Authors: Patti Berg
“Bad habit,” Jon quipped. He hadn’t twiddled his thumbs since he was a kid, but suddenly it seemed the thing to do. “My grandfather used to twiddle his thumbs. You would have liked him.”
“I doubt it. Just another Winchester.”
“He came here looking for me once. I was upset about shooting a deer.”
“I remember.”
“Do you?”
Alex nodded slowly. “You were crying,” Alex said. “I tried to comfort you as best I could, but nothing worked. You wouldn’t list
en to me. Then the old man came. That was your grandfather, I suppose. He
told you what was done was done and you couldn’t change history. He said you’d learned a great deal from what happened, that hunting would never make you happy, not like it does some men. He said there was nothing wrong with that, and that you should turn your energy in other directions.”
“You listened that closely?” Jon asked, smiling across the coffee table that separated him from Alex.
“I would have said the same thing to my own son—if I’d ever had one.” Alex sighed. “I might have liked your grandfather if he hadn’t been a Winchester.”
“You would have liked him,” Jon stated.
“He gave you a stick of wood and a knife that day,” Alex said. “Told you when he was upset he liked to carve. Said he wasn’t much good at it, but it made him feel better. He kissed you on the forehead and left. Next time I saw him was when you tried telling the town about me. I had the feeling he believed, but not those other buzzards, Matt Winchester and his father included.”
“My grandfather told me it never hurt to have friends and loved ones, invisible or otherwise. He even told me that when he was little, not too long after his mother died, he’d go to her room and wish she’d come back. Once or twice he thought he heard her speaking to him. No one believed him, either. He stayed out of her room after that because he didn’t want anyone to think he was crazy.”
“Did he ever go back?” Alex asked.
“I moved him into her room a few weeks before he died. He never said whether he talked with her,
but he seemed more comfortable there; happier, too.”
Elizabeth put her hands on Jon’s shoulders. He could feel her fingers tightening, kneading away the tension that had formed in his muscles. “We want to take you to her room, Alex,” Elizabeth said.
Alex looked at Elizabeth, to Jon, and then to the door. “I can’t go.”
Elizabeth walked around the chair and stood close to Alex. “You have to,” she said, reaching out to him. “Hold my hand.” Jon watched the way Alex touched Elizabeth’s fingers, tentatively at first, as if he was unsure what she planned to do. “I’m going to walk out of here, and you’re going to go with me.”
Alex’s laughter roared through the room, rattling the crystals on the chandelier, ruffling the curtains.
“Haven’t you heard a thing I’ve said? I can’t leave this place.”
“Maybe you’re too scared to give it another shot,” Elizabeth fired back.
“I’ve never been scared a day in my life.”
“Prove it!”
Alex rolled his eyes. He heaved a sigh.
“I suppose if I don’t, you’ll pester me to death, or you would if I weren’t already dead.”
“Come on then.”
Alex rose from the davenport and followed Elizabeth across the room. She opened the door and smiled at Alex. “Hold on tight.” Jon watched Alexander grip Elizabeth’s fingers as she walked through the doorway and saw Alex jolt to a halt when he hit the threshold. “Hell and tarnation! I told you it wouldn’t work.”
“It
has
to.” Elizabeth threw back.
“Let me try,” Jon said.
“You’re a Winchester! It definitely won’t work with a gall-darned, lily-livered...”
“Is that why you never touched me
when I was a kid?” Jon interrupted. “Is that why you never appeared to me? Because I’m a Winchester?”
“Seemed a good reason at the time.”
“What about now?”
“You’re still a Winchester.”
Jon grinned and held out his hand. “I’m Amanda’s great grandson. Surely that accounts for something.”
“Ah,
blast it all! I should have stayed invisible.”
Alex
frowned. He heaved a sigh. At long last, he stuck his hand out to grip Jon’s.
And the two hands merged and became one.
Jon felt a bolt of lightning strike his hand and race up his arm.
Alex jerked away.
Jon’s body sagged with weakness. Nausea nearly doubled him over.
“Oh, Lord!” Elizabeth cried out. “This could work.”
“No!” Alex thundered, shaking his hand, as if he’d been bit by a rabid dog. “I’m not doing that again. It didn’t feel right.”
“How the hell do you think I felt?” Jon bellowed. He could still feel the pain of a million needles jabbing a
t his skin, could feel the fire burning a path from his fingers up his arm.
“Stop it, you two! Stop it right now.” Elizabeth stepped close to Jon and lifted the hand Alex had touched.
“Does it hurt now?” she asked.
He shook his head and she looked at Alex. “Did you really feel something, Alex?”
“What? You think I’d make a commotion if it felt good?”
Elizabeth grinned. “Did you hear what you said, Alex? You
felt
something, even though you haven’t felt anything in a hundred years.”
Alex frowned as he looked from Elizabeth to Jon, then back again to Elizabeth.
“If you want out of here, you’ve got to try it again,” she said. “Both of you.”
She didn’t know what she was saying, Jon thought. She didn’t have a clue how painful that brief experience had been.
Jon walked away. He went to the picture window and looked out at the light snow falling and at Dalton House, the place where Alex should have lived a good, long life. But he hadn’t. He’d been stuck in this godforsaken Victorian with no way out.
He turned and looked at Alexander—his great-grandfather, a man who’d known pain for a hundred years. Surely, Jon thought, he could endure a little—for Alexander’s sake.
“She’s right, Alex,” Jon finally said. “We have to do this if we’re going to get you out of here.”
Jon held out his hand again, and slowly, Alex took hold.
Jon closed his eyes to the agony. “Come closer, Alex.” Jon felt the heat racing up his arm, through his chest, his legs, as Alex dissolved, his life force melding with Jon, making them one. Jon felt as if he’d slipped and fallen into the furnace in his foundry, the pain was so intense. He fought to breathe. His chest heaved, and he forced the torture from his mind.
Jon opened his eyes and saw the tears flowing down Elizabeth’s cheeks. “Don’t cry.” He managed to laugh. “This is only a temporary condition.”
Elizabeth slipped her fingers into his and they felt like ice against his skin.
“You’re burning up, Jon. You can’t do this.”
“You’d be amazed at the things I can do, Ellie.”
“I’ve sampled some of them. I want a chance to try others, too,” she said. “Please, Jon, don’t do this. We can think of some other way.”
It’s hotter than Hades in here! Quit your jabbering and let’s see if this works.
“Did you hear
that?” Jon asked Elizabeth, and she shook her head. “Our friend Alex is raising a ruckus inside my body. I can hear everything he’s saying—and thinking—perfectly clear. Come on, let’s see if we can walk out of here.”
Elizabeth opened the door, and Jon easily walked out onto the porch. “We’re outside, Alex,” Jon said.
Well, don’t this beat all? I can see everything plain as day, just like I’m looking through your eyes. Come on, boy, I’ve got more things to see before you’re through with me.
Jon smiled, and Elizabeth frowned. “Are you all right?”
“For the moment.” Jon gripped the railing as they walked down the stairs, then wrapped his arm around Elizabeth’s shoulder for support when they reached the street. Thank God they didn’t have to contend with wind and heavy snow as they made their way toward Dalton House, and thank God none of their friends were roaming about. He’d have a hell of a time explaining the awkwardness of his walk, or the heat burning his skin if someone shook his hand.
It took a long, agonizing five minutes to read Dalton House. When
Jon mounted the steps leading to his home, Elizabeth rushed ahead of him, opening the door so he wouldn’t have to exert what little energy remained in his body.
He walked through the entry and turned around slowly.
Well, I’ll be! I’d almost forgot how pretty this place is. Always loved those stained glass windows. Your
great-great-grandfather had them shipped here all the way from England. And that chandelier up there
—Jon could hear Alex whistle inside his head and the shrillness of it sent pains shooting through his skull. But he refused to tell him to stop. For the first time in a hundred years, Alex was halfway free.
‘Tell me about the chandel
ier, Alex,” Jon said. “Is there something special about it?”
Jedediah took Amanda and his wife on a European tour when Amanda was just about five. They were in some castle in Austria and Amanda couldn’t take her eyes off the chandelier. She said it was the prettiest thing she’d ever seen. Well, Mr. Dalton was a very rich man, and he loved Amanda something fierce. He made a downright fool of himself bargaining for that thing. Paid a damn sight more than it was worth and shipped it home. I remember the way Amanda stopped to look at it every time she came through this room. Her eyes sparkled prettier than those crystals.
“Is he talking to you, Jon?” Elizabeth asked.
Jon put his finger to his lips. “I’ll tell you later.” He hated to keep Elizabeth in the dark, but he didn’t want to interrupt Alex. When he was calm like that, when he was reflective, the pain lessened, and Jon rather enjoyed listening to his great-grandfather talk. It
was like listening to his grandfather’s stories all over again.
With Elizabeth’s hand on his arm, Jon slowly crossed the floor and put a foot on the marble staircase. Each step up the stairs took effort, and half-way up, Jon grasped the banister to help pull himself up. “Remind me to install an elevator in this place one of these days,” he managed to joke.
He heard Elizabeth’s weak laugh.
I
carried Amanda up these stairs once,
Alex said.
It was the night of her father’s funeral.
Jon felt Alexander’s sadness, not only in his body, but in his heart. He’d only heard stories about his ancestors; suddenly they seemed real, like they were there in Dalton House right now.
When they entered Amanda’s room, Jon sat in one of the dainty Chippendale chairs before the fireplace, hoping and praying it would support his weight.
I remember this room. Amanda and I talked here about the family we wanted to raise.
We
talked about going to Europe on our honeymoon and buying chandeliers for each of our children.
Jon’s throat tightened at the emotion in Alexander’s words. What, he wondered, would happen when they showed Alex the picture of Thomas, when they let him know he and Amanda had fathered a child?
I like chandeliers. They always remind me of Amanda.
Jon heard and felt Alexander sigh deeply.
She must have hated me something awful when I disappeared.
Jon watched Elizabeth open the box he’d taken from the drawer and placed on top of the vanity. She pulled the locket from inside and lifted the frame with Thomas’s photo, too. She walked toward him, holding the picture frame to her breasts. “Do you remember this locket, Alex?” she asked, holding it before Jon’s eyes.
That was my wedding present to Amanda. I gave it to her the night before I died.
Jon repeated Alexander’s words so Elizabeth could hear, then he took the frame and looked
closely at the picture of Thomas. “This was my grandfather when he was a young man,” Jon said.
He has Amanda’s smile.
“It might be her smile, Alex, but what about his eyes, his hair? Look closely,” Jon popped open the locket and held the small picture of Alex next to the larger one of Thomas.
There was too much silence for too long a time, and suddenly Jon could feel the pain intensify, could feel sorrow ripping through his body.
That’s my son,
Alex cried.
Jon felt Alexander’s tears
stinging his own eyes; Alex’s sobs racked his body; and slowly, Alexander’s pride and joy swelled lightly in his chest and heart.
“Elizabeth and I realized
the truth just this afternoon,” Jon said. “We didn’t want to tell you about Thomas, we wanted you to see for yourself.”
Oh, God!
Again Jon felt Alex’s agony; the pain again ripped through his body. He staggered across the room, gripping a post on the bed to keep from falling to his knees.
How she must have hated me. I gave her a child, and then I left.
“You had no control over what happened, Alex,” Jon told him, trying to ease Alexander’s sorrow, hoping that would alleviate the pain. “Luke was responsible. He had everything planned. He needed someone to take the fall for the bank robbery and the murder, and he wanted to marry Amanda, so he could get his hands on her money. By getting rid of you, he covered all bases.”