by Lotta Smith
“She says she loves you too,” I informed him, and he kissed my forehead. Then I cooed to my daughter, “Welcome to the life of the living, Sophie.”
PROLOGUE Part 2
Humming to herself, Christina Hepburn smiled as she took in the sunshine and lukewarm breeze caressing her.
It was a clear morning in late August. The sun was bright but seemed to have lost the menacing, blazing attitude it sported earlier in the month. Suddenly, a strong gust of wind blew into her face, prompting her to shut her eyes and chuckle. For kids, it was the saddest time of the year, their precious summer break about to end, forcing them to go back to school. Then again, they’d have some fun when they reunited with their friends at school.
For Christina, just like many other moms, the end of summer meant having a little more alone time after months of having the kids at home. No more working her behind off prepping meals, keeping up with laundry, and sending the little ones to a smorgasbord of summer camps. Of course, even with the kids back in school, that didn’t change the fact that Christina was doing all the household chores. Still, having some space and alone time felt really good. Without the kids complaining about their sibling’s meanness and interrupting her while she was in the middle of cooking, her chore routine went more smoothly.
While she was watering her plants, her phone beeped in the pocket of her floral print summer dress. She could tell from the ringtone that the call was from Matt, her husband.
“Come on, what’s this about? Don’t tell me you forgot something again,” she muttered to herself before she took the call. Matt was a caring husband, but he had a bad habit of constantly misplacing and forgetting his stuff. The previous week, he’d left his wallet with his driver’s license at home, and she had to deliver it to his dry-cleaning factory. Considering he was behind the wheel on the way to his workplace, it was like a blessed miracle that he wasn’t stopped by a cop. She didn’t know if it was Murphy’s Law or the universe’s irony, but cops tended to question those who weren’t carrying their driver’s license, and it was meant to rain whenever you weren’t carrying an umbrella.
When she answered the phone, Matt’s voice echoed breathlessly. “Hey, Christina, this is so huge! I’m driving by our apartment, and your favorite actor—what was his name?—is shooting something with a TV crew and everything. I’m sure it’s for his TV show about the rogue lawyer and newbie psychic. Anyway, you’ve got to see it! I’m sure you can see him from the balcony.”
His voice sounded not just breathless but slightly shaky. Maybe it was the unstable signal. Maybe they needed to switch their cell phone service provider.
In retrospect, many thoughts crossed Christina’s mind, but what grabbed her attention the most was her husband mentioning her favorite show.
“Are you talking about Kendric O’Donnel?” Christina perked up. She really liked that actor. If she wasn’t happily married to Matt with two kids, she might have had a huge crush on him.
“Yup, that’s him. You’ve got to see him.”
“Wow, really?” She moved her footstool closer to the balcony railing and looked down at the street. Except she couldn’t find anyone who even remotely looked like her darling Kendric. Actually, no one seemed to be walking under the balcony. “Hey, Matt? I don’t see anyone on the street. Maybe you mistook someone else for Kendric.”
“No, I’m not mixing him up with someone else. Oh, he’s right there in front of me. Seriously, he looks so cool. No, cool is an understatement. Even from a guy’s perspective, he looks dazzling. Now I can understand why you’re so hooked by him. I’m glad you agreed to marry me before seeing him.”
“Really?” She chuckled.
“Yup, I’m telling the truth. Kendric’s right there by the bush, but you’ve got to hurry because it looks like the director dude’s satisfied with this scene. They may move at any time, so I’m afraid you don’t have enough time to come down.”
“What? Really? Well, let me see….” Christina tried leaning over the fence. Stray locks of her hair fell over her eyes, and she brushed them off her face.
All she wanted was just a peek of her favorite actor.
But the next thing she knew, her world was rocking, as if she’d been struck by a massive earthquake that was ready to destroy the whole town.
“What the…?” she muttered, turning back to see what was going on.
When she saw the face of the person she’d least expected, her mouth formed the shape of the O.
She wasn’t sure what to do. One part of her wanted to shriek like a banshee, and the other wanted to ask why.
But before her voice had a chance to be heard, Christina was thrown out into the air to experience the most thrilling ride of her life.
Feeling gravity pull her to the ground, she found the sensation resembled riding Space Mountain. Except, unlike the popular ride at Disney World, hers wasn’t equipped with a safety bar.
The only good thing about her fall was that she managed to lose consciousness the moment before her body slammed onto the hard pavement.
CHAPTER 1
Eleven months later…
It was Saturday morning, and the sun was beaming on my face. I was in bed, enjoying a certain physical activity that starts with an S, which made me deliriously happy.
No, you don’t need to cover your child’s tender ears because I’m not talking about sex.
I was in the middle of something waaay better, and this particular activity was called sleeping. In my opinion, sleeping makes you a gazillion times happier than the other activity starting with an S. With sleeping, you don’t need partners, and you don’t get all sweaty or anything. On top of all that, you get to restore your energy by sleeping.
Anyway, I was sleeping oh-so-happily, as in without a care in the world. Okay, in the corner of my mind, I was bracing myself for Sophie’s screaming, demanding my attention.
Sophie Rowling, our daughter, happened to be one of those super fussy babies who came with a devastatingly strong set of lungs. We were still living in the same condo building on Fifth Avenue, and all the units were highly soundproof. But even with the impeccably built structure, the neighbors still heard when she wailed.
On the plus side, Sophie was about to welcome her first-ever birthday without suffering from any major illnesses. So far, she’d had a fever only twice, which was excellent. Of course, both occasions scared the bejeezus out of us, but I’d heard about and witnessed so many worse cases with babies and young children during my time in med school, such as having issues with heart valves or gastrointestinal systems, or troubles with the central nervous system. Her just being on the fussy side was the least of our problems as parents.
Another happy aspect was having Auntie Jackie. After all, she’d turned out to be a really fabulous nanny to Sophie. With Sophie being a baby and yours truly not so fluent in baby language, communication between us would have been difficult, if not impossible. But I had Jackie, and whenever my daughter was wailing and screaming, she listened to her and told me what our little princess demanded. Amazingly, Sophie seemed to be seeing and hearing my ghostly pal, and sometimes when she woke up in the middle of the night, just needing some entertainment but not needing to be fed or have her diaper changed, Jackie would play peek-a-boo with her until she got tired and fell asleep.
I didn’t know if I would have survived the past year without Jackie, and a part of me wished I could go back to my babyhood and play with my guardian ghost. Who wouldn’t want to play with a ghost who could actually disappear and then reappear? It must have been way better than playing with human adults who’d just cover their faces, saying, “Gone, gone, gone… peek-a-boo!”
Things were getting better now that our little daughter was growing out of her babyhood and getting ready to become a toddler. Instead of needing to be fed every two hours, she slept longer hours during the night. And instead of breast milk and formula, she already enjoyed eating ordinary food with a spoon.
Feeling my brain becomin
g alert, I rolled on my side in a lame attempt to keep my sleeping status longer. I was lucky to be a full-time stay-at-home mom, but with Rick going to work every morning, it wasn’t like I had all day to sleep whenever I wanted to. Not to mention weekends were meant to be the days when I caught up on sleeping; that had been the agenda since when I was a kid, even though I always slept fine on weekdays. However, I loved, loved, loved sleeping, and I never missed a chance to sleep in whenever I had one.
By my side, Rick was sound asleep. After working for a full week, including a brief business trip to London, I knew he was tired and needed to recharge his energy, and that was part of the reason why I didn’t want to get up too early. I wanted him to rest and relax without disturbing him with moving around too much. When I was pregnant, we used to talk about the plans for my return to work, but the moment I met Sophie, I realized I didn’t want to go back to work anytime soon. I wanted to spend a lot of time with her, and I didn’t want to miss anything as she grew up. Rick had the same opinion; he wasn’t keen on leaving her to a team of babysitters, and he himself wanted to be a caring dad.
And yes, he was a totally rocking daddy. When I first met him, I couldn’t see him as daddy material. First of all, he was always busy bragging about being voted one of the most eligible bachelors in Manhattan—though he wasn’t thrilled about coming in second. With the photos of him attending a series of fabulous parties with models, actresses, and socialites clutching his arm circulating the Internet, I didn’t even daydream of being in a relationship with him, much less marrying him and having a child together. But boy, he turned out to be so sweet and awesome.
Back in the days when Sophie used to wake up and wail every three hours in the night, he used to take turns with me to respond to her needs. He handled bottle-feeding and diaper changes like a pro. I’d been talking to my fellow moms, and some of them were rather unhappy that their husbands conveniently remembered some important business things they had to do whenever poopy diapers needed changing.
At the warmth of Rick’s presence close to me, I smiled to myself. I was having one of those moments when I couldn’t help feeling giddy about everything. I had not only a super cute daughter but an amazing husband, and since giving birth to Sophie, I hadn’t had a case for which I had to talk to ghosts of murder victims. Dan, the CEO of the security-based conglomerate USCAB and my father-in-law, was extra smitten by his first-ever grandchild. The moment he saw Sophie for the first time, he said, “Being a mother is a twenty-four-seven job. Mandy, you can have maternity leave as long as Sophie and you need.” As a result, I was still on leave. I knew how lucky my situation was, but I was beginning to forget that I used to solve crimes by talking to dead people.
Okay, maybe I didn’t solve cases on my own as often as I wanted to believe. Rick, a former FBI agent turned COO of USCAB, was the one who usually solved cases, but interviewing the murder victim often helped solve it faster.
Listening to his steady breathing, I was being lulled into sleep again. My breathing slowed down, and I was about to grab some more sleep… until hysterical laughter echoed from the baby monitor.
“What was that?” Rick groaned.
“That’s Sophie,” I muttered, keeping my eyes shut and not giving up on a little extra beauty sleep.
“Is she okay?” He moved to sit up on the bed.
“No worries, she’ll be fine. She’s not crying. In case of trouble, Jackie would be here, alerting me, but she’s not here. So she’s having fun with Jackie and laughing. Let her.” I reached for him, holding his hand. “Let’s go back to sleep. You had a hard week with the business trip and everything, and you need your rest.”
I patted the mattress by my side, inviting him to have some more sleep. Tired, I yawned. I’d been really sleepy while I was carrying Sophie, and when she was born, I’d been extra drowsy with midnight feedings and changing the diapers and entertaining her whenever she couldn’t sleep. Even after she started sleeping longer hours, I was lethargic. But in retrospect, I was a constantly drowsy kid, and even when I was in med school, I was sleepy, so maybe that was my default state of mind.
“Good.” Lying on the bed and coming back to his usual position, he touched my face. “Speaking of having fun, we must seriously consider doing that.”
“Oh?” My lips quirked up into a grin.
“I’m not that tired.” He winked. “Actually, I have extra energy to enjoy a little adult-themed quality time with you.” He pulled me close and planted a kiss on my neck. “Come on, don’t turn your head away from me. My kiss landed on the wrong place.”
“We need to brush our teeth before kissing,” I informed him. “You’ll be sickened just to imagine the amount of bacteria in our morning mouths. According to Cashewshiba, the cutesy cashew nut who knows a ton of trivia, you literally exchange two hundred million germs per second between months.”
“Yuck. Sometimes I wish you hadn’t gone to med school at all.” He laughed. “Except I might never have met you in the first place if you weren’t a student in Chapel Hill. So overall, I’m grateful you went to med school.”
“That’s nice to hear.” I giggled as he stroked the back of my neck.
“I know. Hey, what do you say about the adult-themed fun? If Sophie’s playing with Jackie, she’s likely to fall asleep again when she’s satisfied, right?”
“Well, that depends on the time.” I looked at the bedside clock and sat up. “Oh, it’s almost nine o’clock. I’ve got to get up and feed her. We don’t want her to starve, do we?”
“Of course not,” he agreed and shifted as if he was ready to get out of the bed.
“Hey, you can sleep in for a few more hours,” I said, caressing his hair.
“That’s not happening. I don’t want to miss a moment of our little daughter growing up.”
As he stretched his arms, I looked around, thinking I caught someone familiar in the corner of my eye.
“Is Jackie here?” Rick asked.
“I don’t think so. I thought I saw Clara.” I furrowed my eyebrows as I searched the bedroom.
“Mom, are you there?” Rick called out.
“Oh, Mandy, you have really sharp eyes, don’t you?” Clara Rowling popped up in front of us, doing a little finger wave. She was dressed in a frilly pink dress and sporting a witchy hat in the same color. “Trick or treat!” She grinned.
“Oh, right. Halloween is just around the corner,” I said, waving back at her and adding, “Happy Halloween!”
“Happy Halloween, Mom,” Rick joined in, all smiles. “I’m glad you’re here. I’ve been away in London from last Saturday until Wednesday.”
“Wow, you had a really tight schedule.” Her eyes widened. “You really need to take care of your health.” She looked at me expectantly.
“Clara’s telling you to take care of your health,” I relayed to him.
“Thanks, Mom. I will. Sophie needs her daddy around.” He clasped my hand. “And I have a hunch that my lovely wife appreciates having me in the flesh.”
“Of course I do. I’d prefer it if you’re physically with us.” I patted his hand as he looked at me.
Nodding graciously, Clara went on. “I was planning to keep a low profile for a while. You know, Jackie told me the two of you could be engaged in an intimate physical activity. I didn’t want to interrupt in the middle of you-know-what. Nothing is as awkward as crushing lovebirds when they’re in the middle of producing another child, is it?”
My jaw dropped as she said something so naughty, yet still looking elegant as always.
“What did she say?” Rick wanted to know.
“Nothing.” I chuckled. “But I’m glad we didn’t proceed with the adult-themed activities.”
“Oh, right.” Rick raised an eyebrow and cleared his throat. “So, Mom, did you see Sophie?”
“I did! Isn’t she such a beautiful, lovely girl?” Her cheeks glowed pink. “She’s inherited Rick’s green eyes. If he had a little sister when he was a child, she would
have looked just like Sophie. I’m so excited!”
“Speaking of Sophie, I think I’d better go see her and say good morning.” I got out of bed and excused myself.
“She’s having fun with Jackie,” Clara said. “Who’d have thought she’d be such a sweet auntie?”
“She’s been really helpful,” I agreed with her. “I’m not sure if we’d have managed to survive the past eleven months without her. Perhaps Jackie has been more helpful than a human babysitter or a doula.”
“I can imagine that.” She nodded. “I’ve heard horror stories of young children preferring their babysitters to their real moms. What a shame. But you and Sophie seem to be really close. She seems to take you as the mommy who feeds her and takes care of her, and Jackie as her really funny friend and auntie.”
“Really? Did she say that?” I perked up. “I was a little concerned that Sophie might be confused about who’s her real mother. Jackie has been in charge of entertaining her at night unless she needs to be fed, changed, or both.”
“Don’t underestimate her, or babies in general.” Clara winked. “You might be having a hard time understanding what they’re saying, but they’re really communicative. Sophie has a wicked sense of humor, and I can already see her as the it debutante. Dan has already made up his mind to escort her to the International Debutante Ball.”
“Oh, really?” My eyes widened.
“Wait a minute,” Rick interjected as I passed on her words. “That’s my job to escort her as a debutante, isn’t it? Why would my old man want to bother with escorting her at the ball?”
“Because Sophie is the first daughter born to the Rowlings in the past hundred years?” I said, sounding more like a question than a statement.
“That’s why I have to escort her. There’s no guarantee that we’ll ever have a granddaughter,” he insisted. “No way I’m gonna let him do it.”
“Maybe both of you can,” I suggested, mentally adding, Except she might not like being guarded by two of the most feared men in the security industry—mostly because you might scare the boys away.
