Escape from Heartland: A Contemporary Paranormal Romance, Ghost Story: A Heartland Cove County Romance

by Jacquie Gee

  “It was Collette Van Bommel,” I say in a breath that comes out in a horrible rush.

  “Collette Van Bommel, eh?” Dad chews on that a second. “What does she want with me?”

  “She wants you to repair the shingles on the old bridge. Seems she’s getting married on it.” I roll my eyes.

  “Ah, I see.” Dad flips his chin.

  “She thinks it’s going to affect things if they’re left the way they are.”

  “The shingles?” Dad almost laughs.

  “Yeah. Ridiculous, right?”

  “Nothing ridiculous about it if it pays me money.” He returns to grub wrangling. “Though I am surprised she wasn’t in here trying to get something out of you, considering.” Dad’s eyes peer at me through the corners.

  “Oh, she put her order in for one of those, too, don’t you worry.”

  “She did!” His voice is bright.

  “Yeah.” I drag a sad finger over the stairwell wall, not wanting to look at him.

  “Why so glum?” Dad’s hopeful look fades.

  I sigh. "Collette wants one of my dresses to drown herself in."

  “She what?”

  “It’s all the rage these days.” I look off over his head. “Brides buy one dress to be married in, and another just to destroy.”

  “Destroy?” Dad’s fists grip at his sides. “Why would anybody wanna do that?”

  “To take photos of themselves re-enacting famous scenes from romantic movies." I frown. "It's called Trash the Dress. It's the latest fad. Rich brides put on a dress and get their picture taken underwater in it, or washing up on a beach while kissing their new husband, that sort of deal."

  “And this is popular?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “I know, but that’s what they’re doing, and that’s what she wants from me. She already has a serious dress.” I tap the wall, frustrated.

  “Well, just tell her she can’t have one.” He snaps the lid down a grub can.

  “Some girls spend up to five thousand on their trash gowns.”

  Dad’s gaze jerks around. “You’re serious?”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  Dad scowls. “Well, that’s a horse of a different color, isn’t it?” He chews the side of his mouth.

  “Yep.” I sigh, drumming the wallpaper. “I suppose it’s money, isn’t it, Dad?” I look to him for approval.

  He looks down at the grubs. “I don’t care if it’s money or not. She’s not gonna do that to one of your gowns.” He snaps the next cap down extra loud.

  “She did offer to pay me a pretty penny,” I lie. We never discussed price, but I want to see what he says. Besides, Money Bags Van Bommel’s good for it.

  “How much?” Dad’s gaze slides onto me.

  “Upwards of a thousand,” I say, wondering if I’ve hit the amount of the overdue electric bill yet. I can tell I have by the flash of his eyes.

  "Really?" he says. Dad's lips crumple. The look in his eyes is truly conflicted.

  “Don’t worry, I’m not gonna let her have one of the good ones,” I blurt, drawing slow circles over the wall.

  “Good idea,” he says.

  “I’ve decided I’m gonna sell her one of the grunge gowns—”

  "But I thought you loved those the most." He looks at me, perplexed. “I thought you said the girls were all wearing those with work boots up there in the big city?”

  “They are—”

  “Well then?” His brows arch.

  “I mean, I thought they were, but I was wrong." I lower my gaze. I'm lying again, and I don't want to look at him while I do it. He'll know for sure. Especially when it comes to my dresses. Dad's always able to tell when I'm lying. "Turns out, they’re not as popular as I thought. I spent a lot of work on them for nothing."

  He frowns.

  I almost have to bite my tongue after I say it. I swallow down my emotions. Grunge dresses are all the rage in NYC. Almost as much the rage as Trash The Dress. In fact, my grunge dresses are among some of my very favorites, but they’ll likely bring the most money, too. I have a couple I don’t think I’ll sell. But there might be two I can part with. I’ve resolved to show her them. “We could use the money, can’t we?” I look up at Dad.

  There's a pull between us. A familiar longing like my heart's become an over-bloated sponge. Whenever we talk about money, it's the same feeling. It's been awful since Mom died. She was Dad's rock.

  Mom earned money sporadically in her position, but when she did, it was always big money.

  Dad held his own, back when business was good. But it hasn’t been good for at least a decade. Back when people came to Heartland Cove, they stayed and fished and filled up the cabins for rent along the water’s edge, down by the bay. The bait store was a popular place. It used to be booming. Well, for at least four months out of the year. Still, what he earned in those months was enough to take us through the lean ones. It’s the way of life down here. And it used to be a good one.

  Even Collins Cabins used to have a waiting list, in summer. Now, they’re just a bunch of abandoned ramshackle shacks dotting the shores of the bay that Harland Collins, their owner, is lucky to fill a few weeks a year.

  The world has certainly changed here in Heartland since the infamous road expansion.

  Travelers are diverted right around Heartland Cove now. The old hand-painted wood sightseeing signs, out by the old highway, are all faded and grown over.

  Hardly anyone can see them, and next to no traffic passes them by anyway.

  Thanks to the new super highway, the tourists all head to beaches on the other side of New Brunswick—the commercial side, where they pay twice as much money to have the same kind of fun.

  Too bad they don’t realize it.

  Too bad there isn’t a way for us to let them know.

  Still, Dad presses on, ever the soldier, hoping things will get better.

  They’ll get tired of all that, you wait and see, he tips his hat and smiles, on good days. It's like if he just nods firmly enough, his wish will come true.

  “Well, it’s up to you, I suppose," Dad says, returning my thoughts to the dresses. "Whatever you think. You're the expert." He inclines his head and returns to the job of canning grubs.

  I move off the stairs and around the counter, touching the small stack of bills on Dad’s desk as I pass.

  He sees me. I know it. I feel his eyes on my back.

  I turn around quick and catch him looking away.

  My hand rests on the electricity bill he’s yet to open. But I know last month’s was over seven hundred dollars and change. I pick it up and turn my back, spying the overdue stamp on the inside, through the tiny cellophane window.

  Three months. Dad owes three months’ electricity on the shop. That’s an outrageous sum. It must be over fifteen hundred dollars by now. I glance back over my shoulder at him.

  He catches me, and I drop the bill. A small glimmer of shame glints in his eyes. "I'm gonna get to that," he says.

  “I know you will,” I whisper, and head out of the room, hesitating again in the doorway to the stairs.

  If I could just get to New York and make some money to send back to him. I draw in a ragged breath.

  But if I left, who’d help him here while I was gone? I look around. I can’t abandon him.

  I think briefly about the Project Catwalk contest, and my palms begin to sweat. I should find out if I’ve made the cut any day now. What’ll I do if I win? I look back at my dad, clamping on the last lids on the grub cans.

  He picks up the cylinders, balancing far too many, and heads toward the front door. Balancing on one foot, he springs the handle with an elbow, then flips the screen door back with a toe, dropping a canister or two in the process.

  I turn to help him.

  “No. I’ve got this,” he says, a fierceness in his voice. Dad’s never fierce, but I back off anyway. He stoops, collects the runaway cans, drops a few more, and does it again. Ou
r eyes meet as I scoop up the last of the rogue bait cans and stuff them into the crooks of his arms.

  “Thanks,” he says.

  “No problem.”

  The beaten look in his eyes makes a prickly knot clench in my stomach.

  "When you're done with Collette, you can send her up," I say, desperate to end the tension of our silent conversation.

  “Sure.” He jerks his chin up toward my attic sewing room.

  I return to the stairs, grasping the sides of the doorjamb and, in a quick lean-in-and-out motion, fling myself up the stairs, as Dad presses out the front door.

  “Sell her the yellow one,” he hollers back in.

  “What?”

  “The yellow one. For twice the price.” He glances at me, smirking. “You know, the one I think looks like a big banana.”

  I grin.

  It’s our little inside joke.

  The big banana dress is the first dress I ever made. I couldn't afford to buy real wedding silk, so I bought a cheap imitation. I did the same with the tulle and the beads. I bought crafts grade instead of good quality seamstress material. I didn't know any better at the time.

  When I finished the piece, Dad was so proud he asked Vera and Bert Williams down at the General Mercantile if they’d show it off in the window. They agreed, and for a couple of months, the dress looked pretty good—until the sun got to it and the cheap materials I used turned yellow.

  My dress went from being amazingly cool to being the laughing stock of the Cove in just a few weeks.

  I yanked it out of the window, embarrassed, and raced home with it all rumpled up in my arms. I was going to burn the thing when Dad caught me out back making a fire in the barrel and rescued the dress.

  “You never know when someone’s gonna come ’round looking for a banana yellow dress,” he’d said, which made me laugh, and sort of cry, and then I got the hiccups.

  He’s called that dress the big banana dress ever since.

  "You can't be serious." I flash my eyes. "You'd let me part with that?"

  "I don't see why not if the price is right." He laughs. A playful smirk jags across his lips. "Just make sure the price is right. Don’t let her get off without paying you. She can afford to pay. Besides, I think it’d do a lot for Collette’s naturally sallow complexion, don’t you?”

  I spit out a laugh. “Dad!”

  “Well?”

  “You mean her naturally sallow disposition,” I add.

  “That too.” Dad’s smirk gets bigger.

  “Banana yellow dress it is, then.” I turn, with a nod of my head, and bounce up the stairs, two at a time.

  The prickly knot that was growing in my stomach has completely unraveled.

  Dad always knows exactly what to say.

  Chapter 10

  Jayden

  "I know it looks rough around the edges, but it has good bones, and I'm told the foundation is solid as a rock.” Anna prattles on about the condition of Caldwell Manor as we scale the sloped front yard toward the infamous porch, but to be honest, I’m not listening to much of what she’s saying. I can't seem to get my mind off Jules. I mean seriously, it's crazy, I just met the girl, but for some strange reason, she's gotten under my skin like an ornery sliver.

  I need to dig her out and forget about her. She clearly wasn't interested. Besides, I've got work to do. I haven't traveled all this way for nothing, after all. I need to focus on what I need to focus on—the house, and nothing more.

  Well, that and the answers I came for.

  I look down at the earth beneath my feet. Dry as a freakin’ bone. The storm has cleared, the skies are blue, and the wind has died down. It’s like nothing ever happened here. Like there was never a storm. I dig a toe into the earth closer to the porch. Somewhat soft, but not mucky like before.

  “I’m told the gables are still good, though admittedly, some do look rotted." Anna reaches out, jabbing a finger right through one of the porch spindles, and cringes. "With a residence of this age, you really can't expect perfection. You know what they say in the business, trade a little elbow grease for a lot of old-world charm.” She grins.

  Great slogan.

  “And this place is just exploding with it. Old-world charm that is, not elbow grease.” She chuckles. “Check out that beautiful fretwork, for example.” She raises a hand to the best of all the broken pieces. “You don’t see that anymore.”

  I wince, looking up. “No.”

  Her spiked high heels begin to sink into the sandy loam, and she quickly relocates herself up onto the steps of the porch. "I do know the porch posts were replaced by the previous owner," she leans on one to prove it's solid, "and they reported only a small amount of wood rot on the rest of the deck." She grins, showing me a teensy specimen with her fingers.

  This is supposed to be important to me, in the great scheme of things. Standing here looking at this nearly-falling-into-the-sea relic.

  I tilt my head until the house comes into proper balanced view. I’ll have to address that lean first.

  “Are you even listening?” Anna scrunches up her face.

  Huh? What? “Oh. Yeah. Of course,” I say, cranking my head around. I meet her scowling gaze with the warmest smile I can muster, and focus hard on her eyes, trying to personify total and utter attentiveness—even though total inattentiveness is a better description of what I’ve been up to. “You were saying something about gables?” I smile.

  Anna's expression morphs into sour. Her hands find her hips. "You haven't heard a word I've said since then, have you?"

  “What?” She’s been talking?

  She studies me skeptically, her look digging under my skin. “I mentioned the gables about ten minutes back.”

  “Oh.” I gulp, feeling my cheeks turn red.

  “Doesn’t matter.” She turns around, scaling the steps. “You’ll see it all when we go inside.” She tosses me a cheesy realtor grin and reaches for the door handle. “Here she is! A beacon of the community since 1859.” She stops before opening the door, instead unfurling a graceful arm across the threshold like she’s showing off General Motors’ latest sport’s car.

  At least she’s done her homework. Somewhat.

  I read 1843, but I’m not about to correct her. Especially after ignoring the rest of her realtor spiel for the last ten minutes. I gaze at my watch. Gawd, it might have even been fifteen.

  “The original owner built this beauty by hand as a wedding gift for his lover. Though, truth be known, they lived in a tent in the yard for half a year after, before he was able to complete the project enough for them to inhabit it."

  My gaze drifts off the house and over to the barnboard-sided garage, the old shack that stands just off of the drive, on the ridge overlooking the water, not far from where Jules and I parked before. I can’t take my eyes off the padlock on its door. It’s overly huge and rusted. There are three more, smaller ones, hanging on a series of rusty chains all wound around the first. Two black and another silver. The whole thing looks like it should be attached to the gate of a forbidden graveyard or something. Definitely, overkill.

  “Is there a reason why that building is sealed up like Fort Knox?” I point toward it.

  Anna’s gaze widens. She looks unnerved. “No reason,” she snaps, altogether too quickly. I notice she’s twisting her hands. Her smile has dimmed, her eyes are darting, never fixing on the building for longer than a second.

  “How’s about we go look through the main building first.” Her voice becomes light and unnaturally sparkly, and her eyelashes flutter furiously.

  There’s definitely something going on here.

  “Right this way.” She reaches for the door.

  I hesitate, looking back over my shoulder, obsessed with the fact that the grounds are so dry. I keep looking for where all the water’s gone. It has to be here somewhere. It was monsooning all over the place just moments back. I look up at the sky bewildered.

  “As I said before, it’s a bit of a fixer-upper�
��” She starts making excuses before we’re even through the door. She stuffs the key in the lock of the old wooden door, and the beauty creaks open before she has the chance to turn the key. Anna stares at the key in her hand, as the door shuttles back.

  Ah, there it is. The house I remember.

  Anna’s next words come out dry and choked. “I’m told the last owners put in a new dishwasher.”

  "Did they?" I raise a brow, pushing past her. "What a bonus." The interior is abnormally dark and Anna's step abnormally tentative. She scans her surroundings as she creeps along behind me, regularly checking the ceiling as if she's been instructed to do so. "The house comes fully furnished." Anna proceeds with caution.

  I tune out her chatter almost immediately and go about the business of checking out the place. I already know it's haunted. What I want to know is by whom?

  Legend says it’s by Edgar Locklear. But I need to make sure. In all the visions I’ve had, he's never said his name, but I'll know him when I see him.

  It’s cold and dark in the front entryway, but not half as cold and dark as it was about a half hour ago. In fact, this dark shadowy interior almost looks inviting compared to previously. I’m sure the raging storm didn’t help.

  Slivers of sunlight stream in through long ribbon-like windows. Arched gothic muntins mark their tops. A series of six grace the front of the house, with another six gracing each side of it. Two length-wise, stained-glass, cameo-style windows peer out from twin gables along the roofline, like two solemn eyes.

  Architecture's my thing. Always has been. I've been obsessed since I was a little kid. I almost majored in it in college. Probably should have. It likely would be a lot more lucrative than what I do—when of course, I’m not passing myself off as junior ghost wrangler.

  And a lot sexier with the ladies, too. Women aren’t exactly turned on by the men whose job it is to expose the world as a corrupt hellhole in the papers.

  But what can I say, a calling is a calling, right?

  I gulp, feeling the temperature in the room drop.