Dancing Ladies

by Marilyn Gardiner

  * * *

  Wings ePress, Inc

  www.wings-press.com

  Copyright ©2007 by Marilyn Gardiner

  First published in 2007, 2007

  * * *

  NOTICE: This work is copyrighted. It is licensed only for use by the original purchaser. Making copies of this work or distributing it to any unauthorized person by any means, including without limit email, floppy disk, file transfer, paper print out, or any other method constitutes a violation of International copyright law and subjects the violator to severe fines or imprisonment.

  * * *

  Dancing Ladies

  "Let's look at this objectively.” Cass spread his hands on the table, obviously still shaken.

  Deliberately, she beat back the tears. Almost pathetically glad he hadn't been frightened off, her throat tight, she spoke flippantly. “There's an objective viewpoint? You could have fooled me."

  Full darkness wrapped around the screened porch where they sat. The moon was only a silver sliver low in the sky. Overhead a fan whirred as Cass leaned both elbows on the table and gave her his full attention. Kate had scattered lighted candles, dancing now in the backwash of the fan, and intermittent fireflies bloomed and faded across the lawn. In the distance the throaty croak of frogs hummed through the night. The peaceful scene was so rooted in tranquility and the reality of her life so different, that Kate's mind rebelled. With difficulty she dragged her mind back to what Cass was saying.

  "There's always an objective view. I'm trying real hard to find it just now. When did this all begin?"

  "The moment Max and I first entered the house. We both sensed a presence then, and I can always tell now, when I set foot inside the front door, whether or not she's here—active, I guess, is the word."

  "Let's go over it again. What happened, exactly?"

  Kate's chest rose on a big breath and she thought back. “We were barely in town from Winnetka. Max ran in ahead of me and I stopped just over the door sill. There was a feeling—an unwelcoming presence, for want of a better word—that I somehow sensed. I was, all of a sudden, spooked."

  She paused and heard the peepers down at the edge of the lake setting up their nightly chorus. A whiffle of breeze blew through the screen, ruffled the tablecloth and moved on. “This house is my home. I grew up here. There's always been a special, enveloping, feel of security. Of belonging. I love this house, and as silly as it sounds, as a child I always felt that it loved me too. These walls represent security to me. But not that morning. There was an oppressive atmosphere somehow. Almost as if something was trying to force me back out the door."

  "You felt hands? A physical pushing?"

  "More like a pressure, an invisible force preventing me from entering."

  "Did Max feel this presence?"

  "I don't think so. He just barreled on in the door and went straight back to the kitchen. But he saw something there that almost frightened him."

  "Like what?"

  "I don't know. I didn't see it. He said he thought for a minute that someone was there, but...” She shook her head.

  "And then what?"

  "He was hungry and wanted to go to McDonald's, so we started back out the front door. I looked into the mirror by the stairs to brush my hair...” she paused to compose herself and went on. “I looked into the mirror and saw her looking back.” Again Kate's eyes threatened tears. “My sister. Dead for ten years. It isn't possible, I know. Don't say it. I must be totally weirded-out."

  What They Are Saying About

  Dancing Ladies

  What They Are Saying About

  Dancing Ladies

  Marilyn Gardiner has written a spellbinding story, guaranteed to keep you turning pages to see what happens next. Prepare to stay up late with this one. And don't read it during an intense rainstorm or in a house that creaks at night."

  —J D Webb

  Shepherd's Pie

  Dancing Ladies is an intriguing story of a mother's love and her struggle to make a new and better life for herself and her son. Fresh and vivid descriptions and an emerging romance makes an enjoyable contrast of normalcy to the bizarre undercurrents of Kate's life.

  —Heather Garside

  Wings e-Press Author

  The Cornstalk

  A Hidden Legacy

  This paranormal has just the right amount of romance to keep it grounded. The story has that extra something special, and who doesn't love a heroine that is both talented and strong? I looked forward through the tightly woven plot to the last satisfying page. I give Dancing Ladies Four and a Half Beacons.

  —Lighthouse Literary Review

  Other Works From The Pen Of

  Marilyn Gardiner

  Flight Of Angels

  Who is she? Whose child is she carrying? Two worlds collide when long-dead Olivia Avenlyng freely inhabits Beth's body and Beth is pulled back in time to relive Olivia's terror.

  My Pretty Lady

  When Ellen meets her true soul mate and they wrestle with the integrity of an impossible situation, she fears she will have to choose between one of her daughters and Drew.

  Like A River My Love

  Floating down the Ohio River in 1778 with George Rogers Clark's small army, Verity endures all the dangers of wilderness travel. Dare she trust her heart to Trey, the freedon-loving company scout?

  Keeper of The Singing Bones

  Mac has Rastafari friends and Juliet wouldn't trust him with a weather forecast. A stone statue, deep in an underground cave, points to the surprising answer—and love.

  When The Wind Blows

  A mother's worst nightmare! When six-year-old Gilly disappears, Molly sets out to find him herself. Is it possible to fall in love with the detective under such terrifying circumstances?

  A Trivial Pursuit

  Talk about lop-sided pursuits! Jeremy is committed to non-committed relationships and Lauren will settle for nothing less than all the bells and whistles, romance and vows.

  Wings

  Dancing Ladies

  by

  Marilyn Gardiner

  A Wings ePress, Inc.

  Paranormal Romance Novel

  Wings ePress, Inc.

  Edited by: Lorraine Stephens

  Copy Edited by: Sara V. Olds

  Senior Editor: Elizabeth Struble

  Managing Editor: Leslie Hodges

  Executive Editor: Lorraine Stephens

  Cover Artist: Barbi Durbin

  All rights reserved

  Names, characters and incidents depicted in this book are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Wings ePress Books

  www.wings-press.com

  Copyright © 2007 by Marilyn Gardiner

  ISBN 978-1-59705-215-9

  Published In the United States Of America

  March 2007

  Wings ePress Inc.

  403 Wallace Court

  Richmond, KY 40475

  Dedication

  For Fran Priddy,

  friend, critique partner and orchid consultant,

  and

  Lorraine Stephens,

  editor and friend,

  without whom none of it would have happened.

  Acknowledgement

  My grateful appreciation to Hausermann Orchids in Villa Park, IL for their generous help in researching the orchids mentioned in this book,
Fran Priddy, prolific orchid grower, and Tom Gephart, representing the Springfield IL Orchid Club. My profound thanks.

  One

  Dark Secret

  Dark purple blossoms with one even deeper purple lip blossom and a hint of yellow in throat. Brassolaeliocattleya Mericlone.

  Kate had never met a ghost. If asked, she'd have rolled her eyes and said that, in her opinion, anyone actually believing in ghosts must have been smoking funny cigarettes. So, as she walked up the front walk of the family home with her young son, she was totally unprepared.

  She clutched a suitcase in one hand, an overnight bag and Max's clown pillow in the other. Her eyes were gritty from lack of sleep, she was fighting a losing battle with patience and she was half numb with fatigue.

  If she'd known what the drive would be like, she wasn't sure she'd have bundled her orchids and her silks and her son into the rusted out old van and headed south. Not that night anyway.

  But the fact was, she hadn't known. She'd only thought, gratefully, tiredly, that she had been, at last, going home. From Winettka to Winsom. Home.

  The past few hours had been a nightmare. After being strapped in a seatbelt for five hours, Max, who was usually full of bubbles and enthusiasm, got tired and cross. He was sleepy and wriggly, and Kate's nerves were frayed at the edges. She had struggled to keep a grip. Home had never looked so good.

  In the bright light of morning, the sky to the east was a harsh, violent blue-black. A vivid reminder of the storm she had driven through overnight. Sheets of driving rain and wind were pummeling Indiana by now. Her arms still ached from hanging onto the wheel and battling the wind, which had seemed determined to wipe her off the road.

  But now, she was here. For Kate, home amounted to finding refuge. Sanctuary. Shelter when she most needed it. In any case, she was grateful. From the front it was apparent that while the house was old, it had been well kept. A dull, deep green, with pale rose shutters, the house was a true Painted Lady spreading her dusty skirts in the heat of summer. On the right a half-circle appendage reached from the ground to a turret tower surrounding the circular staircase inside. The beautiful six-foot windows in every room made the two-story house light and airy.

  But now ... She frowned. For some reason those giant windows seemed to loom over her like—involuntarily she shivered—like dark eyes, eerie and ominous. What? They were lovely windows, covered with sheer white curtains. Ominous? Where had that come from? Obviously she'd been on the road too long.

  Shuddering again, she stepped up onto the porch. It was a wide curving verandah trimmed in intricate gingerbread woodwork and wrapped around both sides, meeting at a huge screened porch in the rear. After their two-bedroom apartment, she and Max would rattle around the ten-room house like marbles in a glass jar.

  "Mom! Come on.” Max was tired too. And hungry, likely.

  Kate shifted her bags and dug with one hand through her purse while Max waited expectantly at the door. “I'm hurrying. I'm hurrying,” she said as she fingered the key and headed across the wide verandah. Max held the storm door open with his flat little bottom while she fumbled at the lock. With a groan, the heavy door swung open and Max shot in, stumbling slightly over the door jam. Kate followed more slowly. The door closed behind her with an audible thunk.

  The shades had all been drawn and the rooms lay in shadowed darkness. From a fat round newel post, the polished oak staircase rose to her right, with an octagonal, rose-colored stained glass window spilling a mauve flow of light over the landing.

  "I can't wait to slide down the staircase, again!” Max exclaimed and then shot straight ahead to the kitchen.

  A knife of pain sliced through her. She was amazed that a ten-year-old wound could still cut so deep. She should have known the first thing Max would want to do was slide down the broad railing of the old-fashioned, curved staircase. We polished that banister to a perfect high sheen with our small bottoms, shooting down it in tandem, shrieking in delight, launching off onto the carpet at the bottom.

  Kate felt suddenly, inexplicably, odd. The house looked the same. The staircase to the right, the kitchen ahead, and to her left was the living room, a huge parlor and a dining room. But dust motes hung suspended in the heavy air, the silence was oppressive, and the house was shrouded in gloom.

  She felt almost as if she were breaking and entering someone else's home. In her stomach, a curl of something unpleasant unfurled. She stood, arms full, and fought the instinct to back out the door she had just entered.

  In spite of the heat outdoors, she was chilly. Gooseflesh raised on her arms. She frowned. There was the weird feeling that someone was breathing down the back of her neck. But that would be ridiculous. She resisted the urge to look over her shoulder. No one was there. The room was empty, but for her.

  Somehow the house didn't feel welcoming as it always had. She'd grown used to security enveloping her like a well-worn robe when she entered. Not today. For some strange reason, she felt ... She felt spooked.

  She narrowed her eyes against the shadows. An icy curl of air snaked around her legs and her stomach suddenly went weightless. The hair at the nape of her neck stiffened. A strange pressure seemed to bear down on her, as if the house was actually trying to force her back out the door. A cold quiver ran the length of her body.

  Kate forced a deep breath into her lungs and blinked her eyes. The house had stood empty too long. That was it. And Mother wasn't there to greet her. No reason to drape weird thoughts around an empty house. A house was a house. Wood and nails, plaster and paint. That's all. Get a grip, girl, she thought, this is the house you grew up in. She dumped her bags at the foot of the stairs, hung her purse by the strap over the newel post and followed Max to the kitchen.

  He was standing in front of the pantry door. His thin, little-boy arms stuck out of his rumpled Cardinals T-shirt and his hair was smashed to his head on the right, from laying on his clown pillow in the car. He stood stock still, staring at the wide pantry door. His eyes were wide and peering fixedly at one spot. His face was pale.

  "Max?"

  He didn't seem to hear. She had to raise her voice and repeat his name before he responded.

  "Max! What is it?"

  He blinked, and then he laughed, a trembly effort. “I thought there was somebody here. For a minute I saw this—this thing, and then it was gone."

  "Who? Where did you see—?"

  But Max was thinking of food now, his surprise gone. He jerked a nod toward the pantry door. “I'm hungry. Can we go to Macadoodles and get an egg and muffin like you said?"

  "But who was it? Max talk to me."

  "Nobody. There's nobody. Can we get breakfast now?” He turned.

  Reluctantly, she let it drop. Maybe in the shadows he imagined a figure. Whatever it was, it was no longer there. Apparently, the trip had been hard on them both.

  For the umpteenth time, Kate hoped moving to Winsom was the right thing. Not that she had a lot of choices, but leaving the big city for a small rural town was a huge upheaval for both her and Max. For Kate the homecoming was more a fact of finding refuge than anything else.

  When two years ago Huey had left her with a busy five year old who liked to eat and needed a roof over his head, he also left a pile of bills that he had no intention of paying and a pile of junk he optimistically called a van. And that was pretty much it. Oh, he'd said there was work in Austin and he'd send for her, but Kate knew it was over when he walked out the door.

  She had yet to shed a tear.

  The last blow was two weeks ago. The ax was quick and razor sharp. Huey called. He wanted Max.

  In a falsely confident voice she'd promised him they'd both be making snow angels in hell first, but the threat remained. Huey's parental instincts had kicked in, and belatedly he'd remembered he had a son. She couldn't allow custody to go to Huey. On the best of all best days, Huey was not good father material. No. Unthinkable.

  Kate went to the deep bay kitchen window and pulled the draperies open.
There wasn't a great deal of lawn in the front, but now as the sunshine poured in she could see the wide expanse of backyard that would need to be mowed. Her back prickled and she glanced over her shoulder. Nothing was there.

  She shrugged. In the sudden glare of early morning, being frightened seemed utterly ridiculous. The day was just like any other day. Both she and Max felt a bit strange having been transplanted half way down the state, going from an apartment to a large house, driving all night and entering the house for the first time alone after her mother's funeral. Some reaction was surely to be expected.

  Kate started after Max, then slowly crossed to the pantry door. She put out a hand, hesitated and let it drop, started to walk on, then stopped. What had Max seen? She couldn't leave without checking it out, at least. Her hand lay for a moment on the brass handle, shaking only slightly, before she clenched her jaw, held her breath and flung the door open.

  Nothing. She sagged in relief.

  A vague scent hung heavy in the room. Familiar. Overbearingly sweet. Flowers. Although none were in evidence, there must be a bag of dried rose petals in a cranny somewhere, gathered from the rose beds out back and left over from last summer. The smell grew stronger and then abruptly faded away until it was gone.

  In front of her stood shelves of canned goods, rows and rows of brilliant jars of her mother's homemade jellies, over-sized cookers, stewing pots and a stack of salad molds. Pots and pans. Cleaning supplies. She laughed a bit shakily at her own fears. What had she been expecting? A hovering figure in flowing robes threatening them both? A ghost? A knife, maybe floating in the air, dripping blood? This was Winsom. This was her mother's kitchen, for heaven's sake.

  Of course there was nothing there. Still...

  "I'm hungry,” Max said, again. “Let's go!” His appetite, and impatience, was rising. “You said we were going to eat."

  "Right. Let's go find the local Golden Arches and get some breakfast. We can unload the van when we get back.” Reluctant, yet relieved, she let the matter drop.