Noelia handed the woman her paper napkin from her muffin, and Marianna wiped her eyes. Noelia enjoyed a little vindictive satisfaction in seeing her eye makeup smeared across her face.
“It was also partly my fault—I was so intent on surprising Marianna with this trip and with my Italian-language skills, that I never thought of how she must feel, home alone all the time,” Marco said, putting his arm around his wife.
“We can’t apologize enough,” Marianna said. “You’re right, I should have had more faith in my husband; I was just so lonely, and he wouldn’t tell me why we needed all that extra money. At one time, I wondered if he was gambling, but then . . . well, him seeing another woman was a more obvious answer.”
“I have explained everything to Marianna, about the trip and everything. It’s been a learning experience for both of us, to be more open and trusting.” Marco squeezed his wife’s shoulders.
“Well, I suppose all’s well that ends well. And thank you for the flowers—they are beautiful.” Noelia took the proffered bouquet—jewel-colored early roses and peonies—and raised the flowers to her face to breathe in the perfume. “Wherever did you get such a beautiful peony? That’s such an unusual color, the crimson with the curly pink tips.”
Marianna’s face lit up. “You’re a gardener, too?”
Noelia told her how much she loved her garden. “It’s my way of staying sane when life goes crazy,” she admitted.
“I’ll dig a section of that peony for you, once it’s stopped blooming,” Marianna said. “It’s a very early bloomer.”
It was a sweet promise, but Noelia didn’t expect anything to come of it. Marco and Marianna would probably prefer to put the whole embarrassing incident behind them, and she never expected to hear from either of them again.
Still, she felt better for having that whole mess straightened out.
• • •
Nate came into the cafeteria just as Marco and Marianna were leaving. “I hope that wasn’t more trouble from that pair?” he asked, concern marking a crease between his eyebrows. “I really think you should have let me track them down and talk to them.”
Noelia grinned. “I’m touched by your concern, but it was a simple enough misunderstanding. He was keeping secrets—of the good kind, really—but he kind of overdid it a bit, and she was worried about him apparently overworking. And then she saw him with me, when he was supposed to be at a job site, and put two and two together to come up with infidelity.”
“Yeah, and I’m sure she loves him a lot. Love is behind a lot of insecurity, but she should have handled it a bit better than dousing you with a glass of water in front of fifty folks who probably know you. Or know who you are now.”
Noelia shrugged and offered him a mischievous grin. “You know, at my age, I’m not sure it’s so terrible to be painted as the Scarlet Woman.”
To her surprise, Nate bent down and offered her a brief kiss on the lips, one that, from his expression, promised a whole lot more. Funny how a seemingly innocent kiss can curl your toes!
“Would you like to join me for a coffee?” she asked, hoping he could stay a while.
He sighed. “I’d love to, but I just dropped by for a sandwich to go—dinner at my desk while I write up client notes. Then I have one more client to see, and I’ll be free by seven. Remember I said I wanted to show you something at my house? Would you consider coming by tonight or would that be too late for you?”
Suddenly, the tiredness she’d been feeling lifted, and Noelia nodded. “Yes, I’d like that. But you’re making it sound very mysterious—can you give me a clue?”
He shook his head. “You will have to see this to believe it.” And with that he was gone, leaving her curiosity piqued. It seemed a long time until evening.
Chapter Thirteen
“Come on in; let me take your jacket.” Nate welcomed her at the entrance to his handsome two-story home. She entered through a broad arched front door into a spacious vestibule with a mirrored closet in one corner. An antique table in a glowing pine finish stood on the other side of the door, and a crystal bowl of roses sat on the table, along with a small pile of mail. Noelia was instantly charmed.
“This is beautiful! You have a lovely home,” she exclaimed, taking in the mosaic-tiled floor and the original woodwork on the pocket doors that flanked each side of the space. A curved staircase with an oak bannister and scarlet carpeting curved gracefully up past a leaded window to disappear onto the second floor.
Suddenly a whirlwind bundle of fur hurled itself down the stairs and danced around her legs.
“Honey, sit!” Nate commanded. The dog ignored him, and he grinned apologetically at Noelia. “See, she does everything I tell her—not! This is Honey, Lydia’s spoiled rotten pooch.”
“She’s gorgeous! I’ve been thinking of getting a pet, but I’m out so much, it wouldn’t seem fair,” Noelia told him, kneeling to rub the dog’s soft ears.
Nate nodded. “Lydia used to make sure she was home to walk Honey three times a day, or she’d make arrangements for me or Peggy to do it. Poor Honey misses her terribly. Now I have a pet sitter who comes by twice a day, walks her and plays with her.”
Nate finished hanging her jacket in the closet and closed the door with its beveled glass mirror. “The house is lovely, but it’s way too big for one person,” he told her. “It belonged to an aunt of mine, and she offered it to Jackie and me when we got married. She gave us a real deal on it, even for the time nearly thirty years ago, but I’m afraid we disappointed her.”
“How so?” Noelia asked, as she followed him along a short corridor and into a bright modern kitchen, the dog tagging along happily behind.
“Well, her words were: ‘I’m hoping for lots of grandnieces and nephews, and you’ll really need the space!’ Jackie and I only had one child, Lydia, before Jackie experienced the first bout of cervical cancer and somehow the loss of any future children paled in comparison to the idea that her life might be shortened.”
“As it turned out, we were lucky. Jackie went into remission after treatment, and we had another fifteen years or so together before the cancer raised its ugly head again. I lost her six years ago.”
Noelia couldn’t think of anything to say in the face of this torrent of information. Perhaps Nate needed to get all this off his chest, and it would certainly account for some of the sadness she’d sensed about him. The poor man—first his wife’s health and subsequent death, and then to have his only child in a coma with no apparent happy ending in sight.
A round oak pedestal table stood on one side of the large kitchen, with a gracefully curving island between the dining and kitchen area. On the table was another vase of flowers, this time simple white daisies. He pulled out a chair for Noelia and then moved to the island to get plates of cheese, pate, and crackers, and a bowl of grapes.
Seeing her admiring the flowers, he said, “I have a housekeeper, Peggy, who goes above and beyond to add all these little extras. Left to myself, I’d probably never think to bring in flowers, but they do add something to the rooms.”
“Would you like wine, or maybe tea or coffee?”
“I’m driving, so I’ll skip the wine, thank you. Tea would be lovely.”
“I wasn’t sure if you’d managed to get any dinner, so I just put together a snack. But I know you finished just a short time ago, and if you’re hungry, I could order something in . . . ”
Noelia shook her head. “This is lovely, Nate. I did manage to grab a slice of pizza at the cafeteria before I left.”
He raised his eyebrows and said in a tone of mock horror, “You ate hospital cafeteria pizza? And worse, end-of-the-day hospital cafeteria pizza?”
She laughed. “Yes, it wasn’t that bad, actually. If you like cardboard . . . ”
They chatted in a similar light tone for a while, but slowly Noelia began to feel that Nate was trying to put off the subject he wanted to talk to her about. Was it something to do with Lydia? Goodness, she hoped he hadn’t
had bad news . . .
Finishing up with a pate-laden cracker, she wiped her mouth on one of the bright blue paper napkins from a holder on the table. “Nate, you said there was something you wanted to show me, and I have a feeling that it was something besides giving me a glimpse of your beautiful home. What’s bothering you?”
• • •
Nate was surprised by how much he enjoyed having Noelia sitting at his kitchen table, her light-hearted conversation and intelligent comments a foil to all the despair that had hung in the atmosphere of his home for so long. Now he was reluctant to broach the subject that was really troubling him and cast about in his mind for some acceptable alternative to his real motives for bringing her here.
Nothing came to mind, and with a sigh, he began his story.
“You’ll probably think I’m a bit crazy with all this. In fact, I’ve been questioning my sanity a bit myself.”
“That’s a difficult thing for a psychologist, I should imagine.”
He smiled. “There’s an old joke that only people who are already crazy go into psychology and psychiatry work. Maybe looking to find answers to their own problems. But yes, it’s certainly disconcerting. I’m not sure how I would handle one of my clients who came to me with a story like this. But I feel I must tell you, because it seems you are somehow involved.”
Noelia reached out to lay her hand on his. “Do you have bad news about Lydia’s progress?”
“Oh, no, nothing like that. Just promise me you won’t think I’m nutzoid . . . ”
“Oh, Nate, if you could only know some of the things I’ve encountered, particularly in my time working for Kelly Andrews. But that’s a story for another time. Right now, I’m dying with curiosity to know what could possibly be troubling you, and what I could have to do with it.”
Nate found it awkward at first to describe what had happened the other night in his office, when he’d thought he had a burglar but there was no one there . . . and his files had rearranged themselves to form Noelia’s name.
“It’s pretty hard to explain without sounding weird,” he began. Then he told the whole story of being awakened by noises in his office, going downstairs armed with his baseball bat, and seeing a light in the room. As he entered, the light faded, but his file-cabinet drawers were sliding slowly shut, apparently all by themselves.
“At first, I thought maybe there’d been some sort of earthquake, not that that’s a common occurrence here. But why just the file-cabinet drawers? And why wasn’t there any other sign of a quake? And what was that light I saw that faded away, and yet there was no one there and none of the lights had been switched on?
“But most weird of all, most intriguing, was this little display.”
• • •
They were now standing in Nate’s neat and tidy office, with its stark white paintwork and blond wood desk and filing cabinets. A comfortable-looking leather office chair sat behind the desk, and a small leather loveseat in a matching color was pushed up against one wall.
Nate waved a hand to draw attention to the files arrayed in a fan-shape on his desk blotter. Noelia stepped forward for a closer look but kept her hands in her pants pockets, unwilling to disturb anything with the impulse to touch. It took her a few moments to see what Nate had obviously seen; that the first letters of each of the names on the files, when put together, spelled out N-O-E-L-I-A.
“Goodness, why would anyone want use your files to put out my name like this on your desk?”
“I don’t know what to make of any of it.” Nate sounded pleased that Noelia had spotted the arrangement of the files. “As soon as I came downstairs and entered the room, the light disappeared. There was no one here, but these files were on my desk in this formation. I have no idea how the burglar escaped without my seeing him.”
He paused for a moment, a worried frown on his handsome face. “The only other rational explanation I can think of is that I was sleepwalking, and somehow dreaming about what I had done in an earlier sleepwalking episode.”
“Well, have you had experience with sleepwalking before?”
He shook his head. “Never. Not even as a child. And I’ve no idea why it should start now.”
Noelia’s heart rate sped up. “Maybe there’s another explanation,” she murmured.
Nate looked at her, eyebrows raised. “What? You think I had a ghost visitor or something else supernatural?”
Noelia bit her lip and nodded.
He stammered, “I’m a psychologist. I don’t believe in the supernatural. I believe that everything has an explanation.”
Noelia looked at him, their gazes locking. “What other explanation, then? The files jumped out of their drawers and arranged themselves on your desk? Maybe they were bored . . . ”
He shook his head. “No, I know that can’t have happened. But really, a ghost playing around with my files in the middle of the night? That makes about as much sense as the files jumping out themselves.”
As they walked back toward the spacious living room, Noelia paused to admire a display of family photographs on the hallway wall. Nate, his wife, and their pretty daughter at different stages of their lives. They looked so happy . . .
Without warning one of the framed pictures fell from the wall to crash onto the floor at Noelia’s feet. Shocked, she jumped back a little to avoid the shattering glass, and Nate, standing behind her, enfolded her in his arms for a moment. “You’re shivering,” he murmured in her ear.
“I’m sorry, it was just a bit unexpected, having that picture seem to . . . to launch itself at my feet,” she replied. She didn’t mention the cold shiver that had run along her spine, as if cold breath were blowing on her.
“I don’t know how this could happen.” Nate let go of Noelia, seemingly reluctantly. “I thought these were all safely attached to the wall. Perhaps what caused the chaos in my office was responsible for loosening the photographs.”
He bent to gingerly pick up the broken frame. Noelia peered over his arm to see what the photograph was and drew in a sharp breath. She was looking at an image of the woman who had been plaguing her dreams, whose silent screams had woken her from sleep several times. She shuddered.
“Is that . . . is that your wife?” she asked, hoping her voice wasn’t shaking. Of all the photos on the wall, this was the only one of a woman alone.
“Yes, that’s Jackie. We’d taken a holiday in Greece, and I took that picture because she looked so healthy and happy. That was before the return of the cancer.”
Noelia had the sudden feeling that things were falling into place. A year ago she would never have thought she’d believe in ghosts, but after experiencing Kelly’s gift with restless spirits, she had to accept the possibility. She’d hoped never to be in the middle of something like that again.
Noelia slipped her arm through his. “Nate, my dear, I’d like you to pop by the store tomorrow to finalize your requirements about Lydia’s dress. And later I’m going to introduce you to my friend Kelly, and between the two of us, we’re going to expand your horizons.”
Chapter Fourteen
Kelly was already in the store when Noelia arrived the next morning. She was sitting, sipping herbal tea, and staring into space.
“What’s the matter, hon? You look so serious.”
Tears bunched in Kelly’s eyes. “Oh, Noelia, I told Brett about the baby as soon as I could, and he’s so thrilled! But then I had to go and spoil it by talking about the Cranky Ghost and the things that happened at Wedding Bliss—not that he hadn’t already guessed, after that little restless spirit display at the store the other day. How is your eye, by the way?”
“It looks worse than it is,” Noelia told her. “I’m glad Brett was happy. You’ll make wonderful parents. So, why the tears?” She pulled out a chair and sat next to Kelly, putting her arm around her friend.
“We had an awful fight. Brett says I need to stay away from all this ghost stuff, that it could hurt me and the baby . . . and I know he’s got a po
int, Noelia, but I can’t seem to leave this alone. When I survived that shrapnel blast and several of the guys in my unit died . . . well, I feel as though I was given this gift of seeing spirits in trouble, and that I should help in honor of the guys who didn’t make it.
“Brett says that’s all very well and good, but I was actually given my life back so that I could be happy and have a beautiful child, and that I should be grateful for that, and not do anything that might harm myself or the little one.”
“I hate to say this, but I can see his point. I remember how drained you were after dealing with Peter the Mischievous Ghost. You weren’t pregnant then, either.”
“I know all that, and it does worry me. Who knows what effect it could have on the unborn child, all that adrenaline and exposure to something . . . I hate the word, but supernatural?”
Kelly dried her eyes, and they sat in silence for a little while. Noelia felt so sorry for her friend, because she knew the dedication Kelly felt for using her gift. Yet there was nothing in the world more precious than that tiny baby growing inside her.
“How about we keep you out of it? You just act in an advisory capacity and let me and Nate do all the heavy lifting?”
“Nate accepts that there’s a ghost in his daughter’s room?”
“I could slap myself on the side of the head for not seeing that there was a connection between Lydia’s room being haunted and the poltergeist-type thing at Wedding Bliss.”
“Well, a haunting isn’t the first thing most people think about when something weird happens.” Kelly smiled.
“Have I told you about a dream I’ve been having? A man is sitting with his head down, and a woman standing behind him is shouting something to me, but I can’t make out what she’s saying. When I visited Nate yesterday, a picture fell—it seemed to launch itself off the wall and shatter at my feet. It was a photograph of Jackie, Nate’s wife, Lydia’s mother, who died six years ago. Kelly, she was the woman in my dream!”
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