Shake, Rattle And Haunt

by Terri Grimes

  “Um, Sam?”

  He paused in his packing.

  “Yes, Gertie?”

  “You can sleep over if you want.”

  His eyes crinkled at the corners and his mouth angled into a smirk.

  “I’ve got clean sheets on the bed in the guest room and an ample supply of unused toothbrushes,” I clarified. “I mean, with it being so late, I thought you might want to crash here.” Although I stopped just short of stuttering, I could feel my face flooding with color.

  I turned to look at Sam, to find that his smirk had turned into a full wide grin.

  “It is late,” he replied in a hopeful tone of voice.

  Oh no, I was afraid of that. Let a guy pick you up in a bar just once and he thinks he has a standing invitation to the smorgasbord. Time for me to close the buffet line, because there was no way I was going to be a booty call. I had at least a shred of pride left!

  “I’m sorry,” I said in an attempt to back out of my hasty, not very well thought out, invitation. “You probably need to get back to your place and go over the evidence we gathered tonight. I shouldn’t keep you from that.” I stood at the sink and turned the water on high, my back to him as I washed the coffee cups.

  His hand clasped my shoulder. “No, it’s all right. I’ve got everything I need in my van so I can review the evidence anywhere.” He hesitated. “And you did say that you wanted to help me review the evidence.”

  Great. Me and my big mouth. I fought the urge to roll my eyes. When would I ever learn?

  Removing his hand from my shoulder, he turned his attention to his equipment again, snapping the last case shut with a click.

  Shutting the water off, I placed the clean coffee cups in the dish drainer and turned to watch him, anxious to see what he planned next.

  Pointing to his equipment cases with a nod of the head, he said, “If you don’t mind, I’ll take these out of your way and put them in the dining room. Then, when we wake up, I can set everything up in there and we can review the evidence.” He must have noticed the expression on my face because he added, “If that’s okay with you, of course.”

  “Knock yourself out,” I said with the shrug as my heart beat feverishly in my chest. The nearness of him was intoxicating. “I’ve been sleeping on the sofa in the living room downstairs. But I’ve got to get my bedcovers and stuff from my bedroom, so I’ll walk up with you.”

  He put a hand on the small of my back as we walked up the staircase. The same staircase we’d both ran down in fright just one hour earlier. If someone had told me an hour ago that I would be walking up this staircase of my own volition, I would have called them a liar. It was amazing how brave and empowered I felt with Sam at my side.

  “Everything you need should be in the guest room,” I said as we headed to the guest room. “But if you find there’s something I don’t have, just let me know.”

  Sam stopped in the doorway and turned to me, his expression serious. “I’m sure everything will be fine. Don’t worry.” His voice was silky and soothing.

  I gave him a tentative smile, nervous, not so much from the entity, but more from my reactions to the feel of his touch and the crinkle around the corner of his eyes as he smiled at me. My knees were turning to rubber the longer I gazed into his eyes. Damn knees.

  “If you run into any problems during the night, just holler,” he said, with one hand touching my arm. Electric jolts ran up my arm causing my nipples to pop to full attention as if they had a mind of their own.

  “I will.”

  “I mean it, Gertie. Don’t hesitate to wake me up.”

  “Thanks, Sam, I’ll keep that in mind.”

  The nearness of him was so intoxicating I took several steps back

  He closed the gap between us, grabbed me by the arms, still staring into my eyes.

  His actions were executed with such intenseness it made me uncomfortable. Using humor to defuse the situation, I said, “Is this the part where you say you complete me?”

  “No.” His voice was husky. “This is the part where I kiss you.” He lowered his face to mine.

  I closed my eyes in anticipation as his lips covered mine with the gentlest of caresses. Gratifying warmth spread throughout my body.

  With a quick shift his lips pressed more firmly against mine, breaking only to give a quick, sensual nibble on my lower lip.

  “Mmm,” I groaned. “Me likey.” I brought my arms up around his neck, while his simultaneously slid down to my waist, drawing me closer. I inched forward so my thighs circled around his leg, encompassing it as our bodies melded together. My nether regions were positively tingling.

  Sam had a strong, muscular chest and I was anxious to see just how far down those muscles went. My hand casually snaked its way under his shirt, down his chest and to the waistband of his jeans. I let my fingers rest on the zipper pull, ready to spring into action at a moments notice.

  Our kiss careened into an erotic direction as he urged my mouth open with his tongue, invading it with wet, darting strokes. When his fingers reached under my shirt and found my nipples, plucking them with sharp tweaks, my body tingled with waves of ecstasy.

  “Sam?”

  “Yes, Gertie?”

  “You might find my bed more comfortable than the one in the guest room.”

  “I’m sure I would.” His mouth moved to my neck. I shivered as his tongue deftly licked a sensitive spot on my neck, just below my left ear.

  I throbbed with yearning and my knees grew so weak I would have fallen to the floor had it not been for his arms holding me up.

  His mouth found mine again, gently teasing my lower lip as he licked and nibbled it.

  My fingers still on his zipper, I slowly guided the fastener open, sliding my hand lower and lower. There was no turning back now. I wanted him so bad I ached. Just as my fingertip touched the edge of his shaft, he suddenly jerked upright.

  “No,” he said, pulling back.

  “Whaaaat?” I could feel my mouth forming a perfect O.

  “It’s time for me to go to bed in the guest room and you to go to bed in yours.”

  My voice was barely audible. “You don’t want me?”

  “I want you, all right. That’s the problem. But I’m not going to take advantage of your fear of sleeping alone.”

  “I don’t have a fear of sleeping alone. I sleep very well by myself every night, thank you very much.” It was difficult to keep the indignation I was feeling out of my tone.

  “Upstairs in your own bed, Gertie? Is that where you sleep so soundly…alone?”

  He had me there. “Not exactly. But lots of people fall asleep on their couch.”

  “You need to make a stand, Gertie. Let that demon know you’re not going to be pushed out of your own house.

  “I’m trying.”

  “Start by sleeping in your bed tonight. I’ll be just a few feet down the hall. If you call out in the night I’ll be there in an instant.”

  “Okay. Maybe I will.”

  “I hope you do.” He kissed me on the forehead. “Goodnight, Gertie.”

  “Goodnight.” Suddenly a thought ran through my mind. I had to ask while I had the nerve. “I was just thinking how drunk I must have been the night we met.”

  “Yeah, you were pretty drunk.” He chucked me lightly on the chin while a grin spread across his face.

  “Well, if you don’t mind me asking, why it was okay to have sex with me that night, when I was drunk and passed out, but tonight you’ve suddenly got morals?”

  Before he spoke, several conflicting expressions crossed his face, from humor to confusion to incredulousness. “Probably because we didn’t have sex that night.”

  “Of course we had sex.”

  His expression reverted to one of amusement again, his eyes twinkling. “I think I would know if we had sex. Believe me, as much as I would have liked to, we didn’t. I was every bit the gentleman.” He smiled benevolently.

  “But…”

  He placed
his forefinger against my lips.

  “I was wearing your t-shirt.”

  “Would it help if I told you I had my eyes shut while I put it on you?”

  Chewing on the corner of my lower lip, I thought for a moment before answering. “Really? You had your eyes shut?”

  “No, of course not.”

  I gasped. “You’re such a liar. You just told me you had your eyes shut.”

  “No. I asked you if it would help if I said I had my eyes shut. I never claimed to actually have had them closed.”

  “Cad.”

  That invoked another grin from him. “Listen, the past is the past. Live in the here-and-now. Don’t worry about what may or may not have happened days ago. Life is too short.”

  I nibbled on my lower lip. He was right. What did it matter in the fabric of time? “Carpe diem.”

  “Seize the day. And now, I’m seizing the night.” For the second time that night, he kissed me on the forehead. “Pleasant dreams, Gertie.” Then, turning on his heel, he slipped into the guest room and shut the door with a soft thud.

  Sixteen

  I took Sam’s suggestion and slept in my bed that night. Knowing he was on the other side of the wall in the next room gave me the courage I needed. He was right, it was time I made a stand and took back my house.

  It was still dark when I woke. It wasn’t that my internal clock was telling me I’d slept enough, it was my bladder screaming at me for release. That’s what I got for drinking a large bottle of water so close to bedtime.

  As I inched out of bed, I was careful to not make a sound, mindful of Sam sleeping in the next room. Tiptoeing across the room, I eased the bathroom door open, willing the hinges not to creak. My hand fumbled along the wall for the light switch. Finding it, I flicked it on.

  “Aahh!” I shrieked at the top of my lungs as I came face to face with a very familiar set of eyes attached to a very familiar body.

  “What the fu…” I stopped just short of dropping an f-bomb in front of my dear sweet, dead as a doornail, Grandma.

  I heard footsteps coming from the hallway and then Sam’s voice on the other side of my bedroom door. “Gertie, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”

  Wordlessly, I backed against the wall of the small bathroom as my grandmother put translucent fingers to semi transparent lips in a shushing motion. “Quiet down, girl. I don’t bite. I don’t know why you’re in such a fluster.”

  I fought the urge to roll my already widened eyes. Really? She didn’t know why I was in a fluster? Was she kidding me?

  “What’s going on in there?” Sam hollered. He pounded on the door so hard it shook. “I’m coming in.”

  “No, Sam. Don’t come in,” I said through the closed door. “I’m okay, it was just a spider.” My gaze locked with that of my dead grandmother. For someone who had been under six feet of dirt for the last twelve months, she looked pretty darn spiffy.

  “Are you sure you’re all right? I’m an ace at squashing spiders.”

  “Yes, I’m fine, the spider is history. Go back to bed.”

  I heard him shuffling the few feet down the hall, back to his room, muttering something about crazy women. I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard his door close.

  “You always were a jumpy thing. Didn’t get it from my side of the family,” Grandma said with more than a hint of smugness.

  “I’m still asleep, right? This is just some weird dream brought on locking lips with that sexy hunk lying between the sheets in the next room.”

  ”Watch your mouth, young lady. I may be dead but I’m still your grandmother.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Humph, I should think so,” she said with more indignation than someone who’s been dead for the last twelve months should have.

  “It’s not like I’m really talking to you anyway. I’m certain I’m just imagining this.” This was too surreal to really be happening.

  Still wrapped in a serious case of denial, I squeezed my eyes shut hoping that when I opened them I would be in my bed, waking up from this nightmare. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to see my grandma. It was more that I just hadn’t planned on seeing her after she’d been in the cold hard ground for a year.

  Hearing a snigger, I opened my eyes. Shit. She was still there.

  Grandma grabbed her large belly and laughed so hard, her eyes watered. “Hoo boy.” She wiped the ghostly tears away. “You are a riot, kiddo. You have no problem believing in the supernatural when it’s a stranger doing the haunting. You even call a ghost hunter to get rid of the specter in my hou— I mean your house.” Her expression sobered. “But when your dearly departed grandma stops by for a friendly chat you go into denial and pretend it’s a dream, like I don’t exist anymore. Do you think that doesn’t hurt my feelings? I raised you better than that, young lady.”

  I had the grace to hang my head as I mumbled, “Sorry.”

  “You act like the devil himself dropped by for tea,” she berated me.

  “I wasn’t expecting to see you in my bathroom in the middle of the night. You can understand that, can’t you? I mean, the last time I saw you was when you were laying on a silk coverlet in a mahogany box with flowers all over the top.”

  “All right, I’ll give you that, I reckon. And by the way, thanks for burying me in my sage green suit. I always loved that suit.”

  “You’re welcome,” I said automatically.

  “Sweetie, what in the name of all that’s holy are you doing wasting your time with ghost hunters? Maybe I’m old and don’t understand these new fangled ways you young people have nowadays.” She tsked a few times.

  “I don’t meant to be disrespectful, but it’s not that you’re old.” I hesitated briefly. “It’s more that you’re dead.”

  “That’s right, rub it in. I thought better of you than that, Gertie Ann Sugarbaker.”

  Oh no, I knew I was in trouble when she used my middle name. That was never a good sign.

  “I’m truly sorry, Grandma,” I pleaded.

  Her features softened. “It’s all right, baby girl. I know this must be a shock for you. I suppose I can forgive you.” Her eyes narrowed again. “But I still don’t get why you are wasting your time with that man.”

  I sat on the edge of the tub. “Sam is helping me.”

  “Pshaw. Helping you indeed. More likely he’s helping himself to the dessert cart, if you know what I mean.”

  Unfortunately, I knew exactly what she meant. I could have cleared up a few misconceptions on the spot, namely that Sam hadn’t even eaten from the buffet yet, much less from the dessert cart. But if she’d seen the tongue-fest that occurred in the hallway earlier than night, I doubt she would have believed me. I hoped, with every beat of my heart, she hadn’t witnessed it. But something from the tone of her voice told me she knew full well what we’d been up to.

  “Grandma,” I gasped. “It’s not like that at all!”

  She arched one gray, but nicely shaped, eyebrow. “I may be dead, but I’ve still got eyes and ears, child.”

  I could feel the heat spreading across my face as I thought about the way my hand had snaked under Sam’s shirt and made its way towards his crotch. Great. No doubt, she thought I’d turned her beloved home into a brothel, featuring myself as head whore. Why was she making an appearance tonight, of all nights? Grandma had been dead for a year now and she couldn’t be bothered to show up until I tried to get a man in my bed? Don’t tell me, she’d been too busy playing canasta on the other side?

  “Now you listen to me, if you are looking to find someone to keep your feet warm at night, that’s all right by me.” She pointed a meaty finger in my face. “But if you think that hunk of eye candy or his chunky Wiccan friend with the bottle red hair are going to make your demon problems go away, you are misinformed, young lady.” Grandma shut the lid on the toilet and lowered her hefty figure down, making herself comfortable.

  Oh no, it looked like she wasn’t planning on leaving anytime soon. I hoped she didn’t not
ice the sigh that came out of my mouth. “He investigates locations to determine what type of haunting you’re experiencing. He doesn’t get rid of the problem himself. He calls in experts for that, which in my case, was his Wiccan friend that did the house blessing. Or maybe she was a demonologist? Whatever. You get the point, he calls in people to do the heavy duty stuff.”

  Grandma shook her head a couple of times before uttering a noisy snort. The sound startled me, causing me to jump slightly.

  “Gertie, you were raised better than that. You don’t come from stock that depends on other people to take care of things for them. Well, maybe on your father’s side, but that doesn’t count. Our people take care of themselves. There’s not a slacker in the bunch and we intend to keep it that way. You hear me, girl?”

  Oh, I heard her all right. That was the problem.

  I stood and walked the two feet from the tub to where my grandmother was still seated on the toilet lid. “I can’t take on a demon. How am I supposed to handle that one by myself?”

  “You come from a line of powerful women, Gertie Ann Sugarbaker.” She shook her forefinger in my face.

  Oh no, again with the middle name.

  “You are not going to be the first weak link in our daisy chain. Do you hear me?”

  I nodded. If she asked me if I heard her just one more time, I think I would have screamed. I wasn’t deaf. I was just in denial.

  Grandma continued. “So you just pony up right now, buttercup and suck it up.” By the end of her speech, her finger was almost touching my nose as she continually jabbed it in my direction in an effort to emphasize her words.