Grave Phantoms

by Jenn Bennett

  Bo watched the Pacific slowly change from black to blue as morning broke. The cottage’s windows were ablaze with sunlight, and he could see for miles over the calm water. But it only held his attention for a moment, because his attention was focused on the golden girl in his arms.

  He lay on his side behind Astrid, spooning her with one arm curled around her waist, his hand cupping her breast.

  Her heart beating in his hand.

  They shared the bed’s only pillow, and though he’d dozed for a while, his body was aware of the rare gift afforded him—her bare body sleeping next to his—and that had exhilarated him too much to stay asleep for long. He watched her breathing openmouthed on the pillow, limbs entwined with his. He was far too happy.

  And far too satisfied for his cock to be thinking about rising again, but there it was. He’d come four times already—the last time, inside her mouth, which was shockingly new to both of them. Neither seemed to have any boundaries, and the realization that her eagerness to explore matched his own was more thrilling than Christmas and New Year and a birthday all rolled up together.

  Something in the back of his mind told him to slow down and think of the future. To have a care that they were setting themselves up for heartbreak. But he had listened to that voice for far too long and all it had brought him was misery.

  Not today.

  He wasn’t thinking about consequences, rules, or impossibilities. He was only thinking of the present. And right now, the present was yawning and stretching in the most adorable, sexy way possible.

  When her eyes cracked open, he said, “Good morning, huli jing.”

  “Bo,” she said in a sleep-rough whisper as she rolled around to face him. “Tell me I’m not dreaming.” Her voice was small and fragile, and hearing it did something funny to his heart.

  “If you’re dreaming, I must be dreaming, too,” he said, pushing back the blanket to look at her.

  “Oh good.” She kissed him lightly on the lips and winced, slipping a hand between her legs. “I’m sore. And you . . . are not,” she said, eyes widening as she looked down between them.

  “Don’t pay any attention to that. I have to piss like the devil, and until that goes down a little, it’s going to be nearly impossible. I’m sorry you’re sore.”

  Her brows lifted. “You don’t sound sorry.”

  “Mmm.” He fought down a smile. “Not sorry for what we did, but I don’t like you being in pain.”

  “It’s a good pain. I feel like I’ve been fighting in a battle.”

  She looked like it, too. Rosy spots were scattered across her neck and breasts, and three small bruises, impressions left by his fingers, darkened the pale skin around her hip bone. Shameful, perhaps, but he bore her brand on him, too: an angry red scratch down his thigh, a bite mark on his forearm, and stinging claw marks on his back. She inspected him, looking rather pleased with herself, and then blinked rapidly and twisted around to peer outside the windows.

  “Bo! The sun! It’s not raining.”

  Morning sun gilded the surface of the ocean and reflected back a dazzling light so bright, it made him squint. Not a cloud in the sky and no wind battering the trees along the cliffs. How long had it been since the storms began? Three weeks? He hadn’t seen the sun in three weeks.

  “Oh, Bo,” she murmured. “It’s like it’s just for us. A sign that everything is right. Let’s go outside. I want to feel it.”

  “The fog’s still rolling back down toward the city, and it’s early. Give it a little time to warm up out there. How about a nice hot bath first? Might make you feel better.”

  “Together?” she said.

  “It’s an old tub, but it’s big.”

  She smiled her consent, and they spent the better part of an hour in the big bathtub, mostly lounging and exploring each other’s bodies. She was too sore for anything else—that quickly became obvious to Bo. He forced her to take aspirin, and they helped bathed each other, which was a small but satisfying pleasure, then groomed themselves as best they could with what meager supplies the cottage provided.

  After dressing in last night’s clothes, they scrounged the small kitchen for a breakfast of soda crackers, peanut butter, and hot tea. The tea was Bo’s private stash of Longjing Dragon Well tea, imported from China, and for which he’d traded Canadian whiskey. The teacups were mismatched and the plates chipped, but Astrid didn’t seem to care. Dressed in their coats, they took their meager meal outside in the briny morning air to a small stone table that overlooked the ocean, and with the blanket from the bed wrapped around them, ate while the sun continued to rise.

  Astrid curled her fingers around the hot teacup and inhaled deeply. “This is perfect. Let’s stay here and never leave.”

  “And what would we do for money?”

  “That is a problem, isn’t it?” She lay her head on his shoulder and tugged the blanket tighter around them. A seagull sailed in front of them and landed on the cottage roof with a loud squawk. When the bird settled down, she said, “Bo? I need to tell you something.”

  His heart skittered inside his chest, but he tried not to let any panic show. “You can always tell me anything, unconditionally.”

  “I know. It’s just that I’m a little ashamed of this. Well, a lot. Do you remember when we went to the Anthropology annex to see Lowe and Hadley, and you asked me what Hadley and I discussed privately?”

  “And you refused to tell me. Yes, I remember.”

  “Well . . . the thing is, I’d asked for her advice because I’m doing poorly in school. My grades are terrible across the board, but Luke, that is, Professor Barnes, failed me.”

  Bo felt a flush of anger in the center of his chest. “That rotten, dirty pig. He lures you into sleeping with him and then turns around and fails you?”

  “He didn’t lure me. I’m not defending him—”

  “That man should be suspended from his post. And I’m not just saying that because I want to choke the life out of him for touching you.”

  She put a hand on his wrist. “I know you do. But the fact of the matter is that I stopped going to class. So they are threatening to expel me.”

  Oh. That wasn’t good. At all.

  Bo didn’t know how to feel about this, but he could see plainly that Astrid was anxiously avoiding his eyes. “Maybe Lowe could talk to somebody,” he suggested. “After all, he works for U.C. Berkeley.”

  “Another reason not to raise a stink. He’s trying to build a life with Hadley that doesn’t rely on illegal activities. His reputation is precarious, especially considering the family business. I’m not putting his job in jeopardy over my poor grades and attendance. That’s not fair to him.”

  As much as he wanted to argue, she had a point. But he damn sure wished she hadn’t put it that way, because it only made him feel that Lowe was doing the right thing, and here Bo was, on the illegal side of the family business with Winter.

  She scratched her forehead and looked out over the water. “I have one more shot in January. One semester to bring my grades up before they expel me. And I guess that’s what I’m struggling with. Do I go back?”

  “Of course you go back. Do you know how many women in this city would love to have that opportunity?”

  “I know, but what if I’m not a scholar? And what about us? Being apart nearly killed me, and that was when I only had hope. Now I have this,” she said, putting a hand on his chest. “How am I going to go back now?”

  He sighed heavily. No matter how hard he’d tried to avoid that negative inner voice, there it was, saying, I told you so. You thought happiness would be easy? Think again. There’s always a price.

  “We will find a way to make it work. I can take the train down to see you.”

  “When? You work six days a week. I’ll bet you have runs tonight, don’t you?”

  He did. “Winter will give m
e the time off,” he said, but as soon as it was out of his mouth, he knew it was a lie. Once Winter found out what Bo had been doing with his sister . . .

  All his old worries tumbled back. Winter would disown him. Bo would lose his job and wouldn’t be allowed to go near Astrid. He could see it all in his mind, playing out like a picture show in a theater.

  He tried to shove them all back into the dark corners of his mind and busied himself spreading peanut butter on a cracker. He handed it to Astrid, but she didn’t eat it. He took a big gulp of hot tea and attempted to clear his head.

  “If I didn’t go back to school . . .” Astrid said softly. “And I’m not saying I’m giving up, but I can’t help but wonder why I’m doing something that makes me miserable, and that maybe there’s something else out there for me. Hadley says I just need to find out what that is.”

  Bo didn’t know how to help her find that. He didn’t know how to find it himself.

  “I’m not asking for you to help me with that,” she said. “But what I’m wondering is . . . what will we do? How can we be—”

  “Together,” he finished. It wasn’t as if he’d never entertained that fantasy. Of course he had. But he could never quite get the puzzle pieces to fit correctly. He could try to find a legitimate job, but nothing would pay enough to keep her in the style she was accustomed to living in. And even if she was willing to make some sacrifices, where would they live? In his old apartment? Not likely.

  As if she’d picked out his thoughts, she said, “Aida lived on that end of Grant, and she wasn’t the only white woman in her boardinghouse. Besides, I went to Sylvia’s apartment, and it was perfectly fine. The building isn’t run-down.”

  “No, but my apartment doesn’t even have a proper bedroom. It’s not a place for families. I should know. I slept on a pallet in the corner when I lived there with my uncle before he died.”

  Neither of them said anything for a long while. In the distance, he could see the dark shape of a large ship cutting to the north of them, heading up the coast. The wind picked up and blew golden strands of her hair across his jaw. He tucked them behind her ear and smoothed a hand over the back of her head.

  “You know,” she said. “I was thinking about the night I drove you to Dr. Moon’s. Don’t say it—I know I need to get your fender fixed.” A small smile lifted her mouth, and that made him feel a little lighter. “Anyway, I was thinking how Nob Hill and Chinatown border each other, and how you can drive a few blocks from the Wicked Wenches’ million-dollar apartment and be on Grant.”

  “That’s true of any neighborhood.”

  “But I was thinking of the incident outside their apartment building with that horrible woman and her husband, the state senator. The Humphreys. Remember them?”

  How could he forget? It was the first time Astrid hadn’t tried to smooth things over for public appearances, and like everything Astrid set her mind to, she did it with gusto. He smiled to himself as she continued.

  “Anyway, she was upset because the ‘immigrants’ were invading her neighborhood. And I was thinking, yes, of course they are. Because neighborhoods aren’t hard lines. There are those blocks between, where you can still find Nob Hill money living next to a Chinese merchant. Or there’s someone like Ju, who owns that small house on the edge of Russian Hill.”

  Which had been vandalized repeatedly, despite the fact that Ju traveled with thugs wherever he went. “Where are you going with this?”

  “I’m just saying, there are those gray areas between the neighborhoods, and that makes me think maybe that’s a place for us. We aren’t the first people to do this. Love crosses streets. It doesn’t realize it’s supposed to stay confined to one neighborhood.”

  Tell that to the old WASPs who would be happier if people like him didn’t look them in the eye, much less stepped on their sidewalks. He pulled her head to his chest and laid his own head upon hers, tucking her tightly under his arm.

  “What can we do?” she said.

  “I could save up money while you go to school—or while you figure out what you want to do.”

  “Or maybe I could figure out what I wanted to do here. Maybe I could work. I could, you know. Hadley said I could work in the de Young Museum offices. I could be a secretary, or assist her with paperwork.”

  It took Bo several blinking moments to process just how far her conspiracy with Hadley had gone. He was surprised. And impressed. As for Astrid working with Hadley . . . well, that remained to be seen. But he tried to focus on the larger picture. Astrid could live at home and work—thereby allowing them to see each other—but if she did that, he couldn’t stay at the Magnusson house. He’d have to stay at his old apartment building and maybe find new work. New work meant less pay. But if she went back to school, perhaps they could keep things secret from Winter for a while longer—a thought that gave him such a pang of guilt, his stomach twisted. But if he could manage it, he might be able to save money faster. The price, however, was not just lying to a man who’d been like a surrogate father to him; it meant also not being able to see Astrid but twice a year.

  And then there were always the deepest worries. The ones about class and race, and how he could not legally marry her. That if she got pregnant, their children would be under similar restraints. Where would they go to school? Would he take them to Dr. Moon if they got sick? Would they get treated with the same indignities that he’d faced? Or would it be worse for them, because they wouldn’t be accepted in either community?

  He didn’t know the answers, and his heart grieved under the burden.

  As the sun continued to climb a sky free of rain clouds, Bo urged Astrid to eat and began to think of less weighty problems in their immediate future, like the fact that the Magnusson household would already be awake and soon someone would notice that they weren’t home. He’d have to telephone the house and concoct a story. Pray that Greta or Aida answered the telephone, and not Winter. Sneak Astrid into the house.

  Whatever he had to do, it had been worth it. All those years of wanting disappeared when he looked at the sun shining on the softly curving planes of her face and saw the joy he felt in his heart reflected in her eyes. It had been worth it all.

  “This can’t be impossible, Bo,” she said as she swirled tea leaves at the bottom of her cup, peering inside as if she could read their future. “We have to make a plan. I can’t go back to a life without us.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Three nights after they left the lighthouse, on Christmas Eve, Bo stood in the living room of the Magnusson house, surrounded by twinkling candles, the biggest Christmas tree in Pacific Heights (surely), and twenty or so people—most of whom were Swedish and on the verge of being drunk on tulip-shaped glasses of akvavit spirits and mugs of cardamom-scented mulled glögg. And amidst the merry shouts of God Jul! and the lingering smells of the holiday smorgasbord—overloaded with ham, sausage, herring, potatoes, and the precious few Dungeness crabs Winter and Bo were able to catch that morning—Bo was experiencing a wealth of conflicting emotions.

  Though few in Chinatown actually celebrated Christmas, he’d spent the last third of his life developing a taste for yuletide presents and singing “Jingle Bells” around a piano. And he was experiencing that familiar buzz of happiness now, watching Lowe and Hadley’s adopted five-year-old, deaf daughter, Stella Goldberg, grinning as she ran from Aida’s one-eyed mastiff, who was attempting to confiscate the almond cookie the girl carried in her hand.

  But in the back of his mind, he was also worried that he could lose all this if his relationship with Astrid caused a family schism, and wondered wistfully if this was the last time he’d sit in this room watching Greta loosen her staunch Lutheran morals and get tipsy while Winter played horsey with his infant daughter on his knee.

  And somewhere between the joy and worry was Astrid, who wore a dazzling sleeveless red gown that bared half her back, and was now working
in tandem with Lowe to help the mastiff chase the merry, pink-cheeked Stella. How could two people live in the same house and never see each other? He hadn’t been able to skim more than a couple of passing kisses from Astrid since the lighthouse—what with the combined roadblocks of work and hovering family members who always seemed to show up at the wrong times. He’d come this close to stealing into her bedroom last night when he’d gotten home after midnight, but Aida had been up, and she’d stayed in the kitchen with Winter talking seriously until Bo gave in to sleep, waiting for them to go to bed.

  It didn’t help that every time he looked at Astrid she was staring back at him with those fox eyes that left him grinning like an idiot and forgetting to keep his feelings masked. Watching her now made him want to drag her into his arms and feel her smile against his neck . . . and then haul her off somewhere private, find a pair of scissors, and split that red gown of hers right down the back.

  He was in agony.

  After little Stella finally tired, he made his way back over to the fireplace and stoked the logs, inhaling the fresh cedar and eucalyptus branches that decorated the mantel. Behind him, Jonte was coaxing Lena to take off her apron and dance; Christmas was the one time of the year that Greta allowed the staff to celebrate with the rest of the house.

  “Meant to tell you earlier, Sylvia’s fender looks shiny and new.”

  He glanced up to find Astrid smiling down at him, flames from the fire dancing across her face. “They did a good job. I would thank you for having it repaired, only you’re the one who hurt her to begin with,” he said, standing to brush off his pants and replace the fireplace stoker.

  “You make it sound like I socked your best friend in the face.”

  “Didn’t you?”

  She tried to stifle a laugh and pinch his arm, but he grabbed her hand before she managed it. “I’ll throw you in this fire,” he teased. “Burn you right up. We’ll toast marshmallows over your hair.”

  This time she laughed, loud and vibrant, but quickly covered her mouth.