by Yvonne Heidt
Then the dream put sharp hooks back in her. “Get dressed,” she ordered Natalie. “We’re leaving and going to my house.”
“Why?”
“Just get dressed.” Van told her what occurred on the stairs and what she had witnessed in the room.
“But that doesn’t make sense. Why would you start seeing Richard and Sarah?”
“Natalie, none of this makes any sense. Trust me when I say, I don’t know why, I didn’t ask for it, and I want to leave.”
“I’m not running away,” Natalie said.
“You need to come with me. It’s. Not. Safe. Here,” she said slowly, as if she were talking to a child.
Van noted Natalie’s stubborn chin and knew she didn’t have time to argue. She didn’t even want to, for that matter. She had the same look herself. She shook her head and sighed. “I have to go back to the hospital and bring my dad home. Do you remember how to get to my house?”
“Yes.”
“If you change your mind, the extra key is under the blue pot to the left of the mailbox on the front porch.” Van hugged her. “I’d feel a lot better if you were safe at my place until we figured this crazy shit out.”
*
Van helped her father up the stairs.
“I’m not an invalid. I can walk,” he snapped.
“Quit being so cranky, old man. You scared the crap out of me, so let me take care of you, dammit.”
“I’m not cranky; you’re smothering me, Miss Attitude.”
Van considered her mood and decided she was justified. First for the panic she’d had over her father, next for having spent the night in that poor excuse for a chair, then there was the nightmare at Natalie’s this morning.
She bullied her father into taking a nap, and after making sure she was covered downstairs in the nursery for a few hours, she decided she should also try to rest. Just how weird was this going to get? Not only had she experienced the footsteps and rattling doors, now she had experienced the dreams. Sarah’s past. What was that about? Was it because Natalie was already connected somehow with Beth, and now Van got the leftovers? The questions were enough to drive her crazy and piss her off.
Van thought if she were smart, she would run the other way. Fast. Really, really fast. Her logic and emotions warred with each other. As much as she wanted no part of the ugliness she witnessed in her own dream and those that Natalie told her about, Van wanted to believe that Natalie needed help, needed her. It had been so long since she’d wanted to be needed by someone that it felt almost alien. She could only hope she was strong enough to help her.
Van pulled the blankets back on her old twin bed and fell asleep the second her head hit the pillow.
*
Natalie took her coffee cup and Sarah’s diary outside with her. She curled up on the glider and turned to her bookmarked page. She refused to give up hope that she might find some clues on how she could help. She had to find some resolution for the ghosts in the here and now knowing that she’d either go crazy trying or have to sell her beautiful house.
I came to this morning with a splitting headache and my face is swollen and purple. Richard was in a temper last night and went after dear Beth with his fists. When I tried to stop him, he only beat me down too.
How could I forget how cruel he has been to me my entire life? It’s as if his fists have jarred my memories. Things that were better left buried in my mind. When I was thirteen, he locked me in the root cellar beneath the basement after our parents left for a tour of Europe. How could I have not remembered that? I can only speculate that it’s because of the trauma involved.
I screamed until I was hoarse, pounding on the cement walls until my fists were bloody and I finally passed out from exhaustion. Three days he kept me locked down there. Three days without food or sunlight. He took great pleasure in tormenting and humiliating me while he used my body for his own deviant needs.
He finally let me out in the middle of the night and brought me to my room. He’d left my beautiful kitten dead in the middle of my bed and warned me that I would be next if I told anyone. He must have threatened the servants as well because none of them ever said a word about my disappearance.
He has locked me in my room and I believe he’s going to kill me. If I can’t get out and get help, he’s going to kill Beth.
I think he knows that we have become lovers. Perhaps I was too careless with my touch around the servants and they have told him.
I hear him on the stairs.
It was the last entry in the diary. Natalie flipped through the pages. She felt unspeakably sad and let her tears fall unchecked while she curled in a ball and rested her head on the arm of the glider and closed her eyes.
Natalie slowly became aware of the rhythmic thunder of waves rolling on the beach. Now what? She rubbed her eyes when a figure emerged from the fog and she squinted to focus. Beth approached her and motioned her to sit in the sand. Natalie wasn’t frightened, just curious. “This has got to stop.”
Beth looked directly at her. “I want to help you, Natalie.”
“Then stop these nightmares, please.” Natalie reached over to touch her and wanted to panic when she felt warm, solid flesh. “Am I dead? Where are we?”
“Between,” Beth said and waved her hand impatiently. “But that’s not important.”
“Excuse me; I think it’s pretty damn important. You’ve been dead a while. I have a life.”
“Richard is more powerful now. He has gathered the strength to manifest.”
Natalie thought of her trashed studio. “Apparently. How do I get rid of the bastard?”
A smile spread on Beth’s face. “I wish I could have had your spunk back then. We might have run away or managed to kill him, one of the two.”
Natalie stared at Beth. It was more than a little eerie, like looking into a mirror image that had a life of its own, separate from reality.
“I’ve waited so long for you to come back.”
“Yeah, about that. Why me? What about the others that used to live here? How come they never saw you or Sarah?”
“They weren’t you,” Beth said simply and shrugged. “You are the key.”
Natalie was exasperated. “The key again. What fricking key?”
“It’s the blood.”
“Excuse me?” Natalie’s stomach filled with dread, just as a chill covered her damp skin. “What was that again?”
“Can’t you see it?” Beth’s form began to shimmer and fade.
“Don’t you dare leave me hanging. Clarify this for me, please?”
Beth’s voice was a whisper in the breeze. “You are the blood of my blood. You are the key.”
“But that also means…” Natalie didn’t even want to say it out loud.
“Richard is your great-great-grandfather.”
*
Natalie realized that she was staring at the waves crashing on the beach. She felt dazed and her mind raced fifty miles an hour and on five different tracks. She didn’t remember leaving the house; let alone descending the steep stairs to the sand. Good Lord, she could have drowned herself. She had to be at her breaking point.
She turned to look up at her house, and even though she felt the sun warm her shoulders, she shivered. She brushed the sand off her ass, wincing when she felt the granules in her scratches.
Natalie turned back to look at the waves, perfect in their synchronicity. Her life used to be that ordered. In appearance, anyway. She inhaled the sharp, salty breeze and followed her own footsteps back the way she’d come.
Natalie skirted the rear of the house and let herself in the front door then crossed the hall over to the bathroom, pulling wet, sandy bandages off as she went. The scratches looked good. They were healing fast. She looked into the mirror and the full impact of what she experienced struck her between the eyes. Richard is my great-great-grandfather? What kind of shit is that? She shook her head to clear the blurred image. For a second there she thought she was staring at Beth. Are you sure
you’re not just going crazy, Nat?
Then realization hit her. She was related to Sarah as well as Richard and Beth. Things that make noise in the night, okay, she could go with that. Weird dreams, okay, she could run with that also. Apparently, she could also take poltergeist activity in stride. But this? The whole dead ancestor thing was freaking her out. Is this why she could feel them so strongly? Was it really the blood that coursed through her veins?
How much of her life was her own? How did she happen to purchase the very house that her great-great-grandmother owned with her sadistic husband? Natalie was stubbornly refusing to acknowledge the fact that she and Richard were related. That was too terrible to think about right now. It would have to be on her father’s side, as she could trace her maternal ancestors clear back to County Clare, Ireland.
The visions were longer and more intense, the story gathering momentum with each dream. There was so much going on right now that she was having a hard time remembering who she was before the divorce. Did it matter? She was here now.
Blood is the key, Beth had said. Well, Natalie thought, I’ve invested some. She knew instinctively that this haunting was going to take a lot more than burning sage and lighting candles. She didn’t know the details yet. She planned on calling her mother, if she could get through, and asking her to dive into Dad’s family tree. The more information she had, the quicker she could get to the bottom of things, and the sooner she could get on with her new life.
Natalie wasn’t going to let anyone, let alone a ghost, dictate any part of it. Life was for the living, and her dead relatives weren’t going anywhere. She packed up her fear and made a decision to go to Van’s.
*
Natalie found the key where Van said it would be, unlocked the door, and went exploring. She admired the stainless steel and modern design in the kitchen and wandered back out to the living room. The walls were a light camel color that set off the black suede sofa with the chaise on the end. Two dark red leather armchairs rounded off the other end. There were bursts of red and orange in the pillows and accessories. The fireplace was gorgeous and looked to be the restored original rather than a replacement. Natalie breathed deeply. The house smelled like Van, and it made her insides flutter. She lifted her brow in amusement when she saw the game equipment hooked to the television hanging above the fireplace.
The house suited Van perfectly. Beautifully masculine, yet underscored with soft touches here and there. She ended her tour in Van’s bedroom, pausing at the dresser to look at the framed photographs. There was a young girl dressed in a softball uniform holding up a trophy for the photographer to memorialize. She looked at a virtual life collage of Van in all her sports pictures, showing how lean and athletic she had always been. Natalie was tickled to note that even as a teenager, Van had bigger muscles than her ex-husband. There was another photo of Van and her father sitting on a pier with fishing poles strung out over the water. It all looked so Norman Rockwell, she continued to smile.
Ah, here it is. She picked up the photograph of Van laughing with another woman. The love in her face radiated outward. Cara had long, dark curls and brown eyes that appeared to be filled with mischief. They had their arms around each other and they looked impossibly young and happy. Natalie felt a flash of sadness for the girls in the picture. What would that have felt like? She believed for years that she loved her husband, but she knew they’d never taken a picture like this together. Natalie gently replaced the frame and went to lie on the bed. She was unbelievably tired, and it was no wonder, as she hadn’t had any decent sleep in days.
Tonight, she would concentrate on Van. After that, or better yet, tomorrow, she would get busy on a list of things to be done and write out in detail what she could remember of her dreams. It would all wait. It had been waiting for years.
She rolled over and tried to push all the dark, racing thoughts out of her mind and just relax. Easier said than done, but in spite of the inner turmoil, she felt herself starting to float easily before she fell asleep.
*
Van pulled her truck in the driveway and laid her head back for a second. Between the scare she’d had with her father and Natalie and her crazy house, she was exhausted. In addition to that, she had meetings with three suppliers today, each of whom tried, unsuccessfully, to raise their prices. She looked at her filthy clothes. Maybe she could grab a shower before dinner. She noticed Natalie’s car on the street. In spite of how tired she was, Van wondered if she could charm Natalie into said shower with her.
Natalie opened the door before she got to the porch. Van stopped to look at her and her breath caught. Her hair was loose around her face and she was wearing a white tank top and cropped yoga pants. Unexpectedly, her throat closed with emotion. She hadn’t had anyone she wanted to come home to for a long time, and she didn’t realize until that very moment how much she had missed it.
Natalie smiled slowly with a small question in her eyes. “Hi,” she said, “I made myself at home like you said. Actually, I’ve slept most of the day.”
Van smiled. “Hey, honey, I’m home.”
Natalie opened the door wider and went out on the porch to hug Van. “How’s your father?”
“Cranky as hell, but well. I’m dirty,” Van said, pulling away from her slightly.
“Okay,” said Natalie and hugged her anyway, burying her nose in her neck. “You smell good.”
“I smell like work.”
“You smell like sunshine baking on naked skin. I love that.”
Van made a purring sound in the back of her throat and pulled her close. “Oh yeah?” She kissed Natalie’s soft neck. “You smell like…mine.”
“What an incredible thing to say. Do you have any idea what you do to me?”
“I hope it’s at least half of what you do to me.” Van looked down at Natalie’s open face, her beautiful eyes heavy with brimming tears. “I hope those are happy tears,” she said, running a finger gently under Natalie’s lower eyelashes.
“What I’m feeling is so big, I don’t know where to put it all.”
“Aw, that’s easy, honey.” Van led her into the house. “Let me show you.”
*
Van started the shower, stood in the bathroom, and stripped. Natalie felt herself flush and immediately felt the heat between her thighs. Her skin tingled in anticipation as she watched Van step under the spray.
Natalie stared at the blurred flesh-colored image through the frosted glass and swallowed. Van peeked out after a second. “Feel like getting wet?” She crooked her finger at Natalie.
Natalie hesitated for a moment then laughed. “I believe, ma’am, that I already am.”
Van grinned wickedly. “Show me. Come here.” She stood aside to give her room to get in.
Natalie quickly took off her clothes then pressed herself against Van’s wet back. When she moaned at the contact, Natalie felt the sound travel straight to her center and she shivered. There it was again, that wonderful surge of sexual power. She reached around Van to get the soap and a scrubby hanging on the wall. Natalie’s breath quickened and her nipples went taut.
The sight of Van standing spread-eagle with her perfectly sculpted arms high on the shower wall, hands flat against the tile was incredibly erotic. She was so beautiful, Natalie could only stop and appreciate her. Van turned to look over her shoulder. “What?”
“You’re perfect.”
Natalie heard Van’s quick intake of breath. “Don’t move.” She lathered the soap, and beginning at Van’s neck, she slid the foam along her skin in long strokes, finally dropping the scrubby because she didn’t want anything between them.
Natalie continued to stroke Van until she heard her strangled gasp when she reached around to caress her breasts, rolling her nipples between her fingers. Natalie moved her own naked and wet body against hers, marveling at how amazing the friction felt.
Van tried to grab her, but she was too slippery. “Uh, huh,” Natalie said. “My turn.” She wasn’t going to let
Van distract her. Until this moment, it was always Natalie on her back and on the receiving end.
Natalie got down on one knee, and then the other, keeping her eyes on Van’s. “Let me taste you.” Natalie moaned when she felt Van’s hot flesh pulsate against her lips. She’d hoped she would be good at this, and seeing and feeling Van’s reaction told her she was.
Natalie pressed more hot kisses then let her tongue explore and taste. God, she was so soft. Her hands grabbed Van’s ass to bring her even closer. When she found the rhythm that had Van moaning the loudest and squirming against her tongue and teeth, she doubled her attention and increased the tempo. She dropped one of her hands to the ache screaming between her own legs and stroked herself. Van’s thighs trembled then tightened and Natalie felt her orgasm down to her own core and she came with her, nearly blacking out in the process. Van turned off the water and slid down the wet tiles to sit next to her. Natalie folded her up in her arms and loved feeling the pulse in her neck beat erratically because she knew that she made it happen. It was an amazing feeling. She couldn’t wait to do it again. “Chinese food,” she said.
Van laughed. “We deliver.”
Natalie covered her face in kisses.
*
Later that night, Van lay awake in the dark with Natalie curled next to her, head on her shoulder. She could smell her shampoo and the love they shared. She smiled at the ceiling recalling their lovemaking. Wherever she turned, Natalie was there, wherever she wanted to go, Natalie went with it and then took her there as well. She was proving to be a little sex goddess. As if Natalie could read her thoughts, she sighed and held her tighter. Van’s heart swelled. She had thought she would never know this feeling again. Her thoughts stopped cold, and her body went from relaxed to coiled and tense. She knew this feeling. Van had been in love exactly one time before. Lust, plenty of times, but this, this feeling she knew well. She had worked hard over the years to never even get close to it. Love meant pain, excruciating pain. And loss. And yet, hadn’t the good years been worth it? For the first time in a long while, she could remember the joy that being in love brought.
