His brows lifted. “I don’t know—you were yelling pretty loud both times.”
She shoved him lightly in the shoulder, laughing. “I meant waking up—instead of being yanked from bliss into teenaged chaos.” She slid from the bed with a bounce of tight, high breast and a flash of heart-shaped ass. “Are you hungry? I’m starving.”
“Oh, I could eat.” His eyes traveled over her slowly and he waited, unmoving, until she caught his meaning.
“Could you?” She grinned back just as slowly. “Well, come and get it, scout.” She ducked just out of his reach and bounded into the bathroom, where she quickly flipped on the shower.
He was right behind her, and moments later, they were plastered against each other, hot and wet and slick, sliding and stroking and moaning in the midst of steam from dual showerheads.
“I was hoping those two showerheads would make up for their extra cost someday,” she panted happily a few moments later, when they sagged into each other’s arms as the hot water pounded in tandem on both their backs.
“I think you’ve damn near killed me,” Declan said, gathering her close. “But what a way to die.”
She laughed and pulled reluctantly away from nibbling on his wet shoulder. “Now I really am hungry.”
She dug some food out of the fridge as he sat at the island and watched, feeling awfully homey and comfortable. Then his eyes fell on the calendar with yesterday’s date marked with an E and a heart, and he remembered all the questions he’d wanted to ask but hadn’t.
“So,” he said, trying to figure out how to broach the subject tactfully. “Yesterday was a hard day for you.”
Leslie glanced at him as she slid onto a chair at the big slab table. “Have a seat. It’s more comfortable here.”
She had put out cold pizza (from yesterday?), some lemon and blueberry scones from Orbra’s, cut-up apples, some white cheese, and a small bowl of cashews. It looked delicious to him.
“Of course you’d want to know about that.” Her eyes were serious. “It’s normal, given…well…” Her lips moved in a gentle smile and the corners of her eyes crinkled.
“I’m mostly curious about the father—for obvious reasons,” Declan said. “I mean, is he in the picture at all? Because—well, I’m getting pretty attached to you, Leslie, and I’m not the type of guy who plays around. Or who is played around on. You know?” He reached for her hand and covered it with his. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been with someone long term, and I’m pretty sure I’m moving in that direction with you.” More quickly than he thought he should admit.
She squeezed his hand and then released him. “The father was a man named Eric. He was a business associate who lived in Denver. We were never involved on a long-term basis. Just…got together a few times. When I was in town, or he was in Philly.”
He picked up a piece of apple and examined it. “So, Eric. Is that what the E is for on the calendar hanging in your kitchen?”
“The E— Oh, no. No, no. The E is for Ella, the name I had picked out for the baby.”
“And so this Eric—does he have a last name?—is no longer in the picture? Even though you…um…” He lifted his brows and waited.
“Even though he was the father of the baby, no, he’s not in the picture at all. He never was. Eric and I both—well, we were each too busy to date and had no interest in relationships anyway. InterWorks had an office in Denver, so when I was in town, we…” She spread her hands. “It was all a very casual, less-than-friends-but-with-benefits arrangement with no attachments…and then I ended up pregnant.”
“And how did he take it? The news?” A few months ago, Declan would have been terrified at the thought of being the recipient of such news, but he’d obviously come to look at things a lot more differently since Stephanie had come into his life.
“Well…I’ll admit, I was lost and shocked and confused when I found out I was expecting a baby. It was in the middle of the prep leading up to the public offering, and my life was—well, it was insane. I could hardly keep my head above water; I was working seventy hours a week, and I was pregnant. Fortunately,” she said, looking at him with almond-shaped eyes limned with worry and grief, “at least I knew I would have the resources to raise the baby as a single parent. Maybe not as much time as I might have wanted, but the resources to make sure she was raised with everything she needed.”
“And so what happened when you told Eric?” Declan took the opportunity to snag a few cashews to build up his energy again.
Shagging a woman three times in one day—in, oh, less than six hours—took a lot out of a guy.
“So when I told Eric,” Leslie said, reaching for a piece of apple, “he immediately insisted we get married. Even though we weren’t at all committed to each other, or in a relationship, and living a thousand miles from each other, he insisted the right thing to do was to get married.”
“Oh boy.” Declan paused as those words sank in and he realized… That could have been me.
So true. He would have insisted he and Cara get married—because what else did you do at eighteen with an unexpected pregnancy? Or, apparently, even at thirty-something.
He felt a little queasy thinking about it.
“Exactly,” Leslie replied with a wry smile, as if she could read his mind.
“And you told him…?” Declan’s appetite was failing all of a sudden. It was like déjà vu for him…but not exactly.
“I told him no.”
Declan realized he was holding himself tensely, and that his belly was tight and starting to churn, so he forced himself to relax. Whatever had happened with Eric and Leslie was over. So why was he feeling all knotted up over this? Yet, he felt as if a big shoe was about to drop…but he didn’t know why.
“I didn’t want to marry a man I only casually liked, and definitely didn’t love. Plus, I had a career in Philly, and he had a career in Denver, and ne’er the twain shall meet, or so they say. And I knew I’d be miserable, and we’d resent each other. But he wouldn’t let it go. He kept pushing. So I made a…let’s call it an executive decision.”
“An executive decision?”
“I told Eric the baby wasn’t his after all.”
“So…you lied to him?” Something red had begun to creep into the edge of his vision, but he managed to keep his voice calm and steady.
Leslie seemed to sense his unrest. “Not technically. I didn’t know for certain. I never did genetic testing before—uh—before I miscarried. But the only other possible father was a—a one-night fling I had with an old college flame when he came to town.”
To Declan’s surprise, she wasn’t avoiding his eyes. Nor, though she was subdued, did she seem ashamed or repentant for her decisions. Calm, deliberate, intense…but not apologetic.
“So you let Eric off the hook, as you say, and planned to raise a child on your own that was his.”
“I didn’t really have a choice,” she said. “I didn’t want to marry him—”
“So don’t marry the guy. What’s he going to do, drag you to the church? If you said no, what was he going to do?” Declan was aware how tight and hard his voice had become, but he couldn’t help it.
This was so not what he’d wanted to hear. Not what he’d expected from Leslie. This sort of deceit. This high-handed chief executive officer ploy.
“Right. I know.” Her laugh was now—but too late—ashamed and abashed. “It wasn’t the best decision—”
“It definitely wasn’t.”
She looked at him quickly. The initial shock blazing there faded, and her eyes became remote and her expression turned reserved. “Well, I’ve apparently hit one of your hot buttons.”
“Uh…I’d say that’s probably a hot button for most men. Not being given the chance to raise or even know about their child? Being lied to about the paternity of their child?” Declan was so angry, so upset, he was nearly blind with rage. He stood, his fingers curling into fists on top of the table. “I think it’s best if I leave
now.”
“If that’s what you want.” Leslie stood, still the calm and cool executive. “I’m sorry to have upset you—”
“Yeah, well, so am I.” He let himself out without a backward glance, his body shaking with both sorrow and fury.
Seventeen
Leslie didn’t sleep well that night, despite her earlier prediction that she would.
In fact, she and Rufus stayed up far too late, idly viewing some random Glee episodes, simply because Declan had mentioned he’d watched it with Stephanie and she’d never seen it before.
For some reason, the in-your-face high school show peppered with pop songs from the last four decades made Leslie feel like her life was slightly less messy. After all, she was no longer in high school and didn’t have to try and deal with figuring out who she was. She’d done that long ago, and let the chips fall where they may.
Apparently, Declan didn’t like the way the chips had fallen. That hurt Leslie far more than it had when she realized she and Eric didn’t belong together, and that she didn’t want to give up her career—her life—and move to Denver because that was where he lived.
Ironic that she ended up changing careers and moving to Wicks Hollow—but that had been her decision, and hers alone. And if she’d carried Ella to term, Leslie was certain she’d have probably made other life decisions as well.
Too bad Declan couldn’t understand.
And too bad Eric had been so bloody damned rigid and unbending and misogynistic that she felt she’d had to make that executive decision.
Would she have made the same decision now?
Probably…not. Who knew?
What did it matter? It was done with—completely a non-issue.
Except where Declan was concerned. And the status of Leslie’s heart. Damn, she’d really started to fall for him—way early on, in fact, when he came practically barging into her house on a mission to protect his daughter from the child labor law violator.
Leslie laughed, but it hurt. Oh, her heart hurt.
Damn, I really screwed this up. And now she’d ruined everything—over something that happened more than a year ago, before Declan even came into her life.
It was late, and she was drowsing in front of the television on the sumptuous leather sectional, half watching, half sleeping.
Suddenly, her eyes bolted fully open.
The music. The ghost’s music.
It was here, in this room, for the first time ever. Much louder than ever before, encroaching on her private space, moving deeper into the house. What did this mean? Was Dorothy getting impatient? Had something happened?
Leslie was wide awake now, looking around the room wildly for the ghostly image. This was new. It had never come in here before. It was always—
She stopped and looked at the TV. And then she looked at Rufus, who hadn’t even stirred.
The music wasn’t filtering in from the front of the hall, or even from the ghost…it was coming from the TV, from the crew-cut character named Puck, who was playing a guitar and singing a ballad.
The hair on Leslie’s arms prickled, and her hands turned clammy. But it was the same music. She recognized it as the music that always filtered through the night whenever Dorothy’s ghost appeared.
But that music…it wasn’t from the 1920s.
No, this song was much more recent than that.
“I can’t believe I didn’t recognize the song right away. I mean, who doesn’t know ‘Waiting for a Girl Like You’?” Leslie said, uncaring that her voice carried.
She and Cherry were sitting at Trib’s for lunch. They were the only ones there, as he opened at eleven and they’d shown up minutes before.
“Seeing as I only have thirty-five minutes till my vinyasa class,” Cherry said when Trib opened the door to them at ten fifty-five, “I figured you wouldn’t mind letting us in a smidge early.”
“Whatever,” he said. Today his bow tie was carnation pink and he wore a charcoal-on-black striped shirt, charcoal suspenders, and excellently tailored black slacks. He looked like a million bucks—at least, as far as his attire went. His mood, however, seemed distracted instead of its normal cheery one. “Have a seat. Wherever you want. I assume you want your regular, Cherry?”
No sooner had he minced off to the kitchen in his Italian loafers with their order than Leslie launched into her news. “So that means,” she said at the end of the story, “the ghost can’t be Dorothy Duchene. I’ve been looking at it all wrong.”
She and Cherry glanced up as Trib brought them water (no ice for Cherry—“it’s better for the digestion”) and a plate containing three small puddles of…something.
“This is my blueberry pâté, my homemade pear marmalade, and cherry-mint preserves. I’m sampling them today,” he said, placing a tiny basket of rustic-looking crackers next to them. “Enjoy, ladies. I’ll be tied up for a few minutes in back with Aaron finalizing the catering numbers for the mega-reunion on Sunday—that’ll be the pâté’s official debut, in fact. I’m so excited. Incidentally, Luddy’s working on your order, and it should be out in plenty of time for you to get to your vinyasa class.” He gave them a slightly harried smile and rushed off to the back.
“I forgot he was doing the catering on Sunday,” Cherry said. “Maybe I will make an appearance at the reunion. At least the food’ll be good.”
“Who knows—maybe one of your old flames will show up and you’ll be able to forget about stalking the blacksmith in town.” Leslie managed to say the words lightly, but inside she felt the unpleasant lurch of her heart.
She didn’t really know what to do—if anything—to mend the rift with Declan. Maybe there wasn’t even enough there to try. After all, they really didn’t know each other that well. And she couldn’t change the past, as much as she might like to.
“The blacksmith is taken,” Cherry said, then looked at her sharply. “Isn’t he?”
Leslie frowned and, to her embarrassment, realized her eyes were burning as tears gathered there. “Not so much.”
“Oh dear.” Cherry reached across and patted her hand. “I’m sorry, Les. What happened? Want to talk about it? I promise not to make any jokes about too many irons in the fire or anything like that.”
Leslie laughed reluctantly, then told her briefly what happened. “And that’s how I ended up watching Glee—which, I’m not sure what all the fuss was about over that show anyway—at one in the morning. And I sort of woke up hearing that song, and that’s when I realized what it was.”
“So the ghost must be someone who died in the eighties—or after, I guess. I’m not sure when the song came out. Early eighties, I think.”
“I was thinking…I wonder if it could be Kristen van Gerste,” Leslie said. “She was wearing a flapper dress that night, remember?”
“What about Kristen van Gerste?” Trib said as he set two plates on the table. One was a salad, heaped high with roasted fall veggies, sun-dried Traverse City cherries, and kale for Cherry. The other was Leslie’s sandwich, made from a crusty whole-grain loaf with house-made chicken salad, artichoke hearts, and roasted red pepper tapenade.
Leslie’s mouth watered, for she hadn’t felt much like eating since her aborted dinner with Declan last evening. But she responded before taking a bite of her sandwich. “Whether it’s possible the ghost at Shenstone House is Kristen, not Dorothy Duchene, as I’d thought.”
“But don’t ghosts only haunt where they die?” Trib asked with a frown. “She was found in the woods, you know.” Then he stilled, his eyes widening hugely behind his glasses. “Unless she was killed at Shenstone House. Oh my God.” He clapped a hand over his mouth and goggled at them. “What if she was killed there and moved to the woods…” He looked white as a ghost himself.
“Poor sweet, darling Kristen. She didn’t deserve any of that.” He blinked rapidly, then removed a pale blue handkerchief from his trouser pocket. “Damned Marcus Levin. If he hadn’t been such a prick, she’d probably still be alive today. Oh,” he wa
iled softly, removing his glasses to dab at his eyes. “It just brings it all back, doesn’t it? This, and the reunion, and just…all of it. It brings it all back like it was yesterday.”
Since neither Cherry nor Leslie had actually been around at the time, neither could respond appropriately. Still, Leslie didn’t disagree with any of his sentiments—including the suggestion that Kristen could easily have been killed inside Shenstone House, and then, for some unknown reason, had her body moved and left in the woods. And the topazes stolen.
“I was going to see if I could find a picture of Kristen that night at the prom—to see if she looks like the ghost,” Leslie said as Trib was called back to the kitchen.
“That’ll be easy—she’d have been in the paper, not only as Homecoming queen but also, unfortunately, because of the disappearance, of course,” Cherry said. “Let’s see…the Enterprise would have been the main paper in town at the time. You can look online, but the library probably has archives.” She glanced at her watch and grimaced. “If only I had time, I’d come and help you look.”
“No problem, auntie,” Leslie said. “The guys are coming to sand the upstairs hallway and bedroom floors, so I was planning on clearing out of the house for most of the day anyway. I have to pick up a special order in Grand Rapids—the antique pulls for the guest bathrooms came in—and I’ll probably stop at the mall there, so I won’t get to the library till later this afternoon.”
Plus, I don’t feel like doing much else of anything. Might as well go to the library. Bury my nose in a book—or some archives—there.
There was something about a library that comforted Leslie, even though she hadn’t been in one for ages—nor had she had much time to read for pleasure over the last ten years, due to her all-consuming career.
The smell of old books—especially in an older building like the one she visited in the larger city of Holland, the nearest library to Wicks Hollow—the tall ceilings, the shelves upon shelves of goodies… She wondered what would happen if the apocalypse came and people had to rebuild civilization. Wouldn’t everyone want to live in an old library?
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