Wanted: One Ghost Page 5
“You’re…not…real,” April gasped, holding her chest as she tried desperately to find her footing. “You’re…a…ghost. You really are a ghost!”
He shrugged. “I suppose so. No one has told me any differently. But then no one has been able to talk to me in two hundred and thirty-eight years. You’re the first.” With an elegant flourish, he bowed to her.
“Oh my God!” She was shaking so badly she couldn’t move. Her muscles had frozen. The seat of her jeans was wet but she wasn’t sure if she had peed herself or the damp ground had soaked into them.
He extended his hand in a gentlemanly fashion to help her up, but she only stared at the proffered limb. He sighed.
“Of course. It would do me no good to try and help you up since I’m…”
“…not real. You’re not real. This isn’t happening to me.” April closed her eyes and tried to repeat the mantra over and over again, hoping her mental state would finally sort out the situation and thrust her back into reality. She opened her eyes. He was still there, his infuriatingly charming smile, just short of a laugh, etched into one devilishly handsome face.
Scrambling for purchase she grabbed her articles, keeping a close eye on her specter and quickly walked backwards down the knoll until she was on the cobblestone path. She had to get out of here. Where was the damn exit!
***
James turned frantic. April Branford was walking, no—running away from him. He’d feared this would happen, but he didn’t wish for her to leave. He needed her. Giving her a bit of room, he kept pace while he reasoned with her.
“I wanted to tell you when we met. But I figured my presence would be frightening if you knew you could see me.” She didn’t slow a bit, if anything her pace hastened. “I hoped you might fall for me. I didn’t expect you to fall into me,” he explained, waiting for her response to his intentional attempt at humor. She didn’t give him one.
He couldn’t blame her. How would he have reacted if he had been approached by a ghost in his day?
She cursed in a very unladylike fashion, then laughed hysterically, and cursed again. Both died to an almost gut-wrenching sob and a brief prayer asking God, ‘why now?’ She seemed to be ignoring everything he was saying to her. James wasn’t sure if he was supposed to do anything.
He tried a different tactic. “Why were you weeping over Henry Samuel’s grave? Did you find something about the fop deserving of your attention?” James asked.
“I wasn’t weeping over his grave,” April informed him. “I was taking a headstone rubbing when you approached and just about scared the piss out of me.”
“I am truly sorry.” He didn’t intend to cause her distress. “I thought you were in Kings Mill to find out the truth about James Addison?”
She stopped, looked around, nibbling her lip, before turning her wide-eyed attention back to him. “Who are you?”
The questioning look of fear in her eyes was plain and simple. She was afraid of him. She had every right to be scared of a specter, but he didn’t want her to fear him. He’d waited for years for someone to come along and see him, sense him—talk to him. He couldn’t let her run away from him now.
“You already know the answer, Dr. Branford. You saw me out at the mill the other day.”
Her eyes widened. He could see her chest rising rapidly within the confines of her woolen coat as she shook her head in denial. “You’re…James Addison.”
The quietly spoken words weren’t a question or a doubt, she knew, but whether or not she accepted the knowledge was yet to be seen.
“Really, I did want to tell you the truth about me, but I couldn’t. Not knowing how you would react, I couldn’t take the chance of having you run away from me. I don’t want you to fear me, or what I am. You’re the only person who has ever been able to see me in this form. But more importantly, you’re the only person who’s cared.”
She stopped and turned. “I can see you. But you’re not real…I don’t know…”
“You make me feel real again,” he said softly, his voice wavering with emotion.
She shook her head and muttered profanities under her breath to her Aunt Vickie and someone named Wilton. “I don’t have time for ghosts. I’ve a case to solve. Go back to wherever it is you came from.” April waved him off, holding her forehead as if warding off a headache.
“I can’t. This is where I am. Right here, right now. There is no place for me to go back to.” He would hold her in his arms if only he could touch her. James knew this couldn’t be easy for her to understand. “Perhaps I could be of assistance to you, since you know who I am.”
“You’re a ghost. I need tangible evidence of James Addison’s life. I’ll be a laughing stock to my employer if I try to tell him my research is based on facts from a ghost. I need proof. Besides, how do I know you really are James Addison?”
“You don’t,” he agreed. “But what would it take to prove to you I am?”
“Tell me where he is buried,” she challenged.
James shrugged. “Easy enough, but I would prefer to show you.” He began to lead the way, deeper into the cemetery grounds.
“I call bullshit. There is no record of his burial, I’ve researched his information. If he was executed, his body parts could be anywhere.” She scoffed heavily and turned away, moving toward the front of the cemetery, back to the entrance from where she’d started with the rest of the tour group.
She was leaving, not only the cemetery, but him. He couldn’t have her walk away from this moment, from him. Somehow he knew he needed to be with April Branford no matter what.
“Of course there are no records. My remains were buried in a pauper’s grave after having been displayed publicly to warn others who might wish to commit treason.” He scoffed. “Each night I return to my gravestone only to wake in the past, savoring the life I knew at the mill, like you witnessed the other day. Then I’m transported here into the present and walk the streets of Kings Mill, searching for someone to see me, help me, or perhaps guide me to move on. I can’t prove anything. I’m hoping you might believe in me, if only a little.”
Biting her lip, she stopped walking. James noticed she nibbled the luscious bit of flesh when she seemed uncertain or nervous. With tentative steps she approached, daring to get closer to him. Those sparkling eyes narrowed speculatively as she reached out to touch him and of course—went right through his ethereal body. Closing her eyes, she shook her head skeptically. His soul ached wanting to dispel all of her fears as she struggled to come to terms with what he was. Spooking her was the last thing he wanted to do.
When her gaze met his again, he knew, deep in whatever he was made of, April Branford was his destiny. If only he knew how to convince her to feel the same way. He needed her to trust him. But how did a ghost coerce a practical woman to accept who he was and believe in him?
Moments ticked by. Finally, her rigid stance lessened on a deep sigh and she gave him a curt nod.
He smiled, touched his tricorne in salute, and led her deeper into the cemetery.
They stopped short of the linked fence surrounding Lilac Grove. Stately oaks, bare of leaves, towered overhead, but the wind whispered through them as if in greeting. Other than the grounds keeper, no one viewed this area much. Not even flowers or flags marked the passing of time.
He peered down on the woman. She hadn’t said a word, just followed him blindly. She was still shaking. James occasionally caught her looking at him, and then she'd move away. It didn't seem to be in repulsion. Perhaps it was in confusion.
She stiffened her body and forced her arms to her sides by shoving her hands deep into her coat pockets. She was as tightly wound as the eight day clock he had purchased for his mantle years ago. He didn’t want to see her springs explode from the tension she held.
“Are you warm enough in your woolen coat?” he asked, hoping casual conversation might help her relax.
“I’m fine…” She stopped talking and stared wide-eyed into his eyes again.
He wished he could soothe her wariness. Perhaps if he could kiss her it might erase all her fears. He’d been known to make a woman forget her troubles a time or two in the past. A kiss from her would definitely do something for him.
She looked around, frowning.
“Where are we?”
“The least visited area of the cemetery,” James replied, knowing without taking his eyes from her, exactly where they were.
April viewed the solemn rows of tiny marbled bricks sticking out of the ground. “The paupers’ graves.”
James nodded.
The only indications of the graves were a series of numbers imprinted onto the tops of the most identifiable bricks. Some were so cracked and decayed from time and the overgrowth of roots they weren’t recognizable. Others were barely visible, eaten up by the shifting of the earth beneath them. One stone seemed generally intact, the number ten barely visible, etched on the top. April stepped closer to inspect it more thoroughly.
She knelt down. Removing her gloves, she brushed a bit of leaves and debris off of the grayed marble, then respectfully caressed the stone.
“James Addison’s grave.”
He hadn’t needed to tell her. She knew as if drawn to it. Her reverent touch across the old marble pierced his soul, as if it’d been caressed by her fingers.
She looked up at him. “Odd, how would I know that?” She returned her interest to the stone marker. “It’s as if…”
April Branford cried out. Her hand began to glow where it lay on the stone. The stone took on an illumination, radiating from within her, outward like a candle's dancing flame, only brighter.
Before James could answer or help her, the light fragmented and penetrated him like a sword. He was thrown backwards. Pressure and pain ripped into his chest, intensifying as it spread outward through his extremities. This wasn’t gentle. His immortal soul was being pierced, ripped asunder by an invisible hand.
Stumbling, James gasped, clutching his chest where he knew his heart would have been, if he had one. What was happening? The marble brick beneath April’s hands continued to radiate an inferno of orange light. Even though she cried out for him to help her, she kept her hands stationary against the glowing marble, her face contorting as she squeezed her eyes shut against her shock and pain. He could feel it. What she felt echoed in his senses, reverberating between them as if they were mirrored objects catching the same reflection. The glow of light illuminated her, cascading through her and blasting him with its brilliance.
Bloody Hell! The pain drove him to his knees.
“Stop!” he choked out, gasping from the ache.
James shielded his eyes from the bright intensity. A prickling of awareness crept into him. Peering down at his hands he realized he glowed with the same unearthly light as did she and the stone. His soul stretched and ached to fill with solid mass. Agony and pain wrenched through him, making him wither on the ground, until the pain lessened to a dull, quivering twinge. Then he heard it, for the first time in over two hundred years, the mortal thumping of his heart.
Lifting his head he searched April out across the small space between them. Her body was lying across his gravestone, her eyes wide with shock. Her lips moved, speaking to him, but he couldn’t hear her through the intense ringing and cacophony of sounds blaring in his ears. The pain slowly ebbed. Gingerly, James breathed. Sharp, icy shards filled his lungs, like a babe sucking in new life. His bare fingers dug into the rich earth. Wet leaves and soil feathered from between digits of flesh and bone. Inhaling the fragrant scents of dead foliage beneath his nose, a thousand sensations bore down upon him, overwhelming his mind. He was alive!
Unable to speak because of the emotion clogging his throat, he gave silent thanks to the woman. Whatever power she possessed, she was the answer to his prayers.
He noticed April had not risen from his grave. With her eyes closed tightly, she struggled for release from his stone, but it held her fast. She groaned and sobbed before the illumination around her dimmed and darkness surrounded them. She lay exhausted and weak across his meager tombstone. Opening her eyes, she was able to slowly remove her hand and reach out to him, seeking his help.
His body struggled to rise, but he was too weak to support the new mass of weight. Exhausted, he slumped back to the ground, vividly shaking as tremors rocked through him.
“It’s you. You really are James Addison,” she gasped in between breaths.
Her voice shook. She lay there, quivering in the aftermath of what they had witnessed together. Raising her hands in front of her face, as if she were uncertain who they belonged to, she turned them over, studying them.
Slowly, painfully, he inched his way across the few feet that separated them. Reaching her side, James held out his hand, spanning the ground between them. His hand shook, partially with fear but mostly with wonder. Would she be able to take hold and actually sense his touch now?
Her sobs were muffled, but she slowly rolled over, reaching out for his hand in return. Her eyes roamed in a quick beat from his hand to his face, checking for permission to touch him. The smooth, warm silkiness of her palm encompassed in his set his body on fire, in a good way. No woman had made him feel this alive, even when he lived centuries ago. What power did this woman have to make him feel whole again?
“Dear God, you are alive! What have I done?”
Chapter Five
April felt Aunt Vickie’s eyes bore into her from across the parlor without even glancing towards the woman. Minutes ticked by on the mantle clock, the Westminster Chimes still echoing the quarter hour. James Addison walked about the room, touching everything, marveling at his re-born senses. They hadn’t spoken directly to each other since the gravesite. Still shaking inside, April was relieved she was sitting down. Her brain had disconnected somewhere between feeling James’s hand touching hers and arriving back at the house. She didn’t even remember dialing Aunt Vickie’s number much less how she’d managed to get back to the entrance of the cemetery.
Vickie had arrived within moments, annoyed for having been taken out of her Sangria and Séances party, until April explained the man’s presence. The shock and uncertainty echoing in her aunt’s eyes proved to April what happened wasn’t normal by any means—even to a woman who dealt with the paranormal on a daily basis.
Barely recovered from the fright of meeting her first ghost, April was thrown into the unknown of how she brought a ghost back from the grave. Over and over again she muttered, ‘What have I done?’ First to James and then to her aunt.
What bothered her, though, was her aunt couldn’t even answer her question. Aunt Vickie stared at her as if she were the anomaly and not James.
“What did you do, April?” Vickie asked, her eyes narrowing.
“I don’t know. I was hoping you would be able to answer the question. You are, after all, the expert.”
“There are those of us who can talk, see, and sometimes communicate in their realm but never have I heard of someone being able to revive the dead.” The older woman shook her head in befuddlement. “I don’t even know where to begin. What did you do?”
“I don’t know!” April stood up abruptly, and then realized she wasn’t quite ready to stand. Her legs shook. She grasped the doorway arch and pressed her forehead against the smooth, polished woodwork. “One minute I was removing leaves from the stone and the next my hands were plastered to it like magnets. I saw James glowing and writhing in pain. I couldn’t pull away no matter how hard I tried, and then…” She trailed off as James stared at her.
The look in his eyes stole her breath. What did this man want of her? He had said he needed her, and she was the only one who had ever seen him, been able to talk to him. She’d known it was him. He bore all the characteristics of the portrait she’d seen in the book. Why didn’t she connect the two? Oh, who was she kidding? She had. Everything in her mind had screamed for her to accept the fact. From the moment her aunt told her about the orb she should have known. Only
she wasn’t willing to accept the truth.
“How do you feel?” Aunt Vickie asked James as he walked around the chairs and sat down.
James Addison cut an elegant figure of man. Maneuvering around the closed confines of the parlor as if made for the room, April saw the regal bearing in his stance. His demeanor spoke of charm and grace even for a man as tall and broad of shoulder as he was. She couldn’t help but admire the pull of his breeches across his thighs and hips as he sat carefully on the settee, his arm stretched out along the back of the cushion.
“I feel alive, thanks to the good doctor.” He smiled, picking a piece of lint from his sleeve. His stomach rumbled, echoing in the room. “And perhaps a bit famished,” he added.
“I should think so. It’s been awhile since you’ve eaten,” Aunt Vickie replied, getting up from her seat. She turned to April. “Sitting here with a slack jaw isn’t going to solve anything, dear. Here’s your chance for actual historical knowledge, in the flesh. Why not make the most of the opportunity you’re given and collect as much information as you can? But I think some food and perhaps taking him shopping for some proper clothes might be beneficial first.”
“It’s nearly midnight.”
“There’s a SuperMart and a diner nearby that are open twenty-four hours. Take him to get something to eat and then fit him with some clothing and articles he may need to see him through for awhile.” Waving a hand as if warding off a pesky fly, her aunt rose from the chair and approached the stairs.
April panicked. She couldn’t be alone with James Addison. Not yet. She needed her aunt to answer more questions. “Where are you going?”
Vickie stopped and looked at James first, and then back to April. “To prepare a room for our guest. Then I’m calling your mother and grandmother. I have a feeling we’re going to need all the paranormal help we can get.” Her aunt pointed a finger at her. “You are going to take Mr. Addison out for a bite to eat. Go easy though, we want to introduce food to him slowly. He’s your responsibility, April.”