Page 51 of Checkmate
“Research for what?
She frowned, her nose scrunching up cutely. Her fingers traced the design on the front of her folder, and he watched them, fascinated. “For the business, of course.”
“Right,” he said with a nod, forcing himself to focus.
What was happening to him?
He was a married man who had never so much as looked at another woman. And yet he couldn’t deny there was something about Erica he found incredibly attractive.
Perhaps it was because he had already checked out of his marriage. As far as he was concerned, he and Sophie were over. He was sure she felt the same way, given the way she fawned over Alex (seriously, how had he not noticed before?).
His anger over the affair had replaced his heartache and opened his eyes to what else was out there. He still needed time to heal, but his attraction to Erica proved there was life after Sophie when he once thought she was his life.
“Wait. All of that is research for the business?”
Marcus eyed the folder, its contents spilling out from all sides. “That’s bigger than my dissertation!”
“Yeah. Yeah, I went a bit nuts,” Erica said with a laugh. “But it’s organised chaos, I swear.”
“Sure,” Marcus replied, gesturing for her to continue.
“Okay, so we’ve got a section for each of our ghosts,” she said, opening the folder and turning it to face him.
His eyes scanned the wall of text, seeing a few familiar names here and there. “You’ve found some new ones?”
“Potentially,” she nodded. “You’d have to read through them. Each profile has their story, some key dates, how they died, obviously.”
“Obviously,” he muttered, blown away by the amount of work she had put into this.
“I’ve organised them into categories,” she said, flipping the page. “Notable women, villains, victims. And for each profile, I’ve found a picture of each person. Whether it’s an old photograph or a portrait, or whatever.”
“Jesus, Erica. Have you slept at all this month?”
“Oh, plenty,” she said, flashing him a grin. “And I’m not done yet.”
Turning the page, Erica showed him a map of the city, a bunch of lines and markers he couldn’t make sense of decorating the page.
“This is the current walking tour,” she said, tracing a line with her finger. “And these red markers are everywhere you stop to tell a story.”
The blue and yellow lines represented two new walking routes, allowing them to offer different packages as part of their tours.
Little black stars marked all the supposed hauntings in the city and who haunted them. She’d divided their ghosts between both tours to give people a reason to buy both packages.
“This green line here is for later on when we can afford a tour bus—”
“A tour bus?” Marcus looked up at her with wide eyes. “A tour bus?”
“Why is that so shocking?” She laughed, flicking through the pages. “Here, look at this.”
“Future ideas,” he muttered to himself, reading Erica’s neat writing. Surprising himself, he felt a lump form in his throat as he read her words. She had taken the vision for his business and ran with it, presenting him with a folder full of potential that would see his ghost tours flourish.
So, this is what it felt like to have someone believe in him?
Five years ago, when he first begged the city officials for their support, he had been full of ideas and enthusiasm for his job. He spent hours hunched over his laptop, writing out scripts and researching more about their city’s history and those who left their mark.
He couldn’t wait to put his dramatic spin on these tales and take people to see the sites that had long gone ignored but were once the centre of some of the biggest stories of all.
And then his wife had put him down at every opportunity and complained about his lack of growth until he had forgotten just how much passion he had for this kind of thing.
