“Last night, when we came to get you. You seemed… I don’t know. You were different. I mean, I know you were upset, but…” Chris gave a half shrug. “You were kind of cool.”
“Last night I was not cool.”
“I don’t mean—it’s only that you seemed more real. Not so affected.”
She folded her arms and lifted her chin. “You think I’m affected?”
“I think, if I’m being honest, that you come across sometimes like you’re trying to fit some kind of image. An image that’s not really you. I kind of think that the Marsha I saw last night… maybe that was closer to the real you.”
“It wasn’t.” Her voice was sharp. She looked down at the floor a moment and took a deep breath before meeting Chris’s gaze. “Look, I want you to know that I love your father, desperately. There’s nothing affected about the way I feel. And as much as I would love it if you and I could see our way to being friends, I can see that that probably won’t happen. But do you think you could at least tolerate me? For his sake?”
“Marsha…” Chris faltered, words once again failing her. She felt awful that she’d been so obvious about her dislike of the woman. But she’d honestly believed that Marsha was too self-absorbed to notice. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m sorry I made you feel awful, and that I made it seem like we could never be friends. I would love to be your friend.”
Marsha looked skeptical. “You don’t have to pretend to be nice.”
“I’m not pretending. I couldn’t be more sincere.” At the moment, she really was. She hoped she wouldn’t regret this decision once the guilt wore off.
Marsha’s posture softened a little, and hope filled her eyes. “Really?”
“Really. And I promise I’m going to do everything I can to make sure you and Dad get the wedding you want.”
“Do you mean it?”
“Absolutely.”
She grinned. “Oh, Chris, I’m so glad you feel that way. I can’t tell you how relieved I am.”
“Well, I’m sorry for whatever I did to make you doubt it.”
“In that case, there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask, but I haven’t been sure if I should.”
“Dad already mentioned that you were hoping I’d be your maid of honor.”
She threw up her hands in exasperation. “That Drew. Sometimes he’s unbelievable. Well? What do you say?”
Chris smiled. “I’d be honored.”
She squealed and threw her arms around Chris. This time, Chris returned the hug.
“Oh, you’ve made me so happy!” Marsha said as she released her. “Tell you what. I know you have things to do, but maybe tonight we can have some wine and look at my Pinterest board together. I’ve pinned some of the most amazing bridesmaid dresses, and I’d love to get your input.”
Chris grinned, focusing on the fact that there was wine involved in this proposition. “Sounds great!”
“Yay!” She jumped up and down a little and then hugged Chris again. “Thank you so much!”
“That’s what friends are for, right?”
When Marsha released her, she seemed a little more subdued but no less happy. “Right,” she said. “I’ll get out of your hair and let you get on with your day. I’ll go try my grandma again.”
“Great. Let me know if you get a hold of her.”
“Will do.” She picked up her coffee and uneaten muffin and headed out of the kitchen. Chris grabbed another muffin and took a bite, chewing thoughtfully as she watched Marsha go, torn between being glad she’d made her future step-mother happy and hoping she hadn’t made a terrible mistake.
Chapter Ten
Ron waited outside the kitchen, hidden from Chris’s view. She wasn’t actually trying to eavesdrop. She simply didn’t think Marsha should be left alone, and Ron found it easier to do something about it by keeping a constant eye on Marsha than to convince Chris she should be watched.
Of course, if Marsha’s poltergeist—if indeed that’s what they were dealing with—showed up on Ron’s watch, she had no idea what she could do about it. She’d cross that bridge when she came to it.
While she waited, though, she couldn’t help overhearing the conversation the two women were having. Ron felt for Marsha, but she also felt that the woman was hiding something. More suspiciously-minded than her sister, she suspected that Marsha might know more about what was going on than she let on.
Whatever Marsha was hiding, though, her feelings for Ron and Chris’s dad seemed genuine. Ron felt a stab of envy knowing that here was yet another woman who knew a very different Drew Wilson than the one who’d raised Ron after her mother died. Of course, Ron had known that particular version of her father—the loving, affectionate and supportive version—once. She still missed him. Part of her still longed to be welcomed back into that Drew’s good graces, even though it was beyond too late for that.
Where she was concerned, that version of her father died along with her mother. The widowed father who’d had to finish raising her and Chris on his own was a cold, hard, critical man who made it clear day after day how much the mere sight of her hurt him, how much he resented her for that one kid-stupid mistake of leaving her Barbie car on the stairs for her mother to trip on.
But unlike Ron, her dad still had the luxury of moving on with his life. The evidence of that luxury came out of the kitchen carrying a muffin and a mug of coffee, oblivious to her ghostly guardian. Ron followed her down the hall and up the stairs to Chris’s room, where she set her coffee on the nightstand and bit into her muffin as she settled onto the bed. Her laptop and phone lay next to each other in the middle of the bed.
Marsha reached for the phone and sipped her coffee as she dialed. After a moment, she said, “Granny, it’s me, Marsha. I know I’ve left you a bunch of messages, but this is so important. Please, please call me when you get this.”
She tossed the phone back on the bed. Her shoulders slumped, and she looked so tired and defeated that Ron found herself wanting to help this annoying interloper for her own sake and not simply for Chris. After a moment, Marsha sat up straight and took a deep breath, squaring her shoulders determinedly and plastering a smile on her face. She reached for her laptop and opened it up, unaware of Ron sitting next to her on the bed. The browser opened to a Pinterest page full of wedding inspiration photos.
Oh yay, more jealousy, Ron thought as Marsha began to scroll. It wasn’t as though Ron had spent a lot of time fantasizing about her own wedding when she’d been alive. She’d never really given it much thought beyond what she’d look like as a bride. She’d been in no rush to find a husband and settle down, believing she’d still had plenty of time to meet the right guy.
Well, she had met the right guy, at least. And she had all eternity to spend with him. So why was this whole wedding thing getting to her so much? It wasn’t like she and Joe had anything to gain by being officially married. The only legal status that applied to either of them was deceased.
Ron got up from the bed and tried to distract herself by looking around at Marsha’s things. Her night clothes had been neatly folded and tucked away in her suitcase. An array of high-end makeup and skin and hair care products that definitely didn’t belong to Chris had been set out in an orderly fashion on one side of Chris’s mirrored dresser, proving that Marsha was as high-maintenance as she appeared, at least where her looks were concerned.
Considering how much drama she’d introduced into their lives in the few days she’d been in town, Ron felt safe in assuming it also applied to her personality.
Behind her, Marsha sighed and closed her laptop. She got up and paced the floor, wringing her hands as she went. She kept glancing at her phone as if willing it to ring. After a few laps back and forth beside the bed, she turned and started for the dresser. Ron moved out of the way as she made a beeline for her purse.
It didn’t take a lot of rummaging before she pulled out a pack of cigarettes. She held them a moment, gazing at them longingly, before shaking her he
ad and putting them away. Rubbing her hands on her designer jeans as if rubbing away the guilt, she returned to the bed and picked up her phone.
Rather than making another call to Granny, or to anyone else, she simply stared at it as she tapped the screen. Ron considered peeking over her shoulder to see what she was doing but decided it was none of her business and turned her attention back to Marsha’s things.
Marsha had taken her wallet out of her purse and laid it on the dresser while searching for the illicit pack of smokes. She’d forgotten to put it back. Glancing back to make sure Marsha was too engrossed in her phone to notice, Ron reached down and flipped the wallet open, revealing rows of cards tucked neatly into slots and a Texas driver’s licensed that proved that at least Marsha wasn’t the type to lie about her age. Not yet, anyway.
It didn’t contain anything particularly interesting or insightful, unless you counted the little plastic photo album in the middle of the wallet. Ron was surprised they even included those things in wallets anymore. It seemed just about everyone carried all their meaningful photos on their phones these days.
With another glance to make sure Marsha wasn’t looking, Ron flipped through the plastic sheaves, all but one of which was empty. Turning to the lone exception, she expected to see a stock photo of cheesy-looking models trying hard to look like an actual family or a couple in love—the sort of placeholder picture that usually came with a wallet or picture frame. What she found instead was a young Marsha who couldn’t have been more than sixteen.
Pimple-faced but pretty, this young Marsha wore no makeup and a lot of flannel, with brown hair in loose waves that tumbled past her shoulders. But what was most notable about the photo was the baby she held.
Ron picked up the wallet to look more closely at the photo. The baby couldn’t have been more than six months old. Dressed in frilly pink with a pink bow on a headband wrapped around her little bald head, she sported the fat rolls and wrinkles of a well-fed infant. She smiled happily in young Marsha’s arms, caught mid-laugh, as Marsha herself grinned at the camera.
Ron wondered who the baby was. She recalled that Marsha had a nephew but didn’t remember anything about a niece or a much younger sister. A cousin, maybe? There was definitely a family resemblance. Ron held the photo to her face and squinted. Marsha and the baby shared the same eyes and nose. The photo itself looked like one of those portraits you can get taken at Sears or Walmart, but who has that kind of picture taken with a distant relative?
A gasp from behind her reminded Ron she wasn’t alone. She turned and saw Marsha staring wide-eyed at the wallet, which from her perspective would be floating in mid-air. Ron dropped the wallet, and Marsha let out a yelp and jumped up from the bed.
“Oh, no,” said Ron, turning as Marsha ran for the door. As she turned, her arm, made solid enough by her agitation, knocked over all of Marsha’s carefully placed products. Marsha screamed and ran out of the room.
Swearing, Ron transported herself downstairs and into the kitchen. At the table, Chris was taking a drink of coffee from her spook mug. Startled by Ron’s sudden appearance, she sloshed it on her chin and down the front of her shirt. “Ron!”
“I’m sorry!” Ron hurried to grab a dish towel and hand it to her sister. “It wasn’t the poltergeist, it was me.”
“Yeah, I—wait, what?”
At that moment, Marsha came downstairs, screaming Chris’s name as her feet pounded down the corridor toward the kitchen. “Chris!” She burst into the kitchen. Breathless, she bent over and put her hands on her knees as she gasped for air. She pointed up at the second floor. “It’s here!”
Chris looked slowly from Marsha to Ron, who said, “I swear, I didn’t mean to scare her.”
“What did you do?” she asked Ron.
Assuming she was the one spoken to, Marsha said, “Nothing. I got out of there as fast as I could and came to get you.” Straightening up, she wrung her hands together. “I probably should have grabbed my phone and laptop, though.”
“I accidentally knocked some stuff over,” said Ron.
Chris sighed. “Marsha, it’s okay. It was only Ron.”
Marsha stopped wringing her hands and blinked at Chris. “Ron? As in your sister?”
“I was only keeping an eye on her,” said Ron. “I didn’t think she should be alone.”
When Chris relayed this information to Marsha, her panting slowed and she smiled. “Aw. That’s sweet.” Then her smile faded and her brows drew together. “But what was she doing with my wallet?”
Chris quirked an eyebrow in Ron’s direction. “What were you doing with her wallet?”
Marsha followed her gaze, as if waiting for the answer to appear.
Ron’s mind reeled for a good excuse, but she couldn’t think of any. Looking at Chris, all she could do was shrug.
Chris rolled her eyes and turned to Marsha. “She was curious. But she promises it will never happen again.”
“Oh. Well. Okay, then.”
“Ask her who the baby is,” said Ron. Chris simply looked at her. “Go on, ask her!”
With a sigh, Chris said, “Ron’s curious about the baby.” She shook her head like she had no idea what Ron was asking about.
For the tiniest instant, Marsha looked stricken. But she recovered quickly and smoothed out her features. “She’s my niece.”
“I didn’t know you had a niece.”
“Well, you wouldn’t. She died.”
“Oh.” Chris shot eye daggers at Ron. “I’m so sorry.”
“So am I,” said Ron. “So, so sorry.”
“Ron’s sorry, too. And she’s sorry she scared you.”
“I really am.”
Marsha gave a slight nod and folded her arms. “It’s okay. I guess it’s nice to know there are good spirits watching over me in this house.” She frowned slightly as she seemed to consider this. “A little creepy, if I’m being honest, but considering the alternative, it’s good to know I’m not alone.”
With more side-eye at Ron, Chris said, “I’m sorry. I would’ve warned you what she was up to if I’d known.”
Marsha waved a hand. “Forget about it. So, a ghost sister and a ghost dog. They must really keep you on your toes.”
“You don’t know the half of it.” Chris looked down at her damp shirt for emphasis.
“Okay, well, I guess since it’s safe, I’m going to head back upstairs.” She started to go but turned back to Chris. “Oh, is your sister still here?”
“Yep.”
“Could you ask her not to follow me? I just… I’d like to be alone for a little while. Really alone. If that’s okay.”
“She can hear you,” said Chris, “and it’s fine.” She cast a stern look at Ron. “Right?”
She didn’t like the idea of leaving Marsha unattended, but she felt too contrite to argue. So she nodded. “Right.”
Marsha nodded. “Okay. Thanks.”
She headed out of the kitchen. Chris retrieved the towel she’d dropped on the table and mopped herself up. “So you were snooping?”
“I wasn’t snooping. I was keeping an eye on things.”
“In her wallet?”
“I was bored. It was there. She wasn’t looking.” She sighed. “At least not at first. But it won’t happen again. I promise.”
“It better not. You see how tightly she’s wound. The woman’s terrified.”
“I know. I’d better get back up there with her.”
“You heard her. She wants to be left alone for a while.”
“I’ll leave her alone. I won’t go in the room. I’ll only stick close by and keep an eye on things.”
“I don’t think that will make her feel better.”
“It will make me feel better.” Ron popped herself to the upstairs hallway before Chris could argue anymore. Marsha had already shut herself back inside the bedroom. Ron approached the door, intending to poke her head in and make sure everything was okay, but the sound of crying froze her in place.
&nbs
p; At first, she thought the white lady had followed them home. The sobbing sounded similar, so wracked with pain and grief. Except this crying was muffled, as though Marsha had buried her face in a pillow, not wanting anyone to hear. And the only effect it had on Ron’s emotions was to stir sympathy, along with guilt at reminding Marsha of the loss of her niece, whom she had obviously loved very much.
Wishing she could somehow comfort the crying woman inside, Ron touched the door but respected her wishes. After a moment, she backed away, letting Marsha have her privacy.
Chapter Eleven
Chris barely had time to finish her coffee and process the events of this crazy morning before Derek returned, loaded down with grocery bags. She met him at the door and unburdened him of a couple. “I thought you were only picking up a few things,” she said as they carried the bags to the kitchen. “This looks like you shopped for a week. For a family of ten.”
“Don’t exaggerate. This would only feed a family of five.” Derek grinned as she glanced back at him on the way to the kitchen. “I went out on a limb and operated under the assumption that there’s nothing edible in your pantry.”
“That is not true. There was absolutely nothing wrong with that muffin mix, and I happen to know that there’s a can of mixed nuts that are only a month old.”
“I stand corrected.” He unloaded his bags on the kitchen counter and turned to Chris as she did the same. “So is everything cool with you and Marsha?”
“Yeah. It finally happened. I’m officially her maid of honor.”
“Congratulations. Or should it be my condolences?”
Chris shrugged as she unbagged groceries and set them on the counter. “It’s fine. She wants us to have our own little slumber party tonight. Wine and Pinterest and planning.”
“Good thing I stopped by the liquor store, then.” He reached into a brown paper sack, pulled out a bottle, and handed it to her. “I got two bottles of your favorite Pinot.”
“Oh, good. That fixes the alliteration problem.” She took the other bottle from him and set them both in the fridge to chill.
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