Eternal (12 page)

I flinched.

“Are you Wren’s boyfriend?” she demanded.

Was it possible to flinch twice in the span of three seconds?

Waylon chuckled and his gaze met mine.

My cheeks flamed but he expertly evaded the question. “You must be Wren’s
big
sister.”

Ella’s hands found her hips and she arched an eyebrow. “I’m just a little girl. Anybody can see that Wren’s older than I am.”

“She won’t be patronized,” I offered.

Ella shot me a look of disapproval. “Patroniz-ed? What do you mean? What are you talking about?”

Waylon touched her on the shoulder, arresting her attention once more. “I think you’re right. It was silly of me to tease you. What’s your name? I’m Waylon.”

She haughtily lifted her chin. “I know.”

“Ella, Mom said not to bother us.” I stepped off the porch. “In the house.” I pointed toward the front door.

She snorted but gave up without a fight and slinked toward the door.

I smiled at Waylon. “I’m sorry.”

“No problem,” he said with a dismissing wave of his hand. “She’s cute.”

I laughed. “You don’t have to live with her.”

Waylon’s gaze drifted over my face and once again, I regretted the ponytail decision. He really was cute and so unlike the pretentious guys I had known in Buckhead. If I hadn’t already met and fallen for Jeremiah, I’d totally be head over heels for Waylon. He seemed like the type who still ate dinner around a table with his family, listened to country music, attended a church and found pleasure in simple things.

I was envious. On the surface, his life seemed so uncomplicated. I hadn’t even been in Columbia a month and already, my life had grown complicated beyond belief.

Waylon scuffed his boot in the pea gravel driveway. His gaze followed the columns upward to the fanlight. “Wow,” he said under his breath. “It looks even bigger up close than it does from the road.”

“You’ve never been inside before?” I turned to glance up at the fanlight, half-expecting to see Jeremiah glaring from behind the thick, leaded glass. He wasn’t. My shoulders sagged with relief. And yet, a twinge of disappointment passed through me.

“No,” Waylon replied, dragging my attention back to the present. “When Miss Polk lived here, I didn’t dare even come up the driveway.”

Old, lonely Miss Polk in love with a ghost…

The same ghost that I…

I bit my bottom lip, not daring to even think about my feelings for Jeremiah right now. “Want to go in?” I took a step toward the porch.

Waylon’s blue eyes lit up. “I thought you’d never ask.”

As he followed me onto the porch, his cologne wafted around me. I couldn’t deny the thrill I felt at the fact that he’d wanted to smell good for me. Maybe my scar wasn’t as bad as I thought. Still, I could deny that the scar served as a mild reflection of the wounds—and blame—I carried on the inside.

The hinges creaked as I pushed the heavy door all the way open.

Waylon entered the house with all the reverence of a monk entering a cathedral. His lips parted as he absorbed his surroundings. Obviously, he felt much as I had the first time I had stepped foot in this house, surrounded by the sharp scent of old wood, the mustiness of ages old drapes and furniture, the shadowy mystery of people who lived and died long before my parents or I were ever born.

“Those are the original crown moldings.” His neck craned back as he scanned the ceiling. “Amazing to think those were all carved by hand.”

He brushed his fingertips on the glossy white trim around the soaring doorjamb. “These walls are a foot thick. They don’t make houses like this anymore.”

I smiled in agreement. “I don’t know anything about building houses. But this one is far different from the one we had in Buckhead.”

His eyes widened. “Buckhead? Well look at you, little socialite.”

I shrugged. “It wasn’t like that.”

He scoffed. “Why’d you leave Buckhead to come
here
?”

“David’s job.” I couldn’t admit the real reason.

He grimaced. “Weren’t you pissed?”

“Not really. I-I like it here.” That answer was honest enough but immediately, I realized my mistake.

Waylon’s eyes warmed. I’d given him the impression I liked it in Tennessee because of him!
Oh no.

An awkward silence ensued and he finally turned his attention to the furniture. I stifled a sigh of relief when he meandered into the parlor. He brushed his fingers along the back of the crimson, velvet-covered settee facing the fireplace. I watched his expression in the massive mirror suspended over the mantle.

Squatting, he examined the woodwork. “This has definitely been reupholstered but this piece of furniture is pre-Civil War.”

For the first time, I really looked at the settee. Had Jeremiah courted local girls while seated there? A sliver of jealously caught me by surprise.

“There aren’t many houses surviving that are kept mostly in their original state with the original furniture. I’d say the closest one to here is The Hermitage, Andrew Jackson’s house in Nashville. Even Rippavilla in Spring Hill underwent major renovations in the 1920s,” Waylon explained. “I assume you have indoor plumbing.”

“It’d be tough living here if we didn’t,” I joked.

He stood, straightening to his full height of well over six feet. “Are all the bathrooms at the back of the house?”

I hadn’t noticed before but his assumption proved correct. “Yes.”

“Sweet!” he exclaimed. “They didn’t change too much about the original structure of the house to add them.”

As we wandered from room to room, he admired the antiques, pointing out details that had escaped my eye.

Now that Jeremiah was in my life, I found the things I’d previously overlooked fascinating. “How’d you get so interested in history?” I couldn’t help but be curious as to why Waylon loved this stuff.

“My dad and I reenact.” He gently opened the glass paned doors over the secretary. “These books are old.”

He fingered one of the dusty volumes out of its place and opened it. I nearly gasped when I saw Jeremiah’s florid signature scrawled on the inside cover.

“It’s a law book,” Waylon mused. “I guess one of the Ransoms was studying law before the war.”

I swallowed. Hard. Waylon had no idea he held what would have been Jeremiah’s future in his hands.

A lawyer.

I easily envisioned him as a handsome young man, wearing reading glasses and seated behind a sprawling wooden desk heaped high with papers and thick books. Thanks to the Civil War, he’d never gotten that chance.

Waylon closed the book and then returned it to its place on the shelf. After he inspected the other titles, he shut the bookcase door and then turned to me. “I volunteer at Rippavilla Plantation on the weekends…when it’s not football season.”

I had forgotten. Mt. Pleasant had played its last game of the season last night. “Did we win last night?”

“They called it off because of the weather,” Waylon murmured as he looked at the portrait over the mantle in the south parlor. “Those are the Ransom boys.”

My stomach did a somersault as my gaze shot to the portrait of three children I had carelessly bypassed every day during the week we’d lived here. With fresh eyes, I studied the faces which seemed utterly realistic, prominent against the background of pastel blues and ethereal grays.

In comparison the two older boys who both appeared just a little older than Ella, bore a striking resemblance to Jeremiah. Like him, they boasted gray eyes and unnaturally dark hair.

When I’d seen Jeremiah on the roof of the house, his hair had obviously been black but the sunlight had picked up rich hued highlights of deep brown and dark auburn.

My gaze fixed on the youngest child in the portrait. Intuitively, I knew this baby who lay in something akin to a bassinette was Jeremiah.

Waylon leaned toward the portrait and then his eyes rounded excitedly. He turned to me.

“Washington Bogart Cooper painted this!” he exclaimed.

Although I had no idea who Washington Bogart Cooper was, I didn’t want to look stupid so I feigned shock.

My acting must have been terrible. Waylon ruffled the top of my head with his big palm. “He was a famous painter in the nineteenth century. He painted several of the portraits at Carnton Plantation and at the Carter House in Franklin. I’ll take you there and show you sometime.”

My breath caught. Had Waylon just asked me on a date? Me?

And although I wasn’t the history buff he was, I wasn’t above learning something new—or hanging out with a cute, nice guy. “I’d like that.” I couldn’t quell the smile that tugged at my lips.

A sense of unease settled between us, so palpable I perceived it as strongly as I’d felt the lightning in the attic last night. But my reaction differed drastically. Nothing compared to the energy that swelled through me when I’d touched Jeremiah’s hand.

Waylon cleared his throat. “Cooper painted the presidential portrait of Andrew Johnson, too. This is a real piece of history you have here.” He ventured past me toward the stairs.

I followed.

He ran his palm over the gleaming banister. “Smooth as satin,” he whispered and then he turned to me and searched my eyes. “Do you ever think about all the people whose hands have touched this very wood?”

When I blinked, images rippled through me like water over the rocks in a rushing creek. Soldiers. Ladies. Gloved hands. Bare hands. Old hands. Children’s hands.

Jeremiah’s hands.

A shiver skittered up my spine and I shook off the visions.

Waylon leaned forward, craning to see the upstairs.

I took the hint. “Would you like to go up?”

His face brightened. “If you don’t mind.”

He stepped back to let me pass him on the wide staircase. I led the way up to the landing.

He joined me and gazed out the arched window. “Cool! You can see the cemetery from here.”

Inhaling, I looked out at the sun glinting off the tallest obelisk. Next to that grave lay Jeremiah’s. My insides tensed.

Waylon squinted, trying to get a better look at the stones. “Have you been out there?”

“Yes.” I was suddenly trembling and didn’t know why.

“They say the youngest Ransom boy was buried there after he died here in the house.” Waylon’s voice dropped to a reverent whisper.

Hearing someone else acknowledge Jeremiah’s existence made me feel strange inside. I nodded. “That was in the article you gave me.”

Waylon turned back to face the interior of the house. He warily surveyed the quiet space. “Is it true?” he asked, his voice even softer.

I wasn’t sure what he meant. And when I didn’t answer, he continued. “Is it true this house is haunted?”

My lips parted and I longed to tell Waylon—anybody—the whole story. I clenched my fists. I couldn’t admit it. Some part of me sensed the importance of keeping Jeremiah’s existence a secret. Waylon seemed to like me. What would he think if I confided everything I knew about Jeremiah? I’d be a laughingstock at school. Even though Waylon loved history, he might not believe me. He’d doubtless think I was nuts! Instead of divulging anything, I shrugged. “It is an old house. There are lots of little creaks and pops.”

I walked from the landing up to the second floor, hoping Waylon would drop the subject. He followed with the same astonishment he’d had upon first sight of the downstairs.

He crossed the floor to the bookshelf which was still Mr. Stella’s favorite hiding place. “I think it’s awesome that you got all these books and the furniture with the house.”

Standing back, I allowed him to inspect the collection. “I’d love to read every one of these,” he added.

“There are a few first editions in there,” I said proudly. At least, I’d recognized that. He wouldn’t think I was a total idiot.

He pulled his camera out of his pocket, “Do you mind?”

I shrugged one shoulder. “Of course not.”

He switched it on and snapped a couple of pictures of the architecture and then one of me.

I started to beg him to delete it. No one took pictures of me anymore. Not since my scar. Instead, I bit my bottom lip. “You’re not going to tag me in that, are you?”

“Not if you don’t want me to,” he said.

I scuffed a foot against the edge of the rug. “Since my accident…”

“No problem.” He slipped the camera back into his pocket. “Hey, do you know if any letters or old pictures that belonged to the Ransoms were left behind?”

“I-I haven’t even unpacked yet,” I stammered.
But letters?
I had been hoping for a photo but to find letters written by Jeremiah… My heart soared at the thought.

Waylon’s gaze drifted to the ceiling and suddenly my heart plummeted back to earth. I knew what he was about to ask. My pulse accelerated.

“Where’s the entry to the attic? Have you been up there?” He scouted the upstairs, looking for the entrance. “There’s a widow’s walk on top of the house. Planters used to look out over their fields from their widow’s walks.”

“Really?” I asked trying to sound uninterested. I gulped and wiped my damp palms on the sides of my jeans. I couldn’t go to the attic with Waylon. Not after last night. That place belonged to Jeremiah and me. It was a place he’d shared with me. A special place, like the roof was a special place. Guilt flooded me.

I had to distract Waylon. “Did you…did you bring your metal detector?”

He would not be swayed. “There’s got to be a set of stairs that leads to the attic in one of these rooms.” He crossed the hall from Ella’s room to mine.

I held my breath.

His eyes brightened when he discovered the attic door.

Oh no.

“Look, Wren! Here it is!” he exclaimed.

I prayed the disappointment didn’t show on my face. But when he reached behind the door to grasp the knob to open the attic door, I blurted, “I don’t know if we should go up there or not.”

“These attics are safe. I’ve been in many of them. They’re as big and solid as the rest of these old houses,” he explained.

Panic brimmed. What if Jeremiah was up there? What if Waylon saw him?

Waylon gave the door a tug but it wouldn’t budge. “It’s stuck.”