“No worries. He’s frequently reminded.” Levi’s gaze settled on the porch’s potted plants. “Although I make every effort to see that he’s not living with my father.”
“I know that.” Crooked in Levi’s arm was the letter box and an accordion folder—a Levi trademark. So taken aback by their visit, Aubrey hadn’t noticed those things either.
With his free hand, Levi pointed to the garage. “But he had that warning coming.”
“I don’t disagree. I’m just not in a position to be as hard-assed as you at the moment. Or do I need to remind you who he’s going home with?”
“No. I guess you don’t. So you saw Zeke again?” Levi looked past her head, toward the swing. “That’s what? Two . . . three visits since he’s in town?”
“Just two. Remember, we missed our first connection in Boston.”
“Right.”
“He came by to talk. Gets lonely around here with both of you gone.”
“Did all the neighbors move?” Levi jerked his head toward Diane Higley, who was pushing a mower across her lawn, and Paula Dunlap, who appeared to turn on cue, waving from her mailbox. Levi smiled stiffly, offering a brief wave back.
“It’s not like I could do more than chat about the weekly Stop & Shop specials, or even gossip about the PTA meeting. Their kids all go to public school.”
Levi nodded at this much.
“But I can have a slightly more meaningful discussion with Zeke.”
“Convenient.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing.”
Tension rose with the breeze, and Aubrey changed the subject. “Why do you have the letter box with you?”
“I wanted to take another look, point out a few things. Can we go inside?”
“Of course.” Aubrey wanted to say, “It is your house.” She didn’t. It might lead to a risky reminder that Levi no longer saw it that way. He headed in; before following, Aubrey looked at the swing. Maybe Zeke was wise to make a preemptive exit. Five years ago, Levi hadn’t been keen on that visit either. Frustrated, she sighed. Based on what was in front of her, the only comfort available seemed to be her past. Was that any more her fault than Levi’s? She made a lackluster attempt to smooth things over and called after Levi, “You know Zeke’s just an old friend.”
Inside the living room, he placed the letter box and folder on the coffee table. He studied her for a moment. “Not always the way you would have described him.”
“Like a hundred years ago.” She flailed out her arms, slapping them to her sides. “So what? Do you want to go another round about your University of Chicago journalism professor?”
“That was sex, Aubrey.”
“Why, thank you for the vivid clarification. Your point?”
“It ends my definition of the relationship I shared with her. A woman I haven’t communicated with since then.”
“Except for your annual Christmas card exchange.”
“Except for that,” he said dryly. “But can you really say old Zeke fits in the same box?”
“I don’t know, Levi. Compartmentalizing life is your ritual, not mine. On the other hand, I’m not the one who packed a bag and left. Keep that in mind.”
“That was about Pete, and you know it.” Levi stiffened his chin. “It’s also not what I came here to discuss.”
“Fine.” She took a turn around the living room. “We’ll consider all talk of Zeke Dublin officially closed. I probably won’t even see him again.”
“For some reason, I suspect other—” He huffed and stared at the hardwood floor. “Forget it.” He made calmer eye contact. “I came to talk about the research I’ve done. It proves out your father’s predictions.”
“Go on.” Admittedly, Aubrey was intrigued. “What did you learn?”
“I’ve verified the majority of his predictions, including the old lottery wins, which took some digging.” He opened the accordion folder, unpacking his notes and computer-printed news stories. “Using a sampling of old numbers, I contacted the lottery commission in several states. Most weren’t willing to go fishing for such old information, but eventually . . .”
“Let me guess. Your quest presented a ‘being social in the right situation’ moment, and you charmed them into talking.”
“It did.” He looked over the rims of his glasses. “And I was.” He flipped a few pages into a legal pad, pointing to neatly recorded rows of numbers. “The point is the sequenced numbers were lottery predictions, all of them winners.”
A hum of nonsurprise seeped from Aubrey.
“Not huge wins, but impressive nonetheless. Overall . . .” Levi shook his head at the box. “The facts and corresponding results are astonishing.”
“And something for which you’d have a dozen logical explanations, if not for your unusual insights on what’s possible.”
“Believe me, the urge to disprove the predictions wasn’t totally absent. Yet . . .” He pointed to the box. “Here we are.” They both sat with a thud on the funky orange 1950s sofa. “So that leaves us with the last lottery prediction, which doesn’t occur for a while.”
“And so we just hang around, wait? Proving what?”
“That’s an interesting question, and part of my conjecture.”
Aubrey furrowed her brow as Levi opened the box. The buzz of energy she anticipated was present but distant. Levi withdrew the paper stamped Hennessy’s Funeral Home, Surrey, Massachusetts, bearing six digits and a date. “We could watch the drawing, or we could play.”
“Do we need the money?” Aubrey glanced around the paid-for craftsman and thought of their bank account, which wasn’t lacking. If only their relationship was in half as good a condition as their finances. “We’re not exactly big spenders, Levi.”
“If it’s a win, we could donate it.”
Aubrey tipped her head at his suggestion. A charitable donation sounded fine, but it didn’t feel like the reason for the last lottery prediction or the sudden spotlight on her father’s ghost gifts. “I suppose—”
“Aubrey.”
She stopped talking.
“There’s something else. This is conjecture, but hear me out. With the gap in good predictions, I believe someone pilfered through the letter box over time, took your father’s ghost gifts.”
“And?” she said warily, positive Levi’s conjecture wasn’t complete.
“The last lottery prediction is right here in Surrey.” He paused. “So is your old boyfriend.” Levi was quiet, his mental nudge poking hard at her. “Aubrey?”
If it was possible to be silent on top of silent, that’s what she was doing. Unfortunately, it backfired, and silence translated into a loud confession.
“He knows about them, doesn’t he? Zeke Dublin knows these predictions exist.”
“Yes. Zeke knew about the predictions.” She twisted toward Levi. “He mentioned it when we had coffee the other day. He was aware of my father’s ghost gifts. But that’s it,” she said hurriedly.
“Knows.” Levi narrowed his eyes. “He knows they exist, Aubrey.” His face fell solemn, the same look as the day he announced that moving out might be best. “You’re not this naïve. Tell me it hasn’t occurred to you that Zeke is responsible for the missing predictions. Maybe more relevant, his prior knowledge is the reason for his sudden visit to Surrey. You don’t think he’s here to make another withdrawal?”
Aubrey ran a hand through her hair, running defenses through her head. “If that was true, why wouldn’t Zeke have taken the lottery prediction last time he visited Charley?”
“If you’re an accountant, and you’re skimming off the books, you don’t steal all the money at once. Not if you’re smart. You only take what you need—especially if you have access.”
“Okay, but Zeke hasn’t even been to see Charley on this trip. Not yet. She told me that herself.” Levi started to speak, and she held up a hand. “He also just sat on our porch swing, appearing very surprised about the more specific detail
s of my father’s ghost gifts.”
“Zeke appeared surprised?” Levi said. “How far would that be from acting surprised?”
Aubrey opened her mouth but didn’t offer anything more. Instead, she folded her arms and leaned hard into the sofa. She didn’t want to believe it was a remote possibility. It didn’t matter; Levi was right there with an accusation.
“Could it be that Zeke was quick enough to get up to speed on everything that’s happening with you and realize your father’s ghost gifts are suddenly a hot topic of conversation? Maybe he’s gauging the situation before making his move.”
“Levi, that’s absurd. You’re making leapfrog assumptions. I know Zeke, and he would never betray—” The kitchen door burst open, thudding hard into the wall. A month’s absence didn’t cause a moment’s hesitation. Aubrey and Levi both said, “Shut the door, Pete!”
Loud conversation and a gush of bathroom humor hijacked the house. Like any ordinary day, Pete and Dylan Higley made a rowdy entrance. The boys didn’t attend the same school, but they’d grown up across the street from each other. They’d been skateboarding buddies until Pete moved out. Dylan—a curly-haired kid with fat dimples and bright eyes—burped loud enough to rattle bric-a-brac. Pete sucked in a huge gulp of air. Looking at his parents and with his cheeks puffed wide, he expelled the air in one silent breath. Aubrey wanted to shout, “Go for it! Yes! Do something disgustingly normal in your own house!” Levi’s disapproving look said Pete made the right call.
“Hey, Pa, can we skateboard over at Greenly Field? Dylan said they put in a new ramp.” His father didn’t reply. “My spare helmet and knee pads are still in the garage.”
Levi glanced at Aubrey.
“It’s fine. Let him go.” She thought maybe a taste of what he’d missed—even if it wasn’t her—might remind Pete of the good things he’d run away from.
“Okay.” Levi looked at the ghost gifts scattered on the coffee table. “I was kind of in the middle of something with your mother. Can you wait twenty minutes? I’ll drive you over.”
“Oh, it’s cool, Mr. St John. You don’t have to take us. I skateboard over to the park now. It’s only three blocks.”
“Yes, but you have to cross Piedmont. That’s a busy road.”
“It’s not a big deal. We’ll be fine. There’s a traffic light. Besides, you know my mom.” Dylan rolled his eyes. “She’s got more rules than you.”
Aubrey stifled a laugh.
“That militant?” Levi said.
The boy produced a cell phone. “GPS with boundaries, plus I have to check in every hour. I swear, I’ve done it, like, a gazillion times.”
“Well, if it’s a gazillion times, then I guess it’s probably . . . fine?” Levi looked at Aubrey. While Levi was the strict disciplinarian, Aubrey tended to make the everyday calls.
“Hard to argue a gazillion safe trips.” But as Aubrey spoke, her nose filled with the scents of rose water and dresser drawer sachets. She tasted sugar cookies. She looked at Dylan, acutely drawn to his bright eyes. They weren’t just in front of her, but clear in a photograph in her mind. “You have your grandmother’s eyes, don’t you?”
The boy gave her a squirrelly look. “Uh . . . I don’t know.”
“She passed away not long ago, didn’t she?”
Dylan’s puckish grin faded. “Uh-huh. But, like, last Christmas or something. I remember ’cause my mom didn’t want to put a tree up.” Dylan bumped Pete’s arm. “Let’s, um . . . let’s go.”
“Hold on a second, guys,” Aubrey said.
The boys turned back, Pete looking warily at his mother. “Mom . . .”
Over the years, on occasion, the dead connected to Pete’s friends had made themselves known. Naturally, Aubrey never deemed it an appropriate conversation with a child. She’d shut down any burgeoning entities, shooed them all away. But Pete knew enough to detect his mother’s connection to a spirit. And right now, Dylan Higley’s grandmother was beating a war drum in her ear. “She was your mother’s mother, right?”
“Mom,” Pete said again, even his boyish timbre so like Levi’s.
Dylan blinked at her, considering lineage the way a twelve-year-old might. “Yeah. That’s right. She was fun. Never forgot my birthday.” He smiled. “She used to make these heart-shaped cookies on Valentine’s Day, put my name on them. Was cool when I was, like, six.”
Aubrey took a step closer, and Pete’s eyes went wider. “She . . . your grandmother passed away very suddenly. Your mother was so devastated.”
Dylan’s expression morphed from squirrelly to screwy. “She had a heart attack, I think. My mom went to see her like she always did. She found her on the bathroom floor.” It came out deadpan, the asked and answered question no adult should demand of a child.
Yet she couldn’t make it stop.
“Aubrey?” Levi said. “What are you doing?”
She shook her head, her thoughts detached from her controlled stream of consciousness. The urge to speak about Dylan’s grandmother connected like an overriding circuit.
“Uh, listen . . .” Levi looked at his watch. “I have a work call at four, so if you guys want to get any skate time in, you’d better be heading to—”
“No!” she shouted. Levi and Dylan looked startled; Pete appeared mortified. “They can’t. I mean . . .” She focused on the hardwood flooring as yet another prognostication filtered into her head. It wasn’t a simple connection, a grandmother reaching out to her grandson. It was a clear warning. “Don’t let my grandson go . . . an accident on Piedmont. It will happen . . . if he’s there, he’ll be here before his mother can say good-bye again . . .” Then it vanished, just like Paul Revere, just like Dashiell Durand’s wife.
Aubrey was perched on her knees, looking over the back of the sofa; she dug her fingers hard into the cushion. Her mouth went dry, the smell of sachets fading. “You can go, Pete,” she said tensely. “But only if your father drives you.”
All three nodded vaguely, the boys slowly backing away.
“And as long as he picks you up!” she added. “Promise me!”
Aubrey’s demand came with so much authority no one argued. Levi glanced at her and pulled a set of car keys from his pocket. “I’ll be back in about ten minutes. Sounds like we have more than a box of ghost gifts to discuss.”
As he stepped toward the back door, behind the sofa, Aubrey grabbed his arm. “Go down Chestnut Street, the back way. Don’t cross Piedmont for any reason, okay?”
Levi nodded at a route that would take twice as long. “In that case, I’ll be back in twenty.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
As the car drove away, Aubrey decided she’d had enough. Whatever this new facet of her gift was, she refused to spend years adjusting to it. She’d earned a normal life, and Aubrey was determined to be the entity in charge. She turned back to the sofa, and her line of vision caught on the letter box—a tangible marker of her father’s tormented life. “I’ll just have to be cleverer than any future predictions.” She gulped and shrugged. “How difficult could that be?”
In the quiet of her house, Aubrey sat. She flipped open the box’s lid and gazed into a past of future predictions. “Okay, fair warning, box. I’m expert at navigating ghost gifts, the spectrum of good and evil you represent.” She glanced around the silent room, which showed nothing more apparent than a coat of dust. Scents weren’t aligning either, only the faint aroma of a bayberry candle mingled with yesterday’s takeout, Thai dumplings. Regardless, she continued. “So we’re clear, I don’t spook easily. Know that.” Aubrey snatched up the lone lottery prediction. Her resolve strengthened when the paper felt warm but delivered nothing more obvious or ominous.
In fact, the sensation reminded her of her old real estate listing sheets. The same feeling had emanated off them. It translated more like a compass direction, rather than solid information connecting to any entity—the latter always occurred after she arrived at a property. Interesting, she thought; real estate listing shee
ts and the assumed lottery predictions: both involved addresses. Of course, the paper from the box didn’t belong to her, and the address, Hennessy’s Funeral Home, reflected a less-than-appealing destination. “Irrelevant,” she said to herself. “I’ll take that as no more meaningful than notepaper from Medfield Lumber or Tony’s Pizzeria.” In truth, if making a top-ten list of least-favorite psychic locations, funeral homes and morgues made the top five. Aubrey looked up; the sound of distant sirens bled through. She reached for her cell and texted Levi; voice messaging would deliver it as he drove. How’s your ride going?
The siren noise intensified and so did Aubrey’s heartbeat. After a few seconds of silence, his app generated a reply: Fine. Back Soon. She glanced once more at the open living room window and distant sound of trouble. “What was I supposed to do? Race like a lunatic over to Piedmont and direct traffic?” She widened her eyes at the word “lunatic,” the ease with which the label would apply to any such behavior.
Feeling bolder, maybe thoroughly pissed off, Aubrey pulled the letter box closer. The mosaic appearance was gone. Levi had transformed the contents into a tidier system, filing predictions by subject and date. It was like graffiti had marked the contents: Levi was here. “Thirty years of Pandora’s box, tamed in a few days by Levi St John.”
She perused the stacks of paper-clipped past predictions, the graver events Levi had verified. It was amazing, the range and accuracy. In some instances, the messages read like misfit puzzle pieces. Other tragedies were more recognizable, easier to piecemeal. Things like a deadly 1980 head-on train collision in Curinga, Italy—twenty-nine fatalities. Another forewarning told of April rivers of blood in Africa—a macabre prognostication that Levi had linked to the Rwandan genocide. Looking through the accordion folder, Aubrey found corresponding news stories validating each prediction.
Whether tragic or bountiful, Levi had finessed almost all her father’s prognostications into order. Silently, she acknowledged how he’d done the same thing with her life. It was the comforting, if not calming, effect of Levi. Whether it was this box, Aubrey’s frustration over a case on Piper’s desk, or their son—for the past dozen years of her life, Levi had been present.
Foretold (A Ghost Gifts Novel Book 2) Page 18
