect my sweetheart,” Jefferson began.
“A love letter?” I asked.
Jefferson ignored me and continued reading. “Eva lost her job last year after the tragic passing of the woman of the house, Alice Littlefield. I’ll be in touch when I can.”
We were all silent for a moment.
This sounded like a clue, but why was an old love letter written on a brand new sheet of paper?
“Texas,” Brighton said, pulling us all from our silent reverie.
“Texas?” I repeated, looking over at her questioningly.
“The Littlefield house in Texas,” she elaborated, holding her phone up to show me an image of a beautiful Victorian home. “Alice Littlefield died in 1935, one year before the maiden voyage of the Queen Mary. This was her house.”
Brighton was hovering somewhere between excitement and an anxiety attack as she grinned at me.
“This is a real-life, honest, legitimate clue,” she said. “We found a clue.”
I tried not to smile, since I was still put out by the little lecture that Jefferson had given me, but I couldn’t help myself. Brighton was right. We’d somehow managed to not only make contact on the Queen Mary, but we’d found the clue that would lead to our next location. Suddenly our wild goose chase didn’t seem so crazy.
We had found what we were looking for. Not only were we on the right track, but we’d also made contact. A spirit had led us to our clue. And yet, I was uneasy by the newness of the paper, thinking something wasn’t adding up.
Why would a note from the 1930s be written on
new paper? Was someone following us around and planting these clues for us?
“You did it, Sadie,” Jefferson said quietly, not looking at me as he spoke.
I couldn’t tell if he was actually congratulating me or if he was being sarcastic, but I didn’t really care.
“We’re paranormal investigators,” I said to the group with a small smile. I’d try to figure out my timelines later since I didn’t feel like putting a damper on our victory by bringing up the new piece of paper.
“We investigated,” Deacon said with a little nod.
“And found evidence,” Brighton added.
“And now we know where we’re going tomorrow. Perfect. I’m going to get some sleep,” Jefferson said abruptly, standing from the bed and leaving the room without another word.
“What’s his problem?” Brighton asked.
“He’s Jefferson,” I answered, as if that should be all the explanation she needed. “If he’s not switching his personality every five seconds, he’s not being himself.”
I did have to wonder if our two-sentence disagreement might have set him off, but the interaction was so brief I couldn’t imagine him being that put out by it.
“You should probably go talk him off of whatever ledge he’s on,” Brighton said to Deacon.
“Not likely,” he answered with a laugh. “I’m going to bed. If you guys want to deal with Jefferson’s dark and twisty place, be my guest, but I’m not touching that with a ten foot pole.”
“Coward,” Brighton said to Deacon’s retreating form before adding, “Leave it to the Parrish boys to ruin a perfectly good night with their psychosis.”
~
“Did you kiss Deacon?” I asked Brighton as we lay side by side in her bed.
I wasn’t going to pretend I could spend the night in my room alone again, so I’d admitted my own cowardice and asked if I could stay in her room again for our last night on the ship. I’m sure Jefferson would have made fun of me, but no one had seen him since he had turned dark and broody.
“Let me sleep,” she mumbled, halfway between dreams and wakefulness.
“If I don’t get to sleep, then neither do you.”
She groaned at this exclamation and rolled over on her side so that her back was to me. My insomnia was bad enough on a normal night, but being on the Queen Mary combined with the emotionally charged day I’d had meant I wasn’t going to be getting any sleep that night. Of course, Brighton could sleep anywhere, but I wasn’t about to let her off the hook after I’d caught her in a “compromising” situation with Deacon.
“I’m sleeping in the same bed as you. You can’t really avoid the question.” I nudged her in the back with my elbow.
She grunted, but finally rolled onto her back, joining me in staring at the ceiling.
“Think about who you’re talking to,” she said simply.
“You guys looked pretty cozy when I walked in.”
“Yeah, and maybe something would have happened if you didn’t have terrible timing,” she said. “But we’re talking about Deacon Parrish.”
“So?” I asked.
“So, the boy can’t talk to anyone of the female gender unless it’s one of us,” she explained. “He’s not exactly the type to make a move.”
“Maybe that means you have to make the move,” I said.
“The girl who can’t order her own food at restaurants because she’s scared to talk to people? Yeah. That’s not going to happen.”
“If you’re both such chickens, how did Deacon end up with his hand on your leg and his face about two inches from yours?” I asked in a conspiratorial tone.
Brighton just laughed at this question, making me want to hear the explanation even more. She reached over to check the time on her phone, knocking over about ten prescription bottles in the process and sending her anxiety medicine skittering across the nightstand.
“He pretended to be pointing something out on the screen,” she said, still laughing. “And apparently that meant he had to lean really close to me.”
“Those Parrish boys think they’re pretty smooth,” I said. “Jefferson and his whole stupid idea that we needed to pretend to be married.”
“Yeah, what was that about?”
“Don’t get me started on how little sense that boy makes,” I said with a sigh.
We fell into an uneasy silence, thinking of the burden of a Parrish, before Brighton voiced something that had been bothering me.
“So, Texas,” she said.
“Are we crazy for doing this?”
“You already asked me that,” she pointed out.
“But the further into it we get, the more I’m starting to think we’re crazy.”
“I would agree, if we hadn’t found a clue. If we’ve found what we’re looking for, doesn’t that mean we’re not crazy?”
“Okay maybe not crazy. But out of our league, definitely.”
“We’re a little out of our league,” she conceded. “But this is how we’re making it into ‘the league.’ This guy chose us for a reason.”
“That’s another thing,” I began.
Brighton cut me off. “No, Sade, we don’t know who sent the letters. Yes, it’s creepy. Yes, we should be kind of cautious and probably shouldn’t expect to actually get money out of this. And no, I don’t care.”
“Well, that settles that issue then,” I said. “At least Jefferson’s mom is funding this little project.”
“Sounds like he has some mommy issues,” she agreed with a yawn.
I was losing her to sleep.
“And daddy issues,” I said. “Who carries their dad’s wedding ring around in their pocket?”
“If mommy and daddy issues were all Jefferson had, we’d be fine,” Brighton said distantly. “But we have to worry about those multiple personalities of his that are going to snap one day and kill us all.”
“Yeah,” I agreed half-heartedly. “That’ll be a fun day.”
“So much fun,” she answered, and I knew I had lost her.
Jefferson’s mood swings were the least of my worries when compared to the monumental task of linking four haunted locations together for an unknown benefactor. Yet as I lay there, listening to Brighton gently snoring beside me, I didn’t think of the job ahead of us. Instead, I thought of the crazy Parrish boy who was somehow the glue of our dysfunctional little group.
And that did nothing to comfort me.
Chapter 11
The sunflower yellow polish on my toenails shone in the sun as my feet dangled out the window in the back seat of the Jeep. Even with the wind blowing through the open window, it was still like a sauna in the dumpy old Jeep with no air conditioner.
“I don’t know that you’re really allowed to have your feet hanging out the window like that,” Jefferson said, his shaggy curls blowing wildly around his face.
“Quiet,” I replied. “I’m concentrating. These nails aren’t going to paint themselves.”
I had my body parallel to the back seat, my back leaning against Jefferson’s shoulder for support as I let my wet toes dry out the window, the wind pounding against them forcefully. Deacon and Brighton had claimed the front of the Jeep for this leg of the trip—Deacon piloting our massive hunk of junk like a captain and Brighton insisting a bug was going to hit my feet if I didn’t pull them inside.
“Sade, you can’t paint your nails in a moving car,” Brighton singsonged from the passenger’s seat.
“I’m actually highly impressed by the skill being displayed back here,” Jefferson said, as I finished up my fingernails.
The drive from the Queen Mary to the Littlefield House was about nineteen hours long and our group, in our overly confident state, had decided to make the drive in one day—though that may have had more to do with our limited funds when it came to hotel rooms than the actual desire to be stuck in a Jeep together for nineteen hours.
The long trip had awakened a keen desire to find
anything to entertain ourselves. As we slowly descended into boredom-derived madness, I’d decided to paint my nails in the failed hope that it would pass the time.
“Do you always color coordinate your nail polish with your clothes?” Jefferson asked disinterestedly.
I didn’t think he actually cared, but at this point, any conversation was good conversation.
“I just happen to wear a lot of yellow.” I stuck my tongue out the side of my mouth as I concentrated on not painting my entire finger.
“I guess at least if you spill it, it won’t be noticeable,” he replied with a yawn. He picked a loose thread off my grey and yellow striped shirt and placed it on my jean shorts.
I rolled my eyes.
“Let’s play the cinema game again,” Deacon suggested, obviously desperate for a distraction. He was met with a resounding chorus of nos and groans.
“We can talk about our clue again,” Brighton said.
Jefferson rubbed his temples. “I’d rather play that rubbish cinema game than dissect those three sentences one more time.”
“Ellen Page,” Deacon said excitedly, apparently needing no more prompting to begin playing.
“I just think it would be wise to have some idea of what we’re looking for when we get to this place,” Brighton said, ignoring Deacon’s game.
“Inception,” Jefferson answered.
Apparently the Parrish boys were playing the game by themselves.
I screwed the cap back on my nail polish. “I think we should try to figure out who Eva was,” I said to Brighton.
“Leonardo DiCaprio,” Deacon said.
“I’d start the questioning with her,” Brighton suggested. “Maybe ask if she’s still in the house or ask if any presence there knows who she is. It sounds like our mystery is surrounding whoever came over on the Queen Mary and this woman.”
“Romeo and Juliet,” Jefferson said, confusing me for a moment as I thought he was talking about our case and not his stupid game.
I blew on my fingernails. “We’ll have to ask the people at the Littlefield House if they know anything about an Eva.”
“Claire Danes,” Deacon shouted after a moment.
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