Witch Angel

by Trana Mae Simmons

  “Shhh, shhh, shhh.” Alaynia touched his lips, then followed her fingers with a kiss. “Like you’ve said so many times before, you have responsibilities of your own, darling. But you’re wrong about one thing—dead wrong. I’m not capable of taking care of myself. Ever since you appeared in my life ... or I guess it was the other way around; I appeared in your life.” She giggled quietly and tucked her head against his neck, swirling a fingernail in the dark hair at the open vee of his shirt. “Ever since that day, I’ve known how empty my life had been up until then. Without you in it, my life would return to the same emptiness, and I’d just be a robot moving through the days. That’s not living, Shain. It’s just existing. You’ve brought my life alive—something I wasn’t able to do for myself.”

  “A robot?” Shain murmured.

  “It’s something Jake would really be interested in. I’ll tell you about it some day.” Alaynia quickly sat upright. “Shain, I need to go check on Jake and Cole. And Jeannie brought Tiny back in with her, so she could make sure he kept off his leg. He was limping awfully bad. I think that horrible man kicked him in the barn.”

  “Shhh, shhh, shhh.” Shain repeated Alaynia’s words, then kissed her to make his point. Reaching over to the bedside table, he turned the wick down in the only lantern left burning in the room, then tenderly laid Alaynia across the bed, settling beside her.

  “I checked on everyone right after I sent you in here to rest for a while, darling. Jeannie’s asleep, with Tiny curled up with her. She even gave that darned pig one of the pillows on her bed. Tana’s with Cole, and she said he stirred a little, so she thinks he’ll come out of it soon. When he does, I’m pretty sure he’ll confirm what Tana told us—that Fitzroy and Annette instigated this whole mess tonight, then tried to blame it on Little Jim. They figured it would cause even more agitation between my neighbors and me. But when the sheriff finds out what’s happened, you can bet Fitzroy will be, at the least, run out of the parish.”

  He sighed and tightened his hold on her. “And I think we can save enough of Chenaie’s crops to get by this year. Next year, they’ll be even better, without someone sabotaging us.”

  “What about Annette?”

  “That, too, will be up to Cole when he wakes up. But, knowing Cole, he’ll probably just be satisfied with everyone knowing Annette’s still spreading lies every time she opens her mouth.”

  “And Jake?”

  “Zeke showed up a while ago, insisting that he wanted to sit with Jake.” Though she could barely see him in the darkness, Alaynia sensed Shain shake his head. “Jake’s lived a long life,” he murmured. “Exactly the way he wanted to live it. Tana said his heart is weakening, rather than recovering.”

  Tears filled Alaynia’s eyes, and she wrapped her arms around Shain, burying her face against him. He held her and rocked her for several long moments, then tenderly tipped her face up, covering her lips with his. The kiss was full of comfort and consolation—promise and anticipation. It deepened almost imperceptibly—almost questioningly—and a whimper of need escaped Alaynia’s throat. Shain’s palm feathered down her back, across her hips, and settled on her thigh, urging her closer to him. With a muffled cry of surrender, Alaynia complied with his entreaty.

  * * * *

  Jake stirred on the bed, and Basil quickly stood from his seat on the window seat. Zeke immediately half-rose from his chair and swung his head toward the window, his eyes widening in fright as Sylvia murmured a caution to Basil. Apologizing in a quiet voice, the ghost used his powers to shield his presence while he watched Jake move a gnarled hand from beneath the blanket covering him.

  “Zeke?” Jake whispered.

  Zeke sat back down, extended his dark hand, and entwined it around Jake’s pale one. “Mister Jake,” he said in a choked voice. “You gonna be all right, Mister Jake. You soon be eatin’ my good cookin’ again.”

  Jake turned his head slightly, focusing on Zeke’s ravaged face. “No, my friend. But I will be all right. I’m not afraid, Zeke. I want to see all the wonders Alaynia has told me about. And I don’t want you to mourn for me.”

  “No, Mister Jake.” Zeke hung his head. “Please.”

  “Listen to me, Zeke,” Jake said in a slightly stronger voice. “There’s something I need to say. You’ve been my friend through a lot since we met. Can you please be my friend through this, too?”

  Zeke sniffed mightily, then rose from his chair and knelt by the bed. With his free hand, he smoothed back the wiry wisps of hair on Jake’s head. “We always be friends, Mister Jake. If you ain’t with me, we be friends in my rememberin’ of you.”

  “Thank you, Zeke.” Jake’s breath caught in his throat, but he finally managed to draw it in once more. “My Will is with Carl Beauville, at the bank in Baton Rouge, Zeke. The land and cabin are yours now, and there’s enough money to build the house, if you want—and enough to take care of you.”

  “I’ll see it’s built, with Miss ‘Laynia’s help,” Zeke replied. “I gonna call it Jake’s House.”

  Jake managed a smile. “Then you’ve gotten over your fear of Alaynia?”

  “Yessuh. When I seen how much she care for you when you took sick, I knew she came to make your life happy while she could. She give you some powerful things to think on in that mind of yours.”

  “She did that,” Jake agreed. “There’s also some other bequests in the Will, Zeke. One for our little friend, Jeannie. The rest is for a scholarship fund, to be used for bright young men or women who want to pursue the scientific field. Alaynia will help you manage it.”

  “Yessuh.”

  “And I didn’t get a chance to tell Alaynia, but that lottery ticket I gave her was one of the winning ones. Make sure she cashes it in, because it’s worth ten thousand dollars. Shain’s gonna piss and holler at her, but Alaynia can handle him.”

  Zeke tried to speak again, but his voice choked in his throat and he only nodded.

  “Well,” another voice said, and Basil and Sylvia peered out the window. “I know you’re concerned about what’s happening here, but there’s something else that needs your attention.”

  “Frannie!” Sylvia flew through the window to join the other angel. “Where have you been? Why haven’t you answered me when I tried to contact you?”

  “I’ve been busy, dear. We’ll talk later. Look.”

  Basil joined them, and he and Sylvia gazed in the direction of Frannie’s pointing finger. They mentally dissolved the roof of the manor house, and Basil growled deep in his chest when he saw Fitzroy slipping up the dark stairwell from the back veranda, a pistol in his hand.

  Sylvia rapidly tuned into the man’s thoughts. “He’s coming to kill Cole!” she said with a gasp. “He doesn’t want him to live to expose the scheme he and Annette Escott tried to pull off. We’ve got to stop him!”

  “Wait,” Frannie cautioned. “Look. Over there in Jeannie’s room.”

  Tiny snorted once and woke, then scrambled down the steps on the side of Jeannie’s bed. Limping only slightly, he crossed the floor, slipped out the half-open door, and raced down the hall, his nose wrinkling and faint oinks sounding. He skidded around the corner beside the top of the stairwell just as Fitzroy raised his foot for the top step. The pig barreled into the man without pause.

  Fitzroy screamed in terror, dropped the pistol, and grabbed wildly for the banister. His fingers fell an inch short, and he wobbled precariously for one long second. Tiny scurried back as Fitzroy fell, his body tumbling out of control down the steep stairwell. At the bottom, he lay without moving.

  “He’s dead,” Basil said with a nod. “He won’t bother Chenaie again. Are we going to have to deal with his spirit now?”

  “No,” Frannie said in a grim voice. “He’ll be whisked away by someone else, who will take care of what happens to him.” A sudden, brief flash of light accompanied her words. When it faded, Fitzroy’s body still lay at the foot of the stairwell, and Shain and Alaynia were running down the hallway.

  * *
* *

  Fingers of faint dawn light flowed through the open window in the Camellia Room as Alaynia entered it. She walked over to her drafting table and smoothed a hand across the landscape plans she’d been working on for Jake’s house. Bowing her head, she offered up a silent plea for her friend’s spirit.

  She turned toward the door as Shain entered. “How’s Jeannie?” she asked.

  “Asleep again,” Shain said. “She’ll be all right. She said she and Jake had talked once about how he’d die a long time before she did, but he promised to always watch over her, if he could.”

  “Do you believe he can?” Alaynia asked quietly.

  “I ...” Shain hung his head for a second, then came toward her. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking the last few hours. I think maybe he can. Just like my grandfather’s probably been doing what he can to watch over Chenaie. All the stories seem to point to him. I have to believe it, don’t I? After all, he’s probably the one who brought you to me.”

  “Well, son,” Basil said from the window, “it’s about time you appreciated what I’ve done for you.”

  Alaynia stifled a scream and flung herself into Shain’s arms, which closed reassuringly around her. She stared at the figure of the man she’d seen briefly in the graveyard as he floated through the window and stood before them, materializing into a somewhat firmer shape.

  “Now, I don’t have much time, so get your fear under control, Alaynia. It’s not as though we haven’t spoken before, you know.”

  Shain glanced inquiringly down at Alaynia, and she choked out, “At Tana’s. He ... he told me to make my decision carefully.”

  “If I remember right,” Basil said with a wink, “I told you to make it with your heart. And I’ve been telling those two pesky angels that ...”

  “Angels?” Alaynia interrupted with a squeak. “The ... other voice I heard at Tana’s?”

  Basil turned slightly and crooked a finger. “Come on, you two. Show yourselves, so Alaynia can tell you herself what she wants to do.” He glanced back at Alaynia. “That’s the only way they’ll let me alone and allow me to go be with Laureen.”

  “Laureen?” Alaynia squeaked again.

  “She was my grandmother,” Shain whispered, falling silent again when Alaynia gave a start as two heads appeared just above the rim of the windowsill. The dark one propped her chin on her crossed arms, and their wings of snowy feathers rose from their shoulders, almost completely filling the window. They reclined in the air as easily as though lying on a bed. The blond angel wore white, but the black one wore a brilliant red gown, sparkling with jewel-like tints even in the dawn light.

  Alaynia shoved against Shain so hard, he stumbled backwards a step. Another glance at his face told her that he wasn’t quite as terrified as she, though she detected a paleness under his tanned skin. He kept his arms tightly around her. She stared back at the window and licked her lips with a sandpaper tongue. “Who ... ?”

  “I’m Sylvia,” the dark face answered. “It was my voice you heard at Tana’s. Annoyance isn’t supposed to be an angel trait, but I forgot for a minute when I found Basil trying to appear to you. I didn’t shield my voice from you when I spoke.” She nodded at the golden-haired countenance beside her. “And this is Francesca.”

  Francesca spoke in a soft, consoling voice. “Please don’t be frightened, Alaynia. We were sent here to work out the trouble our friend Basil instituted with his interfering ways.”

  “At least you called me your friend,” Basil grumbled. “When you two first showed up here, I had my doubts if we’d ever be able to speak a civil word to each other.”

  Sylvia giggled, then lifted her head. Alaynia never saw her move, but the next instant, she stood in the room beside Basil. She recognized the gown the angel wore as a dashiki. Her bare, dusky feet poked out from beneath the hem, an endearing characteristic that alleviated Alaynia’s awe a little—but not much. She only realized her nails were digging into Shain’s forearm when he muffled a grunt of pain and pried at her fingers.

  “You can’t doubt Frannie’s friendship,” Sylvia told Basil. “Why, as soon as she helped Violet straighten out that computer mess, she searched all over until she found Laureen for you. You could have been with your wife all this time, if you’d just ascended on to the next plane.”

  “A computer?” Alaynia murmured. “In ... in Heaven?”

  Francesca joined the other two figures. “Oh, my, yes, my dear. I don’t see how I got along without it all these years. But Violet—she’s my replacement until Sylvia and I get back from our sabbatical ...”

  “If we ever get going on our sabbatical, girlfriend,” Sylvia reminded her.

  “Yes, well, that’s our next priority. But like I was saying, Violet was playing with the icons. Now, I’m still not sure how she did this, but she swears that little mouse came to life. I told her that was impossible and she must have been playing instead of paying attention to her duties. But she had icons on top of icons on top of icons. Took me forever to get them sorted out. I ...”

  “Frannie,” Sylvia said in exasperation, and Alaynia snapped her wide-eyed gaze to the other angel, whose dusky toes tapped beneath her gown. “Aren’t we bending the rules here, so Basil can do his thing and we can, hopefully, have everything back in the proper order?”

  “His thing?” Francesca asked with a frown. “Oh, yes, you’re right. Alaynia, the most important aspect of your mortalness is your free will. Our friend here tampered with that in your life, and he’s truly sorry. Aren’t you, Basil?”

  Basil sighed, then squared his shoulders. “Well, no. I’d be lying, if I said I was sorry for what I did.”

  “Basil,” Sylvia warned.

  “I’m not,” Basil insisted. “I think it’s like we talked about once—perhaps Alaynia’s destiny was for me to bring her back here. Look how happy she and Shain are. The two of them will fill Chenaie with little St. Clairs, like Laureen and I wanted to do.”

  “Excuse me,” Alaynia said, gaining a little courage now that she was becoming more accustomed to the spiritual beings in the room. “You said you didn’t have much time, and I have a couple questions to ask.”

  “Umm ... well, I don’t know if we’ll have time for that, my dear,” Francesca answered for all of them. “First, you have to make your choice. Basil?”

  “My choice?” Alaynia asked the ghost. “Like you told me to do when you spoke to me at Tana’s?”

  “See?” Basil said with a haughty look at Francesca. “I’ve been trying to let her choose. Even though the two of you wouldn’t believe me.”

  “Grandfather!” Shain’s low-throbbed growl silenced the ghost, and even the angels floated a step back. Alaynia sighed in relief as Shain took control of the situation.

  “Grandfather,” he said again, “whatever choice you have to offer Alaynia, do it now. We’ve been up all night, and my wife is exhausted. The three of you may not need any rest in your states of being, but we do. And ...” He slipped a purely masculine wink at his grandfather. “If you want Chenaie filled with great-grandchildren, you’ll have to give us an opportunity to make them.”

  Alaynia blushed and reached over her shoulder to smack at him, but Shain grasped her hand and kissed her fingers. She started to turn in his arms, then stared around her in dread. She wasn’t in the Camellia Room any longer. Instead, she stood on the dirt roadway, where she had found herself after she drove through the time warp. And she was totally alone.

  Chapter 29

  Alaynia stood frozen for a long moment, even her mind too paralyzed for her to think coherently. Finally, her eyes were burning so badly, she blinked. Very slowly, she gazed down at herself, noticing she still wore the robe she’d had on when she was in the Camellia Room.

  But it was also the robe she’d packed when she left Boston. It couldn’t have all been a dream—could it? She glanced across the road at the live oak tree where she’d first seen Shain. A few streaks of sunlight filtered through the leaves, dappling the groun
d beneath the tree. No one stood there to greet her.

  “Shain?” she whispered, all the while knowing no one would answer. And when someone did, she gasped in fright and whirled to face the speaker.

  “It be all right, Miss ‘Laynia,” Zeke soothed. “Maybe all the rest of them left you all on your own, but I be here for you.”

  “I—I—” Alaynia clenched her hands at her side and cleared her throat. “Were you in the Camellia Room a minute ago, too? Are ... are you alive, or ... ?”

  “I be alive as I can be,” Zeke assured her. “Don’t know what brought me here, but had me this urge to come back to this place a while ago, just after Mister Jake passed on. Sorta thought I heard Tana’s voice, but I ain’t real sure. Still, I hitched old Stubborn back up and we come along.”

  “Thank God,” Alaynia breathed, noticing the gray mule and decrepit wagon a few yards behind Zeke. “I was standing here thinking I had totally imagined everything. But at least I know you were real.”

  “It all be real, Miss ‘Laynia.” Zeke nodded his wiry gray head in reassurance. “And you appeared this time, just like you did the last time—‘cording to Massa Shain, anyway.”

  “I think one of the angels sent me here,” Alaynia explained. “I’m supposed to make a choice, but I don’t know what I’m supposed to choose between.”

  Zeke’s eyes widened. “Uh ... angels? Them beings with wings?”

  “Oh, yes,” Alaynia admitted. “Wings and robes and the whole shebang. Well, come to think of it, I didn’t see any halos on their heads. And Zeke, one of them was black. Her name was Sylvia.”

  Suddenly a vibration ran under her feet, and Alaynia’s head whipped around. Stubborn let out a frantic “hee haw,” and Zeke quickly ran over to the mule to grab his bridle. As soon as she could force her feet to move, Alaynia raced toward Zeke, and he wrapped his free arm around her waist.

  “Lordy, what is that?” Zeke asked in an awe-stricken voice.

  Alaynia gazed at the shimmering wall of heat waves down the road. Immediately she understood. “It’s the time warp,” she told Zeke. “I’m being given the choice of going back to my own time, or staying here at Chenaie in the past.”