Authors: Jan Irving
Tags: #Gay, #Fiction, #Romance, #Erotica, #General, #Paranormal
Jade shrugged, already anticipating a cool dip to get rid of the miasma of cleaning for other people and to ease her sore back muscles. “Well, pool. And I remember the first owner. He wasn’t creepy, just old.” She was amused. “He was really into gardening, that’s for sure, even had his grandson help him out sometimes, though the place has grown all wild now.”
“I better walk with you as far as the house,” Thomas offered, butting out his grass. “Don’t want the ghost of Sullivan’s Mountain to get you.”
Jade held his gaze, making sure he knew there would be nothing more than walking involved. “Okay.” She didn’t want to hurt his manly pride by pointing out she could take care of herself.
when they broke through the meadow, which was full of buttercups, foxglove, and wild daisies this time of year, Jade and Thomas spotted some lights on and a big Toyota truck taking possession of the uneven old driveway.
Jade shook her head, having only spoken to Noah Matthews on the phone. He had said she could use the pool whenever she wanted, but she didn’t want to interrupt his first day in a new home.
“There’s a road through the woods they used when they were cutting out the lots,” Thomas suggested, as if reading her disappointment. “It’s not paved and it’s a bit rough, overgrown, but it’ll take us around the house. We can hike through the trees ’til we get to the pool.”
Jade wanted to give him a queenly pat on the cheek, happy to be catered to. It was something she intended to get used to, something she intended to live for real one day. A vision of Alec Danvers, tall and tanned with floppy brown hair, rose in her mind’s eye. He seemed perfectly content in this small corner. But something like this would never be enough for Jade. She’d make her way somehow.
watched Josh looking around his room. The movers had brought everything a couple of weeks back, and Noah had driven out to the country to supervise the unpacking. He’d spent particular time in this room, hoping it would mean the closeness he’d once enjoyed with his son would return. Of course, he knew why they weren’t close, and it wasn’t
Josh
who had pulled away. It was Noah.
He sighed, rubbing the back of his neck.
As Noah watched, Josh passed a reverent hand over the handsome walnut desk and Dell laptop he’d treated him with. Noah hoped it made up for the chilly, cracked granite-tiled floor and dark, unknown scrap wood that made up the walls. Josh’s bedroom was
on the bottom level, near the kitchen, but it was cold and, when Noah had first seen it, full of cobwebs and wolf spiders. The ugly things freaked him out a little. “Not bad,” Josh noted, amusement in his eyes. “Dad, a new computer and not a stupid desktop!”
“Not bad? Hell of a lot better than I had growing up!” Noah pointed out, shaking his head. But he’d never wanted hard times for his kid. He was grateful that the money his wife had left them, supplemented by his work writing technical manuals for software engineers, meant he’d been able to provide better.
“Yeah, yeah. Poor boy makes good.” Josh rolled his eyes. Then he bit his lip. His face looked very young to Noah as he continued, “I wish… Mom could see it. Do you think she can, maybe?”
Josh was very grown-up for his age, but the topic of his mother could sometimes leave him grasping for extra reassurance.
Noah didn’t believe in traditional religion, so he sat down, giving himself a moment. He always wanted to say the right thing, the weight of being a single parent heavy. “I think that wherever she is, she’d like to know we’re happy, that’s what I think, Joshua.”
Josh nodded, satisfied for the moment. “But who are you going to date out here, Dad? I mean, you’re still pretty young.”
Noah felt a blush coming on at his son’s frankness. That was one topic he wanted to stay away from! Until recently, he’d lived like a monk since Margaret’s death from cancer all those years ago. Raising his son and working like a demon to lose himself in his job and bury his loneliness had taken all his time—well, until a few months ago.
Uneasiness tightened his shoulders.
Don’t think about it.
He cleared his throat, embarrassed that his heartbeat accelerated. He paused before continuing, again aching to be truthful with his son about so many things… but was Josh ready to know who his father truly was? Noah was too shaky to confide in him—
yet. But he hoped some time out here in their new life would change that. “Maybe I’ll meet someone right at the church social,” he teased with forced lightness.
“Ha ha, yeah, right. Do they still do those things out in the country?” Josh asked, eyes wide, as if he were an anthropologist studying a strange culture.
That look made Noah smile. Shit, he was glad that when Margaret got pregnant from a one-nighter, they’d decided to have Josh, to be married. She’d never been what he’d wanted, but they’d created this amazing person.
Noah shook his head full of carefully styled ash-blond hair. “I don’t know. All I know about the country I learned from watching
Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman
with you when you were younger.”
shone his small flashlight into the deep woods off the tiny, rugged road. “I think if we head through there it shouldn’t be too far.”
Thomas’s face tightened. He and his mother didn’t get on well, Jade guessed. Well, the woman was a real dragon with an icy temper, although not as chilly as her husband. “Doubt it. You know this is a total cliché, don’t you?”
“It is?” Jade paused to study Thomas, thinking he wasn’t such a bad kid, just bored and unhappy. She could certainly remember feeling that way herself.
“I mean, two hot young people heading into the scary abandoned old house or the haunted woods….” Thomas lifted some dry hanging moss in one hand, which was suspended from a dead, bleached branch, reaching out like a skeletal hand. “Every horror movie I ever saw, the kids who have sex wind up dead.”
“Okay, one, Thomas,” Jade scoffed. “There will be no sex. Second, that’s probably a cliché based on prudish Judeo-Christian ideas that being hot was a bad thing.”
“All the night school I’m taking,” Jade confessed, flushing a little. He could totally choose whatever school he attended, but Jade, not so much. “But to tell you the truth, kid, this mountain always gave me the creeps. If I had a shit load of dough, I wouldn’t live up here, nuh uh.”
Still, she led the way into the damp breath of the trees, watching her footing carefully, since she’d grown up on hiking trails on the Pacific Northwest. Roots and rocks could snag an unwary walker, and she had a scar on one knee from a fall on unforgiving granite.
The only beacon came from Thomas’s heavy flashlight, piercing the olive gloom and guiding them over a rough trail, like something animals used through the brush. Mist writhed over the trees and shrubs, which were damp and dripping with the late spring night air.
Jade swallowed, suddenly dry-mouthed. This was stupid; she was acting like a kid who had played with an Ouija board at a sleepover. Besides, she was the adult, so she had to reassure Thomas. But suddenly this simple walk to take a dip seemed like a bad idea. “Do black bears wander around at night up here?” she asked. Where she lived in the foothills, although it was remote and countrified, it was unusual to see one.
“Sometimes they get into our garbage. In fact, the other night one really fucked up our cans. Dad bought some heavy-duty bearproof metal ones, but something got into it anyway!” Thomas shared. “Probably the fucking ghost that lives up here.”
“Crap!” Jade gave a relieved laugh.
“What?”
“You’re trying to scare me. Come on, admit it.”
“Actually….” Thomas paused and then shone the light up toward his face, his pale skin, green eyes, and mousy brown hair looking extra washed out in the diffuse misty air. “I seriously wouldn’t mind heading back. I, uh, think we might be lost.”
“But the house is just ahead. We could make out the lights through the woods just a minute ago!” Jade put her hands on her hips, a little scared for her charge. She hadn’t meant for him to join her, get lost up here with her. And if she didn’t return to her car soon, she’d miss helping Marcie out with that extra hour her girlfriend needed this evening with her kids. Shit!
“Yeah, but the trail kind of snaked deeper into the woods. I think we somehow missed the house and pool,” Thomas said, uneasiness in his voice.
Well, hell, she was uneasy too, though she hated to admit there was anything she wasn’t up to handling. She took a deep breath. “Okay, I guess we should walk back, retrace our steps. It’s not far, is it? I never wandered around here all the time I’ve worked in the house.”
“All right, let’s do it then, come on. I’m going to be in so much shit tonight if I’m really late. My girlfriend needed some extra time to see her son’s exhibit at the library art show.”
Jade skidded down a leaf-covered hill, careful not to slide on the mud and wind up on her ass. Behind her, Thomas’s flashlight lit their path, weaving back and forth like the flashlights used on a paranormal investigation TV show.
Jade wrapped her arms around herself, worried because without light, they had no way to find their way back. “Okay, maybe we should….” She swallowed,
not
wanting to suggest this plan, but maybe it truly was their only option. “Just stay here. Huddle somewhere together and wait until it gets light out. We should be able to find our way then.” She made herself sound confident so he wouldn’t be scared.
“I don’t know; we weren’t too far from the road….” Thomas’s voice drifted off, and Jade could tell he was no more wild than she was about spending the rest of the night out here in the forest, waiting for the light to break.
She reached out and felt for Thomas’s sleeve. “Hang on to me, okay? Your Mom will be really pissed if I don’t get you home in one piece.”
“
What?
” Jade barked.
study, Noah put on his glasses and went over some the hard copy he’d printed out of his next book. He found it easier to catch little mistakes if he read the work in his favorite chair. It was late, but the excitement of finally being here after months of planning kept him wide awake.
But had they moved for the best reason? The thought had raised itself more than once like a persistent ghost, but now, not wanting to think about what had led to his decision, Noah got up and opened the peeling French doors, letting in the cool mountain air. The lights were on around the pool—the ones that were still working and not broken or buried by debris—highlighting the unkempt landscaping, but beyond was the sheer dark volume of the woods, seeming to loom oppressively over tall green grass and sculpted rock.
He frowned, remembering Josh’s unease with the surrounding forest. He wondered if his son would come to like where they lived, their new environment—so far he’d been very fixated on the new props of their life, but Noah had made a deliberate effort to sweeten the pot until they could fix up their home. To Noah, their new surroundings were soothing, even though sometimes he saw them in a different light, as if looking at the skull of a person through their skin. But he knew he and Josh just weren’t used to this much natural land. It was nothing like where they’d come from.
diner, Chief Kell Farraday touched his radio and called back County Deputy Alec Danvers, who sometimes offered him welcome backup here in Sullivan, which had a small population of just over one thousand two hundred.
The deputy was currently dealing with a drunk and disorderly,
Moss Beacon over at the Road House again. His old lady cheated on him, and instead of giving her hell, Moss picked a fight with someone every Friday night regular, taking out his frustration on travelers since the locals were too smart to mix it up with him.
“Does he need stitches this time, Alec?” Kell asked his friend, grateful for his help. He’d started the day with administration work he had to cover since his secretary was only part-time, delved into a felony investigation, and then topped his time off with doing traffic duty for a bike-a-thon through town.
“Naw, but the guy he hit sure does! Looks like he was mowed down by a truck, Chief.”
Kell sighed. Well, that made things more complicated. Why the hell couldn’t Moss think things through? “The guy he fought want to press charges?”
“Yeah, you do that,” Kell drawled. “Meanwhile I’m going to have a nice big piece of peach pie.” This was his favorite part of the unpredictable day of a local chief. He made less money than a starting patrolman in most parts of the country, but he liked this town. And this town liked him: They were satisfied, along with the board, with his work, and willing to overlook his personal life. And living here, he knew just about everyone. It also gave a man lots of thinking time, which Kell liked. He was a natural loner, and a couple things in town the past couple of years had made him thoughtful. But he just knew one day he’d get to the bottom of it, like the socalled ghost haunting Sullivan’s forest.