by Angie Fox
My dear, deceased grandmother would be proud of my grace and poise, especially since I was seated directly across from Beau.
Ellis took the chair next to me, glowering at his brother the whole time, while Virginia retreated to the exit near the kitchen, conversing with the busboys, the waiters, pretty much anybody she could order around, while sending our table death stares every so often.
I got it. She was in survival mode. For once, I knew how she felt. We were both stuck in this ridiculous revenge plot of Beau’s.
Even then, I wasn’t quite prepared to contain my surprise when a tall blonde slipped into the seat next to my ex.
“Hi, hot stuff,” she said, planting a sweet kiss on Beau’s cheek.
It was the woman I’d seen arguing in the alleyway back in Kingstree.
She’d drawn her long hair into a polished twist and wore dangling pearl earrings with a lavender silk dress that hugged every curve yet still managed to appear both classy and expensive. It also exposed her sleek back and pooled at her sides, making it clear she wasn’t wearing a bra.
She was as strong as I remembered her, with a rigid bearing and a steely gaze. You’d think Virginia would have liked that a little bit. Unless she was competition.
Beau gave a self-effacing chuckle, clearly taken with the attention from his new flame. “Stephanie, meet my blue-collar brother, Ellis,” he said, with a wry twist to his mouth, as if it were funny that Ellis had chosen a career in law enforcement over a guaranteed job in the family legal practice.
“It’s a wonder they allow me at the table,” Ellis lightly quipped, shaking her hand.
“It’s a wonder she doesn’t fall out of that dress,” Virginia drawled, commanding a seat at the head of the table. She shook out her napkin. “Although Beau does have a point, dear Ellis. An old distillery is nice, but you could be investing in more upscale enterprises like this one.”
Even his success would never be enough for her.
“I’m happy with my life and Southern Spirits,” Ellis said, as if her dig hadn’t bothered him in the slightest. But I knew him, and I saw she’d hit pay dirt.
I had to give it to my boyfriend that he could be cordial at a moment like that. Ellis didn’t fight the flood. He just stood strong while the muddy water rushed past him.
He’d been knee-deep in this battle ever since he’d decided to follow his gut rather than be told how to live his life. I admired him for it, but it was sad that his own flesh and blood never would.
“Not everyone can be a titan of industry,” Stephanie concluded, running a hand along Beau’s arm.
“Not everyone has it in them to fight for what truly matters,” I mused, looking her dead in the eye. “I like a man who is willing to stand up for the little guy.”
Ellis gave a small smile. “Stephanie, this is Verity.”
They’d obviously met before. Without me. That was all right. I knew I wasn’t exactly invited to Sunday dinner.
The blonde across the table flashed a quick, shallow grin. “I know exactly who she is,” she said, with a bit too much relish, as if she’d sized up the competition and found me lacking. Well, if she saw me as competition, at least I had more material on my dress, and all of my underwear, too.
Just then, the man from the alleyway passed by our table. I’d recognize him anywhere. For one thing, he was built like a college quarterback. For another, I’d paid special attention to his sturdy jaw and wiseguy features because I’d fully expected to have to describe them to the police.
What was he doing on the train?
He caught eyes with Stephanie, and I wasn’t the only one who noticed. “Do you know that guy?” Beau asked. “I saw him watching you on the platform, too.”
“I’ve never seen him before in my life,” Stephanie remarked, so smooth and innocent that it sounded like the truth.
“He spoke to you ten minutes ago at the bar,” Virginia corrected Stephanie. I had to give her credit. She didn’t miss a thing. And she never hesitated to act. “You seemed quite agitated by him.”
Stephanie blinked, wide-eyed. “He was hitting on me. I told him to stop.”
Virginia gave her a long look. “You don’t have to give us the whole story, dear,” she remarked, shooting a warning glance at her youngest son. “Every woman has her secrets.”
Beau tried to smile and failed as an awkward silence settled over the table.
Stephanie smoothed her hair. “It honestly isn’t my fault if men are attracted to me,” she said, looking to me of all people for support.
It wasn’t that I was in favor of awkward silences, or conniving girlfriends, or whatever Stephanie was trying to pull. But all I could think about at that moment was that this could very easily be my life.
Here I sat, watching Virginia snipe at Beau and Stephanie, trying to hold my tongue, and failing, as she and Beau tore Ellis down for the terrible crime of being a good, solid person. Then there was Stephanie, who waged a battle for supremacy that she’d have to fight all by herself, because I wasn’t about to join in. And if she truly was “the one” for Beau, she’d be with us for some years to come.
I was frankly done with all of it and we hadn’t even gotten the bread yet.
It wasn’t as if Ellis would alter the direction of his life due to continued criticism. It wasn’t like Stephanie would suddenly confess and tell us all about that guy from the alley. We weren’t going to change the world here. We just needed to get through dinner.
So I counted on the trick that my grandma had taught me, one that her mother had taught her. I changed the subject. “This is a great train.”
Stephanie shot me an indulgent smile. “Don’t you just love what Beau has done with the Sugarland Express? He’s so creative.”
Virginia pursed her lips, and I had a feeling I knew who was behind the success of the enterprise, but I wasn’t going to be the one to say it.
Beau wasn’t either. “What can I say? I’m a perfectionist.”
Ellis laughed despite himself, which seemed to annoy Beau and placate his mother.
To my great relief, the bread arrived.
One course down. Maybe I could skip dessert.
“The Sugarland Express is wonderful, from what I’ve seen,” I said, reaching for the breadbasket. “And it was fun to have appetizers at a historic train station before boarding.”
“You ate at the Last Stop Grill?” Stephanie asked, as if I’d told her we’d picnicked in the truck bed—which we had from time to time. “I hear that place is a run-down allergy trap. I’d never set foot in it,” she said, eschewing Beau’s offer of bread and Ellis’s choice of dining.
I’d tried to be reasonable. I’d tried to change the subject. But I was not going to sit here and take that. “You didn’t seem put off by any of that when I saw you walk into the Last Stop this evening,” I said, buttering my slice. I couldn’t help it. She’d gotten my goat.
Her eyes widened. “I did not,” she said quickly, but I could tell I’d hit my mark.
“Verity is terrible at keeping secrets,” Virginia said conversationally, with an edge of steel, “but she’s almost always right.” She glanced back at the man from the alleyway, as if sensing there was more to the story. “Your friend from the bar is traveling alone, which is strange for a man his age. I wonder what he’s even doing on this train,” she said, eyeing Stephanie.
Beau’s girlfriend sipped her wine.
“I’m just glad I decided to come,” Beau said, lifting a glass. “The train is magnificent. It’ll bring tourism dollars to Sugarland and put us on the map again.”
I’d toast to the last half of that. But as I lifted my glass, I felt a distinct chill in the air.
Not two seconds later, Frankie rose straight out of the table in front of me, his hat askew so that I was looking straight at the bullet hole in his forehead.
“We need to talk,” he stated, as if I didn’t have other things to do at the moment.
I reached around him to clink my
glass with Beau’s.
“Real nice,” the mobster said, as if I were ignoring him instead of merely working around him. “Look, I don’t know if it’s a chick thing or what, but Molly met a ghost that looks a lot like you, and now she’s worried about her.”
I pasted on a smile as Ellis made his own toast to our town’s rich history. I was in the middle of dinner. Surely Frankie could see that.
“Wait, sweetie,” the gangster said to the empty space by the breadbasket. “Don’t talk yet. I gotta give Verity a dose of energy.”
He wouldn’t dare. I didn’t ask for it. I didn’t need it. In fact, I’d expressly asked him to take it back shortly before boarding.
I braced for it anyway.
A blaze of power hit me square between the eyes, and I stifled a gasp as it raced with hot, needlelike fury over my skin. Jerk! I ground my teeth and tried to keep my serene dinner smile in place as the otherworldly energy settled deep down into my very core.
“I’m sorry,” Molly said, surveying the table as she shimmered into view over the breadbasket. “I really wish it could wait.” She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “But there’s a cute blonde ghost who reminds me a lot of you. Sweet, Southern. She even has a pet squirrel.”
I could not talk about this now. I tried to say it with my eyes as I raised a glass and pretended I’d heard Ellis’s toast.
“Anyhow,” Molly continued, as if I were somehow free to have this conversation, “she was at peace, haunting her ancestral home, when she was drawn back here—right to her death spot!”
I kept my face carefully neutral and gave up trying to clink glasses.
The conductor had warned me about more ghosts returning. I’d hoped he would be wrong.
“So this girl came back,” Frankie said, the unlikely voice of reason. “Maybe she wanted to haunt someplace new.”
“She never wanted to see this train again,” Molly said. “She was murdered in compartment 9.”
I gulped my wine.
Stephanie gave me an odd look. Beau chuckled. I put the glass down.
Molly leveled her gaze at me. “On the first night of the journey, the original train was stopped due to snow on the tracks. It was like an avalanche. In the confusion, her killer struck. What if he’s on the train now? What if he does it again tonight? It’s a bad idea to take the same route as the original train. She’ll have to go through it all again.”
My word. That would be awful.
I remembered Ellis saying we’d travel on historic tracks, but certainly not on the exact same itinerary.
“Excuse me,” I said, clearing my throat, directing my question to Virginia. “Are we traveling the same route as the original Sugarland Express, the one that went off the bridge?”
Molly cringed at the mention of the crash.
Virginia merely nodded and let the waiter place a salad plate in front of her. “Why yes. We felt historical accuracy was critical for the success of this project. In fact, our dinner tonight follows the same menu. Same selection of wines.” She smiled. “We’re traveling the historic route, down to the whistle-stop.” She seemed pleased for the first time that night as she nodded to the man refilling her wineglass. “Of course, we’re grateful to be traveling over a modern bridge.”
She said it to be humorous, but it didn’t lighten my mood a bit.
“See?” Ellis nudged me. “Maybe you’re having an effect on my mom.”
He’d meant it as a compliment. Virginia hadn’t exactly been a stickler for historical accuracy before. And now, the one time she tried, it was looking like a very bad idea.
It made me cringe inwardly to realize the ghost conductor might have been right. We were certainly inviting trouble.
“Well?” Molly pressed, obviously expecting me to do something about the fate of my ghostly doppelganger.
Beau said something into Stephanie’s ear that made her snicker at me. Those two really needed to grow up. And I had to face facts. The girl in compartment 9 was long dead.
“You can’t change the past,” Frankie warned.
“We need to help. Or at least try,” Molly insisted. “How hard is that to understand?”
Dang it. It wasn’t hard at all.
“She’s been watching you, Verity,” Frankie murmured into my ear. “She wants to be like you,” he accused, “which stinks because I don’t even like you.”
I fought to keep my smile pasted firmly in place.
Ellis leaned close to me. “Ghost trouble?”
“Frankie,” I murmured.
It was all he needed to know.
“Tell her she’s not an amateur sleuth,” Frankie pleaded. “This is our romantic trip, not a ghost-hunting, mystery-solving debacle like you always fall into.”
Didn’t I know it.
But it didn’t even seem like they needed me for the argument. “How can you not care?” Molly demanded. “Where’s your heart?”
The gangster glared at me, and if looks could kill, I’d be floating in the middle of the table with Frankie and his girlfriend.
Seconds later, the brakes screeched on our train.
“Hold on.” Ellis took my arm to steady me.
The Sugarland Express slowed too quickly. The train rocked back and forth, rattling our plates and glasses.
Stephanie grasped for her toppling wineglass, reaching directly through Molly, who winced and disappeared. Frankie followed.
Virginia stood, bracing a hand on the table.
Mountains rose up on either side of us.
“Nothing to worry about,” the man in the white jacket announced as the lights flickered. “Remain calm,” he ordered, before the lights failed and the train plunged into darkness.
Chapter 8
A woman screamed.
I grabbed Ellis’s arm.
“I’m right here,” he said, holding me tight.
Brakes squealed. A glass shattered on the floor, the spray wetting my ankle.
The locomotive swayed dangerously to the side, and panicked voices surrounded us.
What is it?
Are we crashing?
Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
A chair at our table toppled to the floor. Virginia’s voice sounded over the chaos. “Remain calm!”
Dim emergency lights flickered on. The train lurched, and Virginia’s hip slammed hard against the table. I held on, wincing as my glass of red wine toppled over my hand and onto the front of Melody’s dress.
Beau remained rooted to the spot, breathing heavily across from me.
Virginia pushed off the table and left us.
“Where does she think she’s going?” I exclaimed, holding Ellis tighter.
“I don’t know,” Ellis said, slipping out of my grasp as he staggered to his feet. He was going after her. Dang him and his need to be noble all the time.
“Stay here,” he ordered, pushing away.
Fat chance.
He was heading for the front of the train.
I stood and started to follow him, hoping I was making the right call. I couldn’t let him disappear into the darkness without me.
If we got out of this, I’d appreciate my life more. I’d be more thankful for the little things. I’d be nicer to Frankie.
The train jumped and shuddered.
I’d never leave my house again.
I braced myself as the steel walls surrounding us gave one final shiver before the train ground to a dead stop.
A woman sobbed. Others gasped for breath.
“Call for help,” a woman’s voice urged.
“I can’t get a signal,” her partner shot back, surprised.
Well, we were in the mountains, so that made sense. At least we were still in one piece. For now.
The original train had also made an unscheduled stop in the mountains, and one of its passengers had died that night. The similarity made my skin crawl. And I couldn’t just wait for Ellis to save the day. I might technically be on vacation, but I had a sinking fe
eling that I was going to have to get to the bottom of the tragedy on the Sugarland Express before this trip was over.
As if I wasn’t dealing with enough, the ghostly conductor flickered into existence by my side. “Miss Verity,” he began.
“I—” Couldn’t I have a normal dinner? Just once, a real date, a getaway without Ellis’s crazy family, or Frankie’s interruptions, or long-dead people and their problems that became my problems and—
“Come with me,” the dead conductor urged, “quickly.”
In the gray glow of the ghost, I saw Dave Abel wrap his arm around his wife, Mary Jo, who was rubbing her wrist.
“What’s going on?” It didn’t look good.
“Someone has broken into the radio room,” the ghost conductor said, beckoning me toward the front of the train. “One of the living. He’s tearing it apart.”
That didn’t make any sense. “Who would do that?” I asked, following the ghost.
I sidestepped chairs and broken dishes as my fellow passengers pulled themselves back together.
“Faster,” the conductor pressed as my heel sent a fallen tray skittering sideways.
I doubled back and grabbed it to use as a weapon. If there was already a man in the radio room, there was a good shot he’d planned the train stoppage.
Or he knew who had.
I reached a shadowy hallway at the front of the dining car and found myself running upstream against two waiters and a cook heading toward the frightened passengers.
“This way,” the cook said as his beefy arm brushed my shoulder.
I let them pass and soon found myself alone in the hall outside the small galley. They’d left the door open. Knives littered the floor. Nobody would even know if one was missing.
The emergency lights flickered and died.
I pressed on. I couldn’t be that far behind Ellis and Virginia. At least I hoped that was the case as I entered the deserted bar car.
“Ellis?” I asked, trying to spot him in the faint silver glow from the ghost.
Shadows swathed the bar at the front.
Ghostly gray light illuminated leather club chairs clustered near the windows, and the faint scent of cigar smoke hung in the air. Each chair, each smoking table, each art deco wall sconce glowed gray. The restoration was so perfect, the merging of the ghostly plane with reality so complete, that it took my breath away.
