Ghost of a Chance

by Yasmine Galenorn

  "I can't make love to you tonight. Andrew, I have to take it slow. I want you, but I can't get lost in you yet." I held my breath, praying that he would understand, wouldn't go charging off in a huff.

  He took my chin in his hand, gave me a single nod, and kissed me sweetly on the lips before pulling away. "We'll take it slow."

  I slipped on my shirt and pulled the ends together, tying them under my breasts. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to go so far—but your arms feel so good."

  That made him laugh, a smile breaking through his severity. "That's a compliment I don't hear often enough." He brought his fingers to his nose. "I can smell you on my fingertips. It makes me hungry."

  I shivered, once again feeling as if I were with a wolf that was prowling the night. Not a player—no, a wolf in the northern mountains tracking the scent of his mate who was unaware she was being followed. I realized how little I knew about him. He was still a mystery.

  "Emerald, tell me something: Are you afraid of me? Or are you playing it safe?"

  I thought for a moment. He did frighten me a little, though I didn't know why. I hadn't seen this side of him before, strong, demanding, and yet—and yet, he had stopped when I asked, and he was still sitting here, not rushing away with his ego crushed. "I'm playing it safe. I need to. For the kids. For myself."

  With a nod, he stood and pushed back the strands of hair that had come loose. His ears were burning red. He was as pent up as I was. "Do you want me to sleep on the sofa? After yesterday morning—"

  "The spirits weren't quiet last night, but they left me alone. I slept down here with the phone right next to my head, and I plan to again tonight. If they come back, I'll be out the door and into my car before they can lay a hand on me. Everything should be fine."

  He acquiesced. "Be careful. I want you whole, intact, in my bed. Actually, I want you whole and intact no matter what." He picked up his notebook. "Get some sleep, Em. Tomorrow is a big day. You and Harl want to be fresh for your drive." We shared a lingering kiss at the door. He patted my ass. "You're gorgeous, you know that? Lock the door after me."

  After he left, I stretched out on the sofa, replaying the scene over and over in my mind. Only in my fantasy, we didn't stop.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Once again, the whisperings started shortly after I went to bed. Samantha complained, setting up a steady series of yowls and growls until I turned on the lights. The mutterings died down, as did her discomfort, and we all dozed off until shortly before dawn, when a loud shriek startled me out of my slumber. I shot up, blinking as the light hit my eyes. The sound hadn't actually been audible so much as kinetic, reverberating through my body.

  Susan hovered in the archway, clutching her head as tears poured down her cheeks. I pushed my way out from under the covers and looked for Mr. B & U, but he seemed to be contenting himself elsewhere for the moment. She shot me a despairing glance, lips twisted, and wept silently in her world of vapor and mist. Then, with another look at me, her gaze so obviously a plea for help, she vanished slowly as a ray of morning light broke through the window.

  Shaken, I forced myself to get dressed and to grab a quick breakfast. I didn't like the idea of leaving the cats alone in the house, so I put in a quick call to Andrew. I woke him up, but after he'd cleared his thoughts, he was gracious enough to accept Samantha and her babies into his home. Harlow and I would drop them off before we hit the freeway. I managed to corral the calico and her kittens—Nebula, Noel, and Nigel—into their carrier, and gathered together their litter box, a bag of clumping litter, their food dishes, and a couple of cans of food. By the time Harlow pulled up, all we had to do was drop the whole kit V caboodle off at Andrew's.

  * * * *

  We took Harlow's car. Relieved that, for once, I wasn't the one driving down I-5, maneuvering through the nasty gridlock that built up miles before we reached the Seattle area, I took the time to relax. Colliding images from the night before vied for space in my thoughts… Andrew and his embrace, my own sexual tension, the terrified appearance of Susan Mitchell this morning. I felt trapped in a kaleidoscope that was spinning out of control.

  Harlow wove in and out of traffic. She was skilled in the art of opportunistic driving and we made progress, slipping into openings I didn't think possible to navigate.

  "This is one thing I don't miss about living in the city," I said, breaking the silence. "Planning ahead, leaving two hours early when traffic is bad."

  Harlow nodded, ducking into the HOV lane as she sped up. After a while I noticed that she was being unusually quiet. I had the feeling that whatever had been wrong the night before was still bothering her. I broached the subject. She shook her head. "I don't know if I can talk about it."

  "C'mon, Harl, you know you can tell me." I knew that she wasn't good at handling high stress, that it could cause a relapse into behaviors best left in her adolescence.

  After a few minutes she took a huge breath and let it out in a shuddering sob. "I'm pregnant. I've been suspicious for a few weeks, but yesterday I went to the doctor and he confirmed it."

  "Pregnant!" I jumped as far as the seat belt would let me and would have hugged her if we hadn't been barreling down the freeway at seventy-five miles an hour. "Oh, Harl! Why are you upset?"

  She squinted through tear-clouded eyes. "I'm so scared. I haven't even told James yet—I'm terrified about what he'll say, what will happen."

  We swerved to miss some joker who had decided that a slow crawl would do in the express lane, and I pointed ahead to a sign advertising a rest stop. "Pull in there. I'll take over the driving." She did as I instructed. When we were parked in the wooded rest area, she unfastened her seat belt and leaned forward, head on the steering wheel.

  I patted her back and brushed her hair off her forehead. "Shush… quiet, babe. Everything will be fine. Everything will be okay." She hiccuped twice and stopped crying as I handed her a tissue. She blew her nose and looked at me, bleak and frightened. And I knew why she was afraid. "You're worried about the anorexia, aren't you?"

  She bobbed her head. When she spoke, her voice was full of phlegm. "I don't know if I've conquered it, or if it's still out there, waiting for a trigger. But that's not the only problem. Goddamn it, Em, I was hooked on coke for years. Is that going to affect the baby? I've already had two abortions…"

  "When?" I hadn't heard about those.

  "When I was modeling. Sex was everywhere and so was cocaine. Heroin, crack, you name it, I could score it. Sex and blow went hand in hand—they were great separate, but man, put them together and wham, bam, thank you, ma'am meant a fine ol' time. A couple of times I was so out of it that I didn't use any birth control. The pill made me gain weight, so I didn't take it." She hung her head. "It's all a nightmare. I don't know if I can be a good mother. Lola sure didn't set a good example for me." With a grimace, she wiped her nose and brushed her hair back from her face.

  "Do you want to be a mother? Do you want a baby?" Strange, but I realized Harlow had never, in all the time we had known each other, mentioned wanting children.

  She shrugged. "Part of me does. Part of me is afraid to think about it."

  "How do you think James will feel?" I'd never seen her so low and thought, this is what I used to be like—depressed, terrified to move, terrified to do anything because everything seemed wrong.

  She coughed, and a bubble of spit appeared on her lip. I handed her another tissue. "Oh, James will be thrilled. If he knows I'm pregnant, there is no way on this Earth that I will be able to convince him I shouldn't have the baby. I'm stuck, Em… either I get an abortion and never mention it to him, or I tell James and have the baby because I refuse to lose him. I love him too much."

  There wasn't much I could say. I wasn't about to tell her what to do—that was a recipe for disaster—but I did decide to give her something to think about. "Did it ever occur to you that you have good friends who will help you through this? That James will be here to support you? Harl, you aren't eighteen anymor
e. You are so much stronger than you give yourself credit for."

  "Really?" She looked at me with that schoolgirl wonder that spoke volumes about her self-esteem. Or lack of it.

  "Really, truly, and honest, too." I slid out of my seat and motioned for her to change places with me. I slid up into the driver's seat of her gargantuan Suburban and buckled in. "Let's go see Diana. If you want to talk more about this, I'm here to listen. If you want to let it be, that's fine, too. Whatever you need, Harl. Whatever you need."

  I shifted the car into gear and pulled back out on the freeway. The traffic had thinned somewhat; rush hour was almost over for the morning. We would hit Seattle in another twenty minutes. "Where are those directions?" I asked and Harlow busied herself by digging out the map. She sniffed a couple more times, but the haunted look that had been dogging her all morning had eased up, and I thought that she would manage to get through this. I would do my part to make it as easy for her as I could.

  * * * *

  A steady rain was falling by the time we exited off the freeway and zigzagged our way to the U-district. Ah, rain. Rain in the springtime. Rain in the autumn. Rain in the winter. The only time it didn't rain in Seattle was during the month of August, and even then we kept an umbrella nearby.

  No matter how hard I tried to get away from this city, I always ended up coming back for one thing or another. I wished that one of those reasons would be Roy's desire to see his children, but he hadn't asked for visitation rights in months, and the kids were slowly but surely beginning to see his true colors. As much as I hated the man, I wanted Kip and Miranda to think their father loved them.

  Harlow guided me through the labyrinth of one-way streets until we found ourselves parked in front of an old brick apartment building. Five stories high, the brick was cracked in several places, and the paint on the window trim was worn and weathered. Two large juniper bushes shrouded the front entrance, and I made an educated guess that we wouldn't be finding an elevator inside. Harl started to pull out a cigarette but stopped as I shook my head.

  "Don't do it, not until you make up your mind about the baby."

  She growled something under her breath but shoved the cig back in the pack and jammed it into her purse. We made our way up the walk. "What floor does she live on, again?" I prayed Harl wouldn't say "five"… or even "four." Come to think of it, "two" wouldn't be that great, and "three," even worse. The bruise on my knee was hurting, and I didn't look forward to climbing a bunch of stairs.

  The gods of bliss were with me.

  "The first—115." Harlow stuffed the paper into her pocket and opened the door. I limped into the dimly lit hallway and blinked. We stopped for a moment to allow our eyes to adjust, then trekked down the narrow hallway. No sounds filtered into the hall; the rooms must be fairly well insulated or else nobody was home during the day.

  110, 112… 115. As I approached the apartment I noticed that the door was slightly ajar. Maybe Diana had stepped out to the laundry room or the incinerator, but it still seemed strange for someone in Seattle to leave her door unlocked. I looked back at Harl, uncertain whether to knock. I rapped lightly on the molding of the doorframe.

  No answer. I knocked again.

  Still no answer.

  "What do you think? Should we wait, or leave a note?" I fished in my purse for a notebook and pen.

  "I don't know. I wouldn't think that she'd go far and leave her door open."

  It seemed odd to me, too. Something felt off—wrong. Take a deep breath. Count to five. Knock one more time. Still no answer. A wave of tension played up my spine, and I noticed that the hairs on my arms were standing up. Diana hadn't stepped out—I knew it as sure as I knew that the other side of the door led to a place I didn't want to go. Using the corner of my jacket, I gently pushed the door open.

  "What are you doing?" Harlow hissed from behind me, but I waved for her to be quiet. The door creaked on its hinges, then gave way and opened another few inches—enough so I could peek around the corner.

  I stuck my head in, as quietly as I could, and looked around. The room was furnished with antiques. A claw-foot sofa; dark, heavy end tables; art nouveau Tiffany lamps. For all I knew, they were real. I noticed the art decorating the walls: poster-size reproductions of Susan Mitchell's book covers. Maybe Diana had forgiven her mother after all. I was about to turn around and leave when a bright red object poking out from behind the sofa caught my eye. At first, in the dim light, it was difficult to make out what it was. In a brilliant flash, with startling clarity, I realized that I was staring at a foot covered by a red stocking.

  "Oh, my God!" I limped forward. There might be somebody still hiding in the apartment, but I didn't have time to think about that.

  Harlow pressed behind me. "What's wrong?"

  I stopped by the edge of the sofa and motioned for her to back away. "Don't touch anything. Don't even sit down." Like a storm waiting to break, nausea welled in my stomach, and I swallowed the rising bile as I took in the scene.

  Sprawled on the floor like one of those victims on Justice Files or America's Most Wanted lay the body of a woman surrounded by a pool of drying blood. The resemblance to Susan was uncanny, and I knew that I was standing over Diana's corpse. She lay on her back, and the look on her face was one of terrible surprise. The carpet around her was slick, saturated with blood from what looked like a single, deadly stab wound penetrating her heart. She had been dead several hours, from what I could guess.

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly as I slipped into "action mode" and everything became distanced, surreal. I turned back to Harlow. "Out in the hall. Get out your cell phone and call 911. Ask them to send the paramedics and the police." Even though I knew it was hopeless, I gingerly leaned down and felt for a pulse. Her skin was cold marble. "Diana's been stabbed. She's dead."

  Chapter Fourteen

  Normally I would have expected her to freak out upon finding a dead body, but Harlow remained surprisingly calm. She tucked the hem of her coat around her hand and nudged the door open a little farther. Good, she was being careful. I heard her murmur into her cell phone before she stuck her head back through the door. "The cops will be here in a few minutes. I'm going to try to find the owner of this joint."

  As I took another look around, it occurred to me that perhaps the murderer was still hiding in the apartment. I peeked in the kitchenette and the closet-size bath. Nope. The studio was clear. The rolltop desk sat open, drawers toppled every which way, empty except for a scattering of calligraphy pens and pencils and splattered ink. With a queasy feeling, I noticed that the closest wall had been dotted with tiny drops of red—blood. Diana's blood.

  As I traced my steps back toward the door, a glint by one of the end tables caught my eye. I bent over to look. The shimmer was a silver cufflink in the shape of a crown. I longed to pick it up, check it for engravings, but the cops would have my head if I did.

  Harlow hissed at me. "Someone's coming. Get your butt out here!" Apparently she hadn't found the landlady yet.

  I hurried out to join her. Two uniformed men were striding down the hall.

  "Over here, officers. We're the ones who called you." Hart's voice was steadier than I trusted my own to be.

  The cops gave us a long once-over, then turned their attention to the apartment. "Where's the body?" The older cop had a knowing, tired look in his eyes, and I had the feeling he'd seen too many bodies lately.

  I pointed. "The door was open when we got here. I went in, hoping to find Diana at home but instead I found her on the floor. I'm pretty sure she's dead. There's no pulse. We called the paramedics just in case, though. They haven't gotten here yet."

  He and his partner took opposite sides of the door and motioned us away. I knew there was no one inside but didn't want to admit that I'd rifled through the apartment, so we retreated far enough to be out of range. The older man pushed the door fully open and they went into what I had taken to calling their "search and secure" mode when I watched the pol
ice programs on the Discovery Channel.

  After a few moments, the younger man—Officer Nelson—returned to the hall. He pulled out a notebook. We would have to go down to the station and give statements. The front door to the brownstone burst open, and the paramedics raced down the hall. It was too late, I thought. Diana wouldn't be needing their services today.

  We could hear them working on her as Nelson began to question us. After looking at our identification and noting our names and driver's license numbers on his pad, he asked, "How do you know the deceased?"

  "We don't."

  He looked confused.

  "We knew her mother, Susan Mitchell. Susan died last Thursday, and we weren't sure if Diana had been notified. We wanted to make certain that the girl knew about her mother's death."

  "Her mother died last week? What was the cause of death?"

  I thought for a moment before I opened my mouth. Here was a chance to plant a seed, but I'd have to be careful. "Apparently she died of an overdose of insulin. The police are calling it an accident."

  "Her mother lived in Chiqetaw?" I nodded. Nelson scribbled this information down. "When you got here, did you touch anything?"

  I squinted. "I don't think so, but we can't be totally sure—I did push the door open so I could go in. I also felt Diana's wrist to see if she had a pulse."

  "We'll need to get your fingerprints to eliminate them from any we find at the scene. What about people? Did you see anyone entering or leaving the apartment or the building?"

  Both Harlow and I shook our heads. "Nobody."

  The officer paused as the other policeman emerged from the apartment.

  The older man, whose nametag above his badge read "Leary," flipped his notepad shut and tucked it into his pocket. "Coroner is on his way. There was nothing they could do. She never had a chance."