Spirits of the Season: Eight Haunting Holiday Romances
Page 43
“Where she couldn’t be found,” Lorraine finished her thought. “Where everyone goes to not be found. She told me that she lived in the mountains of Idaho once, but she bolted when the love of her life caught up with her.”
“’Cause of the Tinker curse? She was afraid he might be crazy?”
“No,” Lorraine shook her head. “From what we seen, darlin’, I’d say she skedaddled ’cause she was afraid of losin’ her own mind. Maybe that feller warn’t human. Maybe he was the ghost of Virgil Hollow–”
Brandi gripped Lorraine’s arm, her heart racing.
“L-Lorraine, I saw it for myself, how the two of them up and disappeared into the creek. That’s crazy talk, ain’t it? Do we dare take a look at where she is now?”
Lorraine rubbed Brandi’s hand, patting it kindly. “We’re family here at Turtle Shores,” she chastised. “Even though the rest o’ the world thinks we’re misfits. If this happened to you, you can bet we’d move heaven an’ earth to get you back.”
Brandi nodded with a flicker of understanding in her eyes.
“But brace yourself, honey,” Lorraine warned. “Maybe Virgil Hollow really did go crazy, like all the others who tried to love Granny. Even as a spook.”
Brandi took Lorraine’s hand in hers for fortitude, giving it a gentle tug. The two women stood to their feet, and Brandi pulled her shoulders back.
“Ma’am,” she called out to the mirror, “p-please show us where Evangeline is now.”
The darkness of the mirror began to lift. All that could be seen, however, was the white reflection of the Cold Moon. Brandi sighed, fearing that perhaps the magic of this peculiar night in December might have passed. But then she saw an unusual sight in the glass.
“Lorraine, there’s pretty lights, rising in the sky like fireflies!”
In the mirror, hundreds of golden lights floated toward the stars, gently ascending until they were consumed by flames.
“What are they?” Lorraine asked.
Brandi shrugged. “I ain’t sure, but they look to me like luminaries. You know, those little lanterns folks put candles in for the holidays. I guess these were released to the sky. Damned if they ain’t breathtaking, sweetie.”
Brandi gazed with wonder at the mirror, until her eyes registered Granny Tinker in the glass, making her breath hitch.
Virgil was beside her in an outdoor patio, lighting candles to put them in delicate paper lanterns and watch them fly. He smiled boyishly at Evangeline, tracing each one with his eyes as though they were his fragile hopes.
“Feliz navidad,” he whispered, leaning in to give her a kiss. His eyes searched hers as though they lit the flame of his heart. “What do you think of my rancho here in Argentina?” He raised his fingers to trace the curve of her cheek. He was older now, with silver threading his hair, but his eyes remained an earnest blue. “I built it for you. I been waiting for you, Evangeline–”
Carefully, he unbuttoned his white cotton shirt to reveal a deep brown scar on his chest, a little to the right of his heart.
“I lived that night,” he breathed onto her cheek. “After the train robbery in Phantom Canyon. But I been haunted by you ever since.”
Evangeline’s fingers leaped to her lips. She trembled as she reached a hesitant hand to Virgil’s chest, daring to press her finger against his scar.
Virgil grasped her hand suddenly and swooped in for a kiss. When he broke away, he studied her pale face in the moonlight, framed by silver hair. The platinum glow of the moon made her look younger, yet shining and eternal at the same time. “Who’s the ghost now?” he whispered, kissing her forehead, her nose, her cheek before returning to her lips.
Evangeline closed her eyes and let his lips travel her face, exploring her—devouring her—until she felt him lift her body in his arms.
“Stay with me, Evangeline,” he urged, carrying her to the bedroom.
“In the early twentieth century? Oh Virgil, we’re a couple of ol’ fools now,” she said with a slip of a smile, her gold tooth glistening. “Caught in a time between times. Beneath this magic moon, how do we know what’s real? And what would an ol’ gypsy like me do with an outlaw in Argentina?”
“I have mines,” Virgil countered. “One here in Chilecito and another in Potosi, Bolivia. Within a few more years, I’m sure they’ll pay out–”
“And while you wait for that, you’ll do what? Head to Chile?” she laughed. “Or don’t tell me—Paraguay? All beneath the governments’ noses, of course.” She returned his kiss with an ardor that surprised him, but then she placed her hands on his temples and looked him in the eye. “You’re still a highwayman to the core, my handsome ol’ bandit. You always will be.”
Virgil’s eyes sparkled. “Well, you’re still my wild wanderer. And as beautiful as they come. So that makes us perfect.”
He held up the turquoise pouch he’d stolen from her in Bender Lake.
“Iron Feather’s medicine bag helped me track you over the years, you know. He summoned you all along, because he wanted his friend to have someone to love, like the woman he’d loved once and buried. Someone strong enough to withstand an outlaw.”
He set Evangeline gently upon a soft bed covered by brightly-colored, Argentine blankets and turned to a rustic dresser to light a candle.
“But that’s just it, Virgil,” she explained. “I don’t withstand you. You drive me insane. Your outlaw love carves its way into my heart the way miners find gold. It leaves a big hole there filled with darkness whenever I’m not near you. I either worry to death about what’ll happen to you. Or I worry that I’m not...”
“Not what?”
He snuggled on the bed beside her, watching her reach into the turquoise pouch and pull out Iron Feather’s old chunk of rock with mica. In it, faces began to appear of all the people she had helped—and would help in the future—at Bender Lake. There was a confused teenage girl with long, curly hair, a lost tow-headed little boy, a tall young man beside him with blonde hair and bitterness in his eyes.
“I’m here on earth for a reason, Virgil, like you. To feed the ones who need it most.”
Virgil glanced at the stone, but all he saw was his own reflection in the mica. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Evangeline sat up on her elbows and pointed to a sepia-toned photo on a mantle in the bedroom that was tucked inside a simple pine frame. It was of Iron Feather as an old man. He had on the same flat-brimmed hat, but streaks of gray ran down his long hair. He was surrounded by children who were tugging on him and smiling.
“Iron Feather didn’t just bring me here to keep you an’ the Bandits Hollow Gang safe with my fortune tellin’,” Evangeline explained. “Though he loves you like a brother, an’ would take a bullet for you.”
She rolled onto Virgil’s chest and gave him a sweet kiss, drawing a big heart with her finger over the bullet scar on his skin.
“He brought me here for the children, Virgil. Don’t you see?” She glanced at the photo again. “The people who really needed that gold.”
Virgil scanned her face, running his fingers down her cheeks and pulling her in for a long, slow kiss. It was the kiss of an old man who’d spent his life searching the whole world for what he wanted, only now pausing long enough to savor it. He tilted his head against hers.
“We fed his people,” Evangeline continued, pressing her lips against his cheek for a moment. “The Ute, Apache, Navajo. Scores of children who’d been torn from their families to be raised as whites in boardin’ schools. You didn’t know it, but between robberies, he organized secret raids to sneak ’em out an’ rode under cover of darkness to take ’em home. The government never knew. He prevailed upon me for my fortune tellin’ skills to help find their parents.”
Virgil’s blue eyes grew wide. “W-Why didn’t he ever tell me?”
“So if the government found out, marshals couldn’t beat it out of you. Out of any of the Bandits Hollow Gang, an’ get the families in trouble. He knew I came from a dif
ferent time an’ place—an’ that I’d probably go back.” A smile surfaced on Evangeline’s lips. “An’ I guess he suspected I was good at keepin’ secrets.”
“That’s why he disappeared a lot, never saying a word,” Virgil nodded with a brooding look in his eyes. “He died poor, you know. In Abiquiu.”
“He died rich, Virgil. Surrounded by the families an’ children who loved him.”
“And you? What have you been doing all these years?”
“Healing hearts. Iron Feather’s work inspired me, love. That’s why I headed to Bender Lake.”
Virgil was quiet a long time.
He wrapped his arms around Evangeline and held her close, swallowing her in a kiss. “I know they need you,” he said breathlessly as he broke away. “The brokenhearted...the lost...all the others in your world who rely on you to be their compass. But I can’t go on without you.” He pointed out the bedroom window at the full moon that lit their bed with a silver glow. “You are my light.”
Evangeline grasped his face gently and stared into his eyes. “We’re a pair, ain’t we, Virgil? Two ol’ outlaws, bound by what we love. You followin’ your adventures, an’ me followin’ my heart.”
A deep boom erupted outside, releasing sparks as bright as a constellation that spread a warm light over their faces. Evangeline smiled at the Christmas Eve fireworks, but then shook her head. “Maybe our magic ain’t meant for this life, Virgil. It’s beyond life. Maybe our magic is meant for the stars.”
“What’re you saying?” Virgil’s voice had a flinty edge. “Are you leaving?”
“We can’t break our hearts on one hand, steering away from what we were born to do, an’ remain together, Virgil. You’re an outlaw who needs to roam this world like he needs to breathe, an’ I’m a fortune teller who ferrets out people’s secrets and stitches their hearts.”
As the fireworks simmered down, an owl hooted outside.
“So that’s why his people always called him Iron Feather,” Virgil said softly, staring at the owl’s silhouette over a branch.
“Because he was soft an’ hard at the same time?” Evangeline replied. “Then that’s what we’ll be.” She glanced up at the bird near their window with the moonlight glinting off its feathers. “Each year, under the Cold Moon, the moon in December that prophesies the renewal of what lies ahead, come to me, Virgil. Keep me warm. Keep my heart alive until–”
“You die?”
She nodded. “An’ I’ve done what I’m supposed to do. Then we can be together forever, both of us free.”
“That’s a long time to wait, my love.” He ran his fingers down strands of her silver hair like they were silk.
“You’ve already waited enough. One night, one eternal night each December, when time stands out o’ time, you’ll be mine. Do ya hear me? All mine. An’ I’ll make love to you like there’s no tomorrow. Our flame will carry us through.”
She glanced at the flickering candle that spread a glow across their room.
“I’ll keep following you,” Virgil vowed. To anyone else, it might have sounded like a threat, but Evangeline was used to it.
“I know that,” she smiled. “You found me in the mountains of Idaho, remember? An’ tonight in Bender Lake.”
“Spook will bring me,” he insisted, nuzzling against her. “She loves a good chase more than life itself. That old mare knows your scent by now, better than any bloodhound.”
“So does the owl,” Evangeline nodded. “Because Iron Feather believed in the power of love. The true kind o’ love, that gives an’ gives and can’t never be separated by time. Will you believe that for me, Virgil?”
“I will try, Evangeline. My soul may roam this big ol’ world, and perhaps the next. But of one thing you can be sure—my heart finds its rest in you.”
Chapter 10
Brandi and Lorraine sniffed back tears beside the antique mirror poised against an old hickory tree in the snow. The glass was completely black now, finished with revealing its secrets.
“That was beautiful!” Brandi exclaimed, pulling out a hankie from her coat pocket and blowing her nose.
“I guess we can be confident he’ll bring her back to us,” Lorraine added. “Virgil loved her too much to take her away from her work at Turtle Shores. Helpin’ folks the way Iron Feather done.”
Speechless, Brandi nodded and grasped Lorraine’s hand to give it a squeeze. She led her to the tree and picked up the mirror, tucking it under her arm as they headed back toward Turtle Shores.
Fortunately, there was enough moonlight left to highlight the narrow path past scraggly honeysuckle bushes to the trailer park. From a distance, Brandi spied the blinking red and green lights of her trailer that filtered through the trees. Yet as they drew closer, she noticed something out of place beside Granny Tinker’s wagon.
It was a dappled-gray horse, tied by a rope to the wagon, surrounded by a man’s tracks in the snow.
And the warm glow of a lantern illuminated the windows of the wagon. Tinkling laughter echoed from inside, spreading across the little glen between Bender Lake and the trailer park.
Brandi stopped, shivering in place.
“Is-Is that a g-ghost horse I’m seein’, Lorraine?” Brandi tugged on Lorraine’s coat. She watched the horse raise its head and nicker.
“If’n it is,” Lorraine replied, trembling a little, “that mirror ought to reveal it. Lay the glass up against the wagon.”
Frightened, Brandi drew a deep breath and dropped Lorraine’s hand. At the count of three, she dashed to set the mirror beside the wagon, running back to Lorraine as fast as her legs could carry her. For a moment, she covered her eyes with the soft wool of her mittens, her heart pounding. When she finally dared to glance the horse’s way, the only thing she could see in the mirror was the reflection of the Cold Moon staring back at them, with stars all around.
A loud clink of glasses broke the silence of the glen, as if Virgil and Evangeline were toasting the holidays with a secret stash of moonshine. Laughter pealed through the wagon, and inside, two silhouettes swayed like they were engaging in a slow, midnight waltz.
“Sounds like they’re mighty happy, honey,” Lorraine whispered. “May not be of this world the way a mind can grasp, but I’d say it’s workin’ for ’em.”
“Oh Lorraine, do you think it might work for me someday, too?” Brandi asked, misty eyed with a tender hope in her voice. “After what I seen tonight, I don’t think I’d mind if it was a spook. ’Cause a love like that might fill your soul for centuries–”
“Be careful what you wish for, darlin’,” Lorraine scolded. “Remember what that lady in the mirror said—there’s a price to these things. By the way, what is it?”
“What’s what?” asked Brandi. She resumed her grip on Lorraine’s hand and headed toward the blinking Christmas lights of the trailers at Turtle Shores.
“Well, as I recall, Granny’s great-great grandma said she’d show us what happened to her after she disappeared, but only for a price. So what’s our price?”
The deep call of an owl stopped them in their tracks. Silently, it flew over their heads, casting the shadow of a man with a flat-brimmed hat onto the snow.
All at once, Brandi and Lorraine appeared bewildered, turning on their heels to try and make sense of their surroundings. The owl hooted again, its echo reverberating through the woods.
“Dagnabbit!” Lorraine complained, stomping her foot. “What in tarnation are we doin’ standin’ out here in the snow, freezin’ our butts off for?”
Brandi shook her finger at the owl. “Must be that dang racket,” she sighed. “C’mon, Lorraine,” she wrapped her arm around her friend’s shoulder, “let’s go to my trailer and I’ll pour you some of Charlie’s eggnog that I got from the Moo & Brew.” She gave Lorraine a wink. “The recipe has a little kick in it for the holidays that I think you just might like.”
About the Author
Bestselling author Diane J. Reed writes fantasy romances about ordin
ary people who are touched by a little magic that opens their hearts to miracles. Along with her passion for books and time travel, she enjoys spying on ghosts and spending time with her family in the Rocky Mountains.
She invites you to stop by and see what's new at http://www.banditsranch.com. She also loves to hear from readers. Email her at banditsranch@gmail.com.
You can find more books by Diane on her author page at Amazon.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Design Credits and Acknowledgments
Foreword
Introduction
Upon a Ghostly Yule
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
About the Author
Saving Laurel
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
About the Author
In the Holiday Spirit
Chapter 1