Page 31 of Ghost Town Boogie

She even got the attention of others, the ghosts who normally stayed in the background, silent and unobtrusive but always there. They said nothing, but watched with interest. Their interest made them more colorful, more real. At times they looked almost, but not quite, alive. Colt really hoped that change wasn’t a permanent one.

Nicole was furious about what had happened to her, and he couldn’t blame her. Her death was an injustice, shocking and unfair. There was a deep wrongness in her murder. Her life had been taken from her too soon, too violently.

When he left the depot intent on a stop at the good bakery, Nicole followed. Fortunately she didn’t dog him for very long before she snapped back, almost as if she had a rope around her waist and when she reached the limit of her boundary someone yanked her back. He didn’t know much, he didn’t know nearly enough, but he’d been right about the place being a magnet, of sorts.

Jack hadn’t been drawn to the depot. If he had, Colt would’ve known about his death years ago. No, Jack seemed to be attached to his mother. He was so desperate to let Nina know he was dead that he clung to her, trying desperately for the past five years to tell her that he hadn’t left home and not looked back, that he hadn’t forgotten his family.

Colt picked up three ham and cheese sandwiches for lunch, as well as a box of cinnamon rolls. Breakfast time had come and gone, but the sweet rolls were there, and they were too tempting. Naturally Tammy, the maker of the great cinnamon rolls, wanted to talk about Nicole’s murder. Who’d done it? Were they all in danger? Should she hire security? Tammy didn’t know how Nicole had died, and since Colt shouldn’t know himself he couldn’t say anything. Mac would be on the Sheriff’s shit list if he found out that the city police chief had said too much to a friend, especially if word spread. In a small town, rumors — fact or fiction — spread quickly. Don’t turn your back on anyone…

He also couldn’t assure Tammy that she wasn’t in danger, not without telling more about what he knew. The killer had been after that picture. It wasn’t a random attack. A serial killer wasn’t roaming the streets of Seawolf Beach looking for victims. No, Nicole’s murder had been an attack with a purpose. He just didn’t understand yet what that purpose was.

As he walked toward the Pine Street house, Colt mentally ran a couple of scenarios. He could tell Mac he saw ghosts, had seen Nicole’s spirit, and she’d told him what little she knew. Which wasn’t much.

He could tell Anna that Jack had been murdered. He could tell her when, but not how or who or why. Which made him wonder again, why? It was possibly, probably — okay, almost certainly — the same man who’d set fire to her childhood home and stabbed Nicole in the back.

The killer had been looking for something in that duck picture and hadn’t found it, so his answer was to destroy the Miller house and everything in it. Maybe Jack would know what the man had been looking for. What kind of evidence might’ve been left behind? If he could just get his old friend to focus…

Colt walked into the house, two teal bakery boxes in hand, expecting to find Anna, Nina, and Jack waiting for him. Instead there was just Anna, who sat on the new couch with her head back and her eyes closed. He didn’t think she was sleeping, though. Something about the way she breathed…

She opened her eyes and looked at him.

“I’ve been waiting for you,” she said in a low, unconsciously seductive voice.

I’ve been waiting for you for a very long time. He couldn’t say that. “Hungry? I brought lunch.” The house was quiet. “Is your mom getting a nap?”

“No. Mom is visiting with her friend Mary Ann. She was getting antsy. I think she really wanted someone to talk to besides me, probably a friend she can vent to about her disobedient daughter who at the ripe age of thirty-six still slips out of the house in the middle of the night.”

“I’m so glad you weren’t there.”

She sighed. “I should’ve been. I might’ve seen something, or woken up in time to get the fire department there quicker, save the house or at least some of Mom’s things.”

The idea of Anna in a burning house… There was nothing sufficient he could say to express his horror.

“I called my cousin, Emily,” she said. “The original plan was for me to take Mom to Aunt Sally’s after we got the house on the market. Emily was going to meet us there to help Mom and Sally get settled in together but the fire changes everything. I’ll stay here a while to take care of a few details, and Mom will go on to Florida. Emily’s going to pick her up in a couple of days. I told her we could make other arrangements, that I could drop Mom off at Aunt Sally’s and come back here, but Em said she could use a few days out of the house with no kids.”

Out of all that all he really got was… Anna was going to stay.

“For all I know Mom might decide to stay with Mary Ann until Emily arrives.”

Nina didn’t think much of him, not where her daughter was concerned. Would she avoid him to show her displeasure, or would she stick close to make sure there was no hanky panky? Mrs. Miller might want to keep a close eye on him.

It didn’t matter. He’d handle whatever came his way. He wasn’t ready to say goodbye to Anna, wasn’t ready to watch her drive away. Eventually that would happen, but not today. Not tomorrow.

Nina was gone, which meant Jack was gone. For now. He and Anna were as alone as they were going to get, for a while. “You’re still here,” he said. Duh, that was obvious. She hadn’t left with Nina, wasn’t out looking for a hotel room. She was here.

“I am. I’ll stay, if you’ll have me.” Anna stood and stretched, then walked to him and took the bakery boxes, which she placed on the coffee table. “I guess it always happens. Someone dies unexpectedly and suddenly you’re hit in the face with the fact that life is short and tomorrow isn’t promised to anyone. Every day is precious and not to be wasted.”

Clichés, but not wrong.

“I told Mom I was going to stay with you for a while, if you’ll have me. No matter what she decides to do, how long she stays here, if she wants to stay with Mary Ann or someone else… I don’t care. I want to be with you. That wasn’t a shock to her, since I wasn’t at home when the fire started. I got a grilling after you left for the depot.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be.” She placed her arms around his neck. “Yes, I had a crush on you when I was a kid, but that’s not what this is. I like you. I want you. I think the feeling is mutual, at least I hope it is. It’s been a very long time since I allowed myself to live in the moment.”

She kissed him, much as she had yesterday on his front porch, but this was different. He didn’t hesitate to participate, to get lost in the kiss as he’d been lost in her last night.

He could take her to bed right now, without another word. Talking was overrated, and he didn’t know what to say, how to move forward. But there was more here than just the physical. He felt it, in a way he hadn’t since Lizzie had died.