“I don’t understand. Her presence was a secret?”
“She said there were people living here in her dream, but even though she could walk around the place, it was like she was invisible to them.” Lexie looked at him then. Jason Bowen had a translucent quality about him, but she could clearly make out his features as though she were looking at him through a thin fog. The man was exceptionally good-looking, exactly like his picture and portrait. It was a little disconcerting that she could see the banister and the wall through his body, as was the faint edge of blue aura that lit him like he had a black light behind him.
“I’m curious. Did she say who these people were?”
Lexie shook her head. “Only that they lived here and so did she. Her dreams changed over the years. There was a point when we were in college where I was beginning to worry about them.”
“Why was that?”
“Because she was giving me details of the 1880s and there was no conceivable way she’d know them.” Lexie didn’t mention her own career came about because of Lanie’s fascinating descriptions of Victorian life.
Hoping the more she said the more she’d recall, Jason pressed, “She never mentioned the people…”
She thought a moment. “There were servants, a cook, a housekeeper, a boy who looked after the horses. I think she called him Patrick.”
“Anything else?”
“It was a long time ago. She used to tell me more when we were younger.”
He gave her a look that clearly said it was important. “What did she tell you when she was younger?”
She gazed at the ceiling as if the answer could be found up there. “Okay, well, there was a parakeet named August.”
Yes, Mrs. Boatwright had a bird named for her husband killed in the war. “Anyone else?” he asked a little too impatiently.
“Look, I’m trying. It was a long time ago.”
Jason smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry. I feel this information is important. It may hold the key to my haunting the place.”
Good God, am I really having this conversation? Lexie rubbed her temple, this whole thing was nuts. “There was a boy who was a little older than Lanie. His name was…” She closed her eyes, trying to recall the long ago time when Lanie talked about the people in this house. “His name was Jacy.” She looked at him then. “Jason. It was you? You’re Jacy?”
“Apparently so.”
“I don’t understand this.” Lexie shook her head again.
“And then what did she tell you?” he pressed.
“The dreams inside the house stopped.”
“Stopped? For how long?”
“For years. When we turned eighteen, Lanie started to dream again, but things had changed. They took a different turn from that point. Some people were missing from her earlier dreams.” “Go on.” At her frustrated look, he smiled gently. “Please, you said people were missing…”
“Look, I’m sure she didn’t confide everything to me.”
Though Lexie said the words, having been privy to enough conversations between the pair, Jason was sure that wasn’t the case. He raised a brow at her.
Lexie grew uncomfortable under his unmistakable doubting gaze. Thinking a moment, she added, “There was a man here then. Remember no one else ever saw her. To them she was still invisible. But this man…she fell in love with him.” She met his lovely eyes and was suddenly sure. “It was you then.”
Jason swallowed, recalling the pain that came on the heels of her saying that she loved him. He answered the only way he could. “I believe so.”
Lexie looked at him, he appeared pained over something. It was exactly how Lanie looked when she came to her house and cried into her margarita glass that she and Jason had become lovers in her dream. An outrageous possibility seized her. She demanded, “And it is you now. Now tell me, Mr. Bowen. Are you messing with her dreams somehow?”
Sidestepping, he said, “I have no idea why she’s having these dreams.”
“You’re evading the question.”
He most certainly was, and it was by no means polite conversation. Then he remembered, he was talking with a woman of this era. Nothing shocked them. “Yes, I believe I can influence her dreams.”
“How the hell can you do that?”
Lexie’s voice rose slightly, and for a moment he didn’t know if she asked about the mechanics of entering Lanie’s dreams or questioned his right to do so. He chose the former and not the latter. “I believe it has to do with electricity.”
She leveled a look at him. “That makes sense on some level. The brain has electrical impulses, and you’re essentially energy right? My question is—why would you?”
She nailed him.
“It happened by accident. I was near her when she slept and got pulled along. I was completely surprised to find myself meeting her for the first time in my own era.”
“And you seduced her in her dreams?” Lexie felt so odd even having this conversation and discussing this inconceivable possibility, with a ghost no less. Seeing the truth in his eyes, he didn’t need to answer. She snapped, “That’s not quite fair, is it?”
He shook his head. His voice sincere, he said quietly, “I can only love her in her dreams, Lexie. I’m a dead man in this waking world.”
“Well she loves you asleep and awake. That’s the painful realization she’s having right now. That’s the reason she slammed that booze and ended up too drunk to drive home. She knows there’s no future in loving you.”
He put his head in his hands. His voice cracked when he replied, “So help me, God, I know.”
He looked so miserable, she laid her hand upon his shoulder. There was a tingly substance to him for all his transparency. It reminded her of holding her palm out to catch the air while riding in a moving car. The air was there pressing your hand, but you couldn’t hold it.
They sat on the stair side by side in silence for a while, each deep in their own thoughts.
Coming to a decision, Jason told her, “I need your help, Lexie. The only way I can leave her life is to know the instance of my death.”
“You don’t know how you died?”
He shook his head. “I know my wife and her lover killed me somehow. Other than that, I have no idea.”
“I knew it!”
He smiled at her. “Yes, I was there when you showed Lanie your discoveries.”
“So what do I do?”
“Keep looking. There must be some record, something that explains this.”
She nodded. “I have stacks of documents and newspaper clippings. I’ll see what else I can find.”
He looked at her. “Come with the information as you always do. Lanie need not know I’m listening.”
“You mean to stay invisible?”
He nodded sadly. “It’s for the best if she thinks I’m gone. You and I both know there is no future in loving me. She needs a man of flesh and blood. The sooner we uncover the mystery of my demise the sooner my soul can move on. She knows you saw me tonight. Tell her we talked and I said I’m leaving. She need not know I need more information to accomplish that end.”
“And you’ll stay out of her dreams?”
After a long pause he shook his head. “I can’t.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Your guess was correct. The woman’s body you uncovered in the cellar was Addy. She was a dear, dear woman and very important to me. I might be able to save her from a horrible death. For whatever reason, I’ve been given the opportunity to see my life again. I’ve also been made aware of murdering minds. Armed with knowledge, I must follow where it leads.”
“But…”
“I won’t hurt her. You can rest assured.” He looked at her hopefully. “You’ll help me then?”
“I’ll do what I can.”
“Thank you. You won’t see me when you come next, but I’ll be here. Explain your findings to Lanie, and I’ll understand.”
“Okay.”
Standing at
the door, Jason held out his hand. “I’d like it if you were to consider me a friend, Lexie.”
Taking it without hesitation this time, Lexie gave it a shake, surprised that she could. Touching him felt exactly like the rush of air you felt when you stuck your hand out a moving car’s window. “I’d like that, too.” With sincerity she added, “I wish you were alive, Jason.”
Understanding the broader message in her words, he smiled. Squeezing her fingers gently, he raised her knuckles to his lips, “Thank you for that.”
On the drive home Lexie prayed for her new friend’s restless soul. Raised Orthodox Christian by her Greek adoptive parents, she firmly believed in the power of prayer. Hers had certainly been answered the day they walked into her life and gave her a family and a home. Unfortunately, prayer could only go so far. Jason and Lanie needed a miracle.
* * * *
Aching inside, Jason sat a long while watching Lanie sleep knowing for her own sake he needed to keep his distance in her waking world. It would be difficult, but he would. Knowing how he died and where his body lay would take him into the light, he was sure of it. He needed to uncover the deed and get out of Lanie’s life as quickly as possible. He couldn’t be a husband to her, nor could he father the beautiful raven-haired children he knew she’d have. He also knew he couldn’t stay to see another man sharing her life. His eyes welled, and his throat tightened. Life. He squeezed his eyes shut. He’d give anything to be that man, but he had no life to share. I ride her sea of dreams like a miserable husk cast into the water by fate. Haven’t I sacrificed enough by giving up my life? Haven’t I already lost all? Must I lose her as well, this gentle creature I love above all?
Invisible alongside her, he lovingly brushed the hair back from her face. Lanie stirred and mumbled, “Jason…”
There was a moment where he wondered if she’d still dream of him after the light took him away. His gut told him no. Heart aching, he whispered, “Take me there, my love. Take us back where loving you is possible. Let me love you while I can.”
Jason found himself sitting at the breakfast table with Lanie and his murderers.
“Why, Lanie, you’re all flushed. Are you feeling well?” Bertha asked. Dabbing her lips with her napkin, she turned to her brother. “Doesn’t she look flushed, Richard?”
Setting his fork down and reaching for his sweet tea Richard appraised the lovely black-haired angel seated across the table from him. Lanie’s cheeks were pink, and her lips appeared swollen as if she’d been overly kissed. Kissed? There were only three men in the house, himself, the stable lad, and Jason. He looked at his host. Jason met his gaze with a smile. His eyes went back to Lanie with new interest. “Lanie looks lovely as always, sister.”
Cathy chimed in, “Yes, such pallid skin tone does draw attention to illness. Perhaps Jason might take a look at you, Lanie. It wouldn’t do to have to take sick when you have so much business to see to before you head home.”
The sound halfway between a honking goose and a case of consumption, Bertha chortled. “You know, it just now occurred to me having a doctor under the roof is a marvelous thing.” Touching her fingers to her black eye, she added, “I’ve yet to thank you for your care, Jason, though if Cathy and Richard hadn’t told me of your help last night I’d scarcely know of it.” To Lanie she informed, “Apparently you were asleep when they brought me home in such a state.”
Lanie only nodded, her cheeks warm. She hadn’t been asleep and recalling just what she had been doing brought a twinge between her legs. Seeking more comfortable ground, she sipped her apple juice and asked with a doctor’s concern, “I was just about to ask after your bruise, Bertha. Did you fall?”
“Oh Lord, yes. I remember catching the toe of my shoe in my hem and stumbling. The next I knew, I was in my bed upstairs with a terrible pain in my head.”
“Don’t hesitate to ask for laudanum, Bertha. There’s no reason for you to spend the day in pain,” Jason told her thinking it would cease her incessant prattle as well.
She gave him a rather disturbing smile. With her naturally haphazard teeth and blackened eye the woman looked like a prize fighter after the bell. She batted her eyes at him. “May I see you for some later, Jason, should the need arise?”
“Of course, but you need not seek me out. Addy knows where the medicine cabinet is. I’ll inform her of the dose.”
“Jason, as long as we are in discussion of my health, I was wondering if I might prevail upon you to take a look at my bunion…”
Cathy’s cup rattled in her saucer. “Bertha dear, I hardly think this is a worthy breakfast conversation.”
“Fiddle-faddle, Cathy. Papa used to talk about his big toe all the time at the table. And besides, Jason is a doctor.” She turned back to Jason. “He had gout, you know. I remember this one time, the toe was so swollen, the nail had turned…”
More than able to ignore his sister’s yammering, Richard pretended to listen as he ate his buttered toast, his eyes drawn time and again to the high blush that colored Lanie’s fair cheeks. He spared Cathy a glance. She was a beauty, too, in her own right, despite the frown she wore in that moment. But Lanie was different. There was a quality to her that Cathy lacked. He found himself passing the hours by comparing the two women, and each time Cathy came up short. Last night when Cathy had come to his bed, he’d told her to keep silent because he didn’t want to risk discovery. In actuality it was because he imagined it was Lanie panting under him. The imagery had been necessary at the time, for admittedly he’d grown bored of his cousin. As a result, it was increasingly harder to rouse to her.
Cathy’s petulance and his sister’s continual jibs and jabs were starting to wear on him. He hadn’t realized just how tired of Cathy he’d grown until she married the Yankee and moved north. The initial plan was for her to marry then eliminate Jason. They’d sell his estate and buy Magnolia Hill back from the bank before another carpetbagger had a chance to purchase more of the surrounding land. They’d already lost four hundred acres for taxes, and two more were in escrow to fund Cathy’s trousseau and their expenses to come here. It rankled him that northerners lived so well while he and Bertha lived like beggars at the mercy of a northern-held bank. He couldn’t wait for this farce to end. Having come to Philadelphia though, he wasn’t sure their plan fit any longer. He liked it here. The north was prosperous, not beaten into submission like Atlanta and its constant reminders of loss. With the good doctor’s money, he could live the life he was meant to have.
There’d been several reasons it was fortunate that Jackson Bowen, a lesser breed of carpetbagger, bought his father’s mill. The first being he didn’t have money to pay the nigras, not even the young ones who used to run the shuttles and rethread the spools. He didn’t want to pay them anything, curse their black hides. Unfortunately, he didn’t have money for the Irish either. The other reason was Cathy had charmed the old man. Playing the Southern belle, she ingratiated herself and it didn’t take long before he introduced her to his eligible son. Of course to consolidate the Bowen wealth, they had to kill Jackson Bowen. He’d simply been in the way. His death also strengthened Jason’s desire to ease his grief in the arms of a wife. It had only taken two months to hook him.
Initially, the idea of Cathy marrying any Yankee didn’t sit well with him. But Bertha wasn’t going to land a man of wealth, not any man with two eyes anyway. The girl had unfortunately taken after their father with his long face and horsey smile. Cathy was their only hope. Then, too, there was just something appealing about making a cuckold of the good doctor. Cathy had cried on their wedding night. Trembling fearfully with his every advance, she asked Jason for more time to find her comfort and the fool gave it to her. She was a maiden after all. A small smile lit Richard’s eyes. He’d been fucking his distant cousin since he was fifteen and she twelve and there was something to be said for such familiar carnal knowledge. Jason thought his wife a virgin still. Smiling into his cup, he sipped his coffee. Virgin. There was no deed left betwee
n he and Cathy that had not already been done. But having been in the doctor’s company for a week like he had, he was sure the man would only wait so long for an unwilling wife.
He wondered if Lanie had become more than Jason’s business partner. It made perfect sense to him if Jason had taken the beauty as his mistress. He’d certainly have her. Feeling his cock stir with the thought, he caught Cathy’s eye and winked at her. Her smiling reply assured him they’d empty his balls sometime after breakfast. Too bad the sun was shining. He’d have to close his eyes. A thought took him then, once the good doctor was eliminated from the picture, Lanie would be distraught and need comforting. Of course he’d marry Cathy right away to secure the estate but that did mean he’d have to keep her. Anything might happen. He looked at Lanie again and smiled at the possibility.
Jason suddenly found himself in his surgery. Lanie’s dream had obviously taken a turn from Bertha’s exhaustive telling of her father’s gouty toe. Thank goodness. The last thing Jason was in the mood for was treating a bunion. He wondered why he was in here, but then recalled he’d offered the woman laudanum for her concussion.
Lanie had been mostly silent and looking uncomfortable during breakfast. They needed to talk. He assured her, “This will only take a moment.” With that he quickly filled a phial with the sweet-smelling opiate.
He was about to put the bottle back in the cabinet when the door swung wide. It was Cathy. “Jason, Bertha won’t be needing the laudanum. It will tire her out. Do you have anything milder?”
Gone from the house or drugged into silence, it didn’t matter to him which it was, as long as he no longer had to listen to Bertha’s expounding. He set the phial on the desk next to the bottle and took the powdered cocaine down from the cabinet. Portioning off a small amount, he asked, “Where are you off to, Cathy?”
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