Happy Medium: (Intermix) (7 page)

She nodded. “Yeah, and from what Gracie said, he doesn’t strike me as somebody who’d be likely to haunt the house.”

For a moment his jaw hardened, then he shook his head again. “No. It’s not Hampton. It’s a woman.”

Emma frowned, running her fork through the lettuce again. “She showed up in your dreams, this woman?”

He looked away from her, staring out at the river. “Yeah. Definitely a woman.”

“What did she look like?”

He glanced back at her, his expression bleak. “I don’t know. I didn’t see her face. Just . . . blonde hair. And very white skin.” He paused for so long that she thought he was finished, but then he shrugged. “There was another one too. But I don’t know if she’s related to the house.”

“Could you see her?”

He shook his head. “Not really. Tall. Sort of old. She had a stick of some kind.”

“A stick?”

“Like a cane. Or a walking stick.”

“Oh. Well, that’s helpful. Maybe. I mean, it’s more information. Or something.” Actually, she wasn’t sure what she could do with that bit, but she figured she should try to be encouraging.

The corners of his mouth edged up in a dry smile. “Or something.”

Emma sighed, resting her fork beside her plate. “I’m sorry. I wish I understood more about this. I mean, you’d think with all the research into the supernatural I’ve done for Gabrielle I’d be more knowledgeable about this kind of thing, but I’m not. And I feel like what’s happening is something important. Something we really need to understand.”

Ray picked up his burger again. “It’s not your fault. I don’t know what’s going on either.” He gave her another smile that did interesting things to her pulse rate. “Thanks for helping me out this morning.”

“I can do more,” she said quickly. “The other rooms need to be scraped too.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Don’t you have research to do?”

“I’ve got my laptop in the car.” She tried a tentative smile. “I can bring it in and do some Internet searches between working on the rooms. Do you have Wi-Fi?”

He nodded, but his eyes stayed narrow. “Any particular reason you want to stay around the house?”

Because you look like you need company, and I’d love to see you without your shirt again.
“Not especially. Any particular reason you don’t want my help?”

He shrugged. “I’ll take any help I can get.”

“Well then, I’d say we’re good to go.” She speared another piece of lettuce. Not that bad. With some blue cheese and crumbled bacon, she’d even call it edible. But blue cheese and crumbled bacon had been banished from her life forever, which meant she was stuck with naked lettuce. She managed not to sigh.

***

By late afternoon, Ray had to admit that Emma Shea had put in a full day’s work. She’d managed to get two rooms upstairs scraped and ready for cleaning, and she claimed she’d be back tomorrow to scrape a couple more. He wasn’t inclined to argue with her, even though he suspected she was there more to keep an eye on him than to learn how to renovate a house.

He didn’t care. He was glad for the company. He hadn’t relished the idea of being in the house by himself, even in broad daylight.

As the day wore on, he’d managed to put some of his morning anxiety to rest. But the late-afternoon sunlight reminded him that darkness was on the way. He wasn’t sure he was ready to face it.

After he’d gone through the hose-down-in-the-backyard ritual, this time with a clean pair of jeans on hand, he came back inside to find Emma seated at the kitchen table with her laptop. “You don’t have much in the way of food,” she said.

“I usually just have a sandwich at night.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t find any bread.”

He grimaced. Grocery shopping. Something else he’d intended to do that had fallen by the wayside.
Stupid ghosts
.
Always getting in the way
.

She closed her computer. “You bought lunch. I’ll buy dinner.”

He thought about objecting, but why? Right now his male ego seemed to be taking a hike. “You’re on.”

They sat outside at the same restaurant where they’d had lunch, although he was a little cleaner now. Somehow the shifting shadows along the river didn’t bother him as much as the ones in his own backyard. But that might change, given recent history.

“Thanks for your help. I wouldn’t have gotten around to those bedrooms for another few days.” He shoveled a piece of catfish into his mouth, amazed to discover he was actually hungry. Of course, the fact that he hadn’t eaten much of anything for two days might have something to do with that.

“I’ll be back tomorrow,” she said calmly, cutting a bite of her grilled chicken.

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Sure I do.” She gave him a faint smile. “We’re in this together. Whatever
this
is.”

He sighed, rubbing his eyes. He really wished he could tell her not to come, but having her in the house made him feel better. Apparently, the whole joining forces thing had been settled in her favor. “Okay.”

They ate in silence for a while until he reached the point where his stomach no longer felt like a gaping pit. “So you’re from Houston?”

She raised her gaze to his, smiling faintly, and he felt a little like kicking himself.
Oh yeah, brilliant conversational opener.

“I live in Houston now. I’m from Kansas City originally.”

“Quite a move.”

She shrugged. “I wanted a job in the entertainment business. There wasn’t much in Kansas City.”

“I wouldn’t have thought there was much in Houston either.”

She shrugged again. “I was in LA when I was hired. Gabrielle decided to move to Houston because the production costs were lower. Plus she has a house there.”

“So are the houses you film in mainly in Texas?”

“They’re all over the country, but mostly in the South and Southwest.” She gave him another faintly dry smile. “Gabrielle loves antebellum stuff.”

“So what’s your job exactly?”

She leaned back in her chair. “Exactly? Whatever she wants me to do. But mostly I find locations and then do research after she approves the places. Technically, I’m a production assistant on the show.”

“Do you like it?”

She took a little longer to reply this time, staring at the lengthening shadows along the river. “I like the idea of it. And it’s a good job to have on my résumé. I mean, Gabrielle’s a piece of work, but I don’t spend that much time with her. She chooses the town, and then I head off to find some houses there.”

“So you’re on the road a lot?”

She nodded. “Mostly. I’ve got a condo in Houston but I don’t use it that much.” She leaned her elbows on the table in front of her. “So what about you? How did you end up in the house restoration business?”

He sighed. “I worked construction to pay for college and found out I liked it. My partner and I set up in Boerne, up in the Hill Country, about five years ago.”

“Flipping houses?”

He nodded. “Some. We make more money doing renovations, though. My partner’s the real estate guy. He finds houses for people, and then I show them how they can fix them up.”

“And now you’re in San Antonio.”

“Trying to be.”

They sat in silence for a moment, listening to the mourning doves call in the trees along the river.

“Are you going to go on working on that house, the Hampton house?” she asked finally.

“No choice. We’ve got a lot invested in it. I can’t let a few ghosts scare me off.” He gave her the best smile he could come up with, but it wasn’t much.

The mourning dove cries seemed louder somehow.
Bring out your dead.
Oh yeah, nothing morbid about his imagination. No siree!

“I’m really sorry.”

He stared at her. “For what?”

“For starting this whole thing.” She pushed her plate away. “If Gabrielle hadn’t done that freakin’ séance, none of this would have happened.”

“We don’t know that. Whatever’s there in that house might have gotten out no matter what.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Gotten out?”

“That’s what it feels like to me.” He ran his fork through the remains of his tartar sauce. “Like something was pent up in there waiting to get loose.”

Bring out your dead.
Yeah, okay, not funny anymore.

“You can’t sleep there again.” She leaned forward, placing her hand over his on the tabletop. Her skin was warm against the back of his hand—maybe he was more chilled than he’d realized.

He licked his lips. “It’s okay.”

She shook her head. “No. It’s not.” The evening shadows seemed to emphasize the blue of her eyes, the red highlights glinting in her hair. “You can’t go through another night of this.”

He didn’t answer. It wasn’t like he hadn’t already thought about it.

“Look, I’ve got a suite at the motel. There’s a couch in the living room that folds out. You could sleep there for now.” Her jaw took on a determined set.

Incredibly enough he felt a stirring in his groin. After last night he’d figured he might never have another erection. But something about the warm September evening and the woman at the table with him seemed to have shoved his body back into the game.

He leaned forward, almost unwillingly, placing his hand over hers. “I’ve got a place to go. Don’t worry.”

“Not at that house? The Hampton house?”

He shook his head. “Nope.”

She leaned back again, sighing. But she didn’t pull her hands away. “Glad to hear it.”

He didn’t pull away either. “You really don’t have to come around tomorrow. I’ll be okay.”

She shrugged. “I’ll be there. The house can serve as my home base just as well as my motel room.”

“Okay.” He managed one more smile. “As long as both of us are out of there before nightfall.”

She nodded. “Count on it.” She pushed up from the table, sliding her hands free almost reluctantly. “I’ll go back to the motel from here. But I’ll come back to the house tomorrow. With coffee.”

“Good enough.” He stood up beside her, staring down into that deep blue gaze. “Well . . .”

“Well.” She blew out a breath.

He ran his fingers along the edge of her shoulder, feeling the smooth satin of her skin. “Take care.”

She closed her eyes for a moment, then stared up at him again. “You too.”

“Count on it.”

Her lips quirked up into a small grin, and then she leaned up, brushing her lips against his cheek. “Night, Ray.”

“Night.” He watched her walk to her car, her hips swinging slightly in the cooler air of the evening.

At least he knew now he wasn’t entirely dead from the waist down.

Chapter 6

Rosie’s house was mostly dark when he got there, but the lights were on in what looked like the living room. The building rose up on its large lot, three stories, probably seven or eight bedrooms, with numerous Victorian accents around the lower gallery.

He’d only been in the place a couple of times while he was helping his sister move in. He’d never been inside when his grandmother had been alive. But then he could never remember even seeing his grandmother. His mother and Grandma Caroline had stopped speaking before he was born. He didn’t know exactly what the problem was between them, but it was serious enough to keep his grandmother out of his life. Out of all their lives, in fact.

Except that she’d left the house to Rosie.

He knew his father thought the bequest was a last slap at his mom, skipping over her to give her daughter a house worth a wad of money. It might also have been meant to cause dissension in the family between Rosie and her brothers, but if it was, his grandmother had miscalculated. Neither he nor Danny had wanted the place. In fact, he was still a little amazed that Rosie wanted it enough to live in that big, echoing barn. She’d lived there by herself for a couple of years, but after Evan had moved in it still seemed too big for two people.

He pushed the button for the doorbell, listening to the sound of faint ringing somewhere deep inside the house. At least Rosie’s place seemed welcoming, warm light spilling through the windows onto the trees. He could do with a little welcoming these days.

The porch light switched on over his head, and he heard footsteps inside. After another moment, the front door was flung wide. “Raymundo, you came.” Rosie grinned up at him, and he almost felt like sobbing with relief.
Normal. Thank Christ.

“You want some dinner? I’ve got lots.” She slung her arm through his, pulling him into the hall.

“I’ve had dinner, thanks. You still have a bedroom you’re willing to spare?” A tight muscle in the back of his neck seemed to relax as he stepped inside.

“You need to ask? Where are your clothes? Don’t tell me you left them over at that house.” Rosie’s honey brown hair hung down to her shoulder in waves, her green eyes laughing. She wore a Jack Ingram T-shirt with cutoffs. The picture of mental and physical health. Lordy, he wished he could feel that way again himself.
Maybe later.

“I’ll bring them over tomorrow. Thanks, sis.”

“Come on, sit with me while I finish dinner. You can have a beer while I eat.” She towed him into the large, well-lighted kitchen. Like the rest of the house it seemed blissfully free of both shadows and random spirits. His shoulders flexed for the first time in days.

Rosie opened her refrigerator and pulled out a can of beer, handing it to him. Her expression froze as she studied his face in the light. “Okay, what’s wrong? What happened to you?”

Crap.
He’d been hoping that a day spent working and an evening in the company of Emma Shea would have helped him look a little less like a zombie. Apparently, it hadn’t. “I’m okay.”

“No, you’re not. Not at all. This is me, remember? I know what you look like when you’re upset. Now, what happened?” She pushed him into a chair at the kitchen table, dropping down opposite him.

Ray sighed. Rosie was a year older and they’d spent most of their childhood torturing each other. If anybody knew when he was in pain, it would be her since she’d inflicted so much of it. “Could I drink a little beer first?”

“Sure. Just remember, I’m not letting you off the hook.” She turned to her plate, digging into what looked like some very nice pasta with marinara.

He leaned against the chair across from her, considering how much to tell her. He sure as hell wasn’t going to get into last night’s dream—she was his sister, for Pete’s sake. He wasn’t going to discuss some weird sex thing with her. Actually, he didn’t want to discuss much of anything with her, but he knew better than to think he could get away with that.

“Well?” Rosie fixed him with a gimlet gaze.

He sighed again, running his hands through his hair. Might as well get it over with. “Okay, so I told you about the TV show, right? The
American Medium
thing?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Yeah.”

“So the woman in charge, the medium, did a run-through of her séance at the house a couple of nights ago, and since then things there have been sort of . . . weird.”

She put down her fork. “Weird how?”

He took a breath. “While she was holding the séance, stuff started happening in the room. The candles she had burning went out and then they fell on the floor. Doors slammed. Emma and I both got, well, groped, only nobody was there but us.”

Rosie stared at him. “Emma?”

“The medium’s assistant. Emma Shea. She and I were sitting at the table with DeVere, the medium.”

“That’s her? Gabrielle DeVere?”

He nodded.

“I’ve heard of her. She’s supposed to put on quite a show.”

He shrugged. “Maybe. I’ve never seen it.”

Rosie frowned. “Wait a second, back up. Groped?”

The tips of his ears began to heat up. His sister, for Pete’s sake. “Yeah, well . . . yeah.”

She leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table. “A ghost grabbed your junk.”

He closed his eyes. “Yeah, okay, I know how it sounds. It happened, Rosie.”

“Of course it happened. Go on.”

He opened his eyes again. That wasn’t exactly the response he’d been expecting. Rosie was still leaning forward, watching him intently.

“That’s it, mostly,” he said. “Emma and I both felt something while the séance was going on. DeVere didn’t—or at least she didn’t give any indication she did.”

“And this happened last night?”

“A couple of nights ago.”

“That isn’t all, though, is it? Something else happened to upset you. Tell me about it.”

He rubbed a hand across the back of his neck. “Dreams. I’ve been having bad dreams the last couple of nights.”

“What kind?”

“Well, you know, sexual,” he mumbled. His face was flaming. The only thing worse than this would be if he had to explain it all to his mother.

His sister leaned back in her chair. “How sexual?”

“Rosie, come on,” he groaned. Maybe there really wasn’t anything worse than this after all.

“Grow up,” she snapped. “This is serious. Very. Now tell me.”

He took a deep breath. He had no idea why his sister suddenly sounded like an expert, but at least she believed him. Maybe she’d studied some kind of abnormal psychology when she got her library degree. “The night right after the séance it was mainly just sort of a vivid dream, the kind where you wake up all hot and bothered but nothing more—you know what I mean?”

She nodded. “Who was in it? Female? Male? Multiple?”

He closed his eyes again. “Jesus, Rosie!”

She grimaced. “Oh don’t get all self-conscious about it. Just tell me.”

“A woman,” he said through gritted teeth. “I couldn’t see her clearly. One woman.”

“Okay, so that’s what happened on the night of the séance. What about last night?”

He rubbed his eyes, thinking. “Same woman—I think. Only . . . a lot more, sort of, vivid.”

Rosie drummed her fingers on the table. “Okay, how vivid? What happened?”

He sighed, then turned his back, pulling up his shirt.

He heard her quick inhale. “The woman in the dream did that?”

He turned back to her. “Yeah, she did. I don’t know how it happened. I mean, it was a dream.”

“Yes, it was.” Rosie frowned. “Sort of.”

He dropped back into his chair. “Sort of?”

“Did you, you know . . . reach satisfaction?” For the first time his sister looked a little embarrassed herself.

Ray stared down at the floor, wishing he could sink into it. “No. Somebody else was there. An old lady. She told me to push the other woman away.”

“An old lady?”

He looked up again. “Yeah. I gave the sexy one a couple of shoves and she disappeared.”

Rosie was frowning again. “What did she look like?”

“The old lady?” He shrugged. “I couldn’t see her that well because it was sort of foggy. She was tall and was wearing a long dress. And she had a stick.”

“A stick?”

“A cane, I guess. She had this walking stick thing she was leaning on.”

His sister nodded slowly. “Did she speak to you after she told you to get rid of the woman?”

“She said the house was dangerous—which I’d already figured out, believe me—and she told me to listen to the sensitive, whatever the hell that means.”

Rosie stared off into the darkness beyond her kitchen window. “The sensitive. That’s interesting.”

“Rosie, it’s nuts,” he growled. “The whole thing is nuts. Are you telling me this makes some kind of sense to you?”

She nodded again. “Parts of it. I’ll have to do some research before I understand it all, though.”

He picked up his forgotten beer, taking a healthy pull. “Research how? You mean like psychiatric care?”

She grimaced. “Of course not. You’re not nuts, Ray, you’ve been haunted. By something very nasty. I’m guessing it’s related to that house, though, and not something that’s specific to you personally. I still need to do some checking around.”

“Emma’s researching the house at the historical society.”

Rosie’s lips quirked up slightly. “Emma is?”

He nodded, avoiding her gaze. “Yeah, well, like I said, she works for DeVere. She usually researches the houses.”

“But she isn’t usually groped by the ghosts, I’m assuming.”

He shook his head, his jaw tensing again. “Not that I know of.”

Rosie’s grin turned wry. “Okay, I’ll leave the house to her. I’ll concentrate on the ghosts.”

“Why?” He finally leaned back again. “You sound like an expert all of a sudden. Since when do you know anything about ghosts, sis?”

She stared down at her pasta. “That’s a conversation we need to have, but I’m not sure now is the best time.”

He braced his hands on the table.
Fuck it.
“Rosie, I’ve had two days of hell. If you know anything that would make me feel better, I’d really like to hear it. And yeah, now is absolutely the best time.”

She glanced up at him, her emerald eyes troubled. “This is really Mom’s thing. She’d explain it a lot better than I will.”

“Ma’s cruising the Inside Passage at the moment.” He gritted his teeth. “We’re here.”

“Yeah, I know. I’m just afraid I’ll screw this up.” She pressed her fingers to her lips for a moment. “Our family has some history with this.”

“With what?”

“Ghosts. The dead.” She sighed. “We—the Riordans, that is—we come from a long line of people who communicate with the dead. Mediums, in other words.”

Ray stared back for a long moment, trying to decide if she was serious. Then, once it was clear that she was, trying decide how he was supposed to react. Laugh? Snarl? Shake his head? Head back to his haunted house for the night?

Definitely not that last one
. “You know how that sounds, right?”

“It is what it is. At this point you might be a little more inclined to take it seriously than you were a week ago.”

He shook his head. “To tell you the truth, I’m not sure what I’m inclined to do anymore. What am I supposed to think about this information? I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh for God’s sake, Ray, it’s the key here.” Rosie pushed herself to her feet, carrying her plate to the sink. “You keep asking what happened at that séance. You should be asking
why
it happened. I know all about Gabrielle DeVere—she’s been in the medium business for a long time, way before she ever went on TV. She’s sort of a celebrity ghost hunter. Only I never heard of her being able to do anything remotely like what you just described. So what was different about that séance this time?” She turned back to face him again.

He shrugged. “It was in that house. The Allard Hampton house.”

Rosie leaned back against the counter. “Which has never had the reputation of being haunted before so far as you know, right?”

He blew out a breath. “Not so far as I know.”

“Okay then, scratch the house. I’ll ask you again: What was different this time?”

His shoulders clenched painfully. “You mean it happened because I was there?”

She nodded. “It sounds like it to me. You were there. You may not have known what was going on, but you were there. And because you were there, you may have made contact with something in that house.”

He shook his head slowly. “No. It wasn’t me. It couldn’t have been me. I’m not some woo-woo nut job.”

His sister dropped into the chair across from him again, reaching for his hand almost like the way Emma had put her hand over his at the restaurant. Jesus, was he that much of a basket case?

“Ray, it’s tough to accept,” she said softly. “Believe me, I know. It’s been tough on all of us. Give yourself some time to process this. It’s not so bad, really.”

He raised his gaze to hers again. “What do you mean
all of us
?”

She frowned. “I’ve got the power. So does Danny. We’ve both had stuff happen with ghosts and haunting. It’s like this genetic thing we inherited, straight down from Great-grandma Siobhan and Grandma Caroline Riordan.”

His pulse thundered in his ears. Giving himself time to process this was probably good advice. Too bad he wasn’t ready to take it. “Danny? The real estate king is a medium?”

“Yeah, like I say. We all have it to some degree. Danny too.”

He shook his head. “I can’t buy that. Danny’s a whiz at real estate, but he’s no . . . medium.”

She grimaced. “Stop saying
medium
as if it were a synonym for
con artist
. A medium is just someone who can contact the dead, who serves as a medium of communication between two realms. Grandma did that. So did Great-grandma. Mom can but she doesn’t usually. Danny can. I can. Now it looks like you can too, so you’d better stop behaving as if it’s some kind of Mark of Cain.”

Ray’s head seemed to be swimming all of a sudden. “Grandma. And Mom.”

“Genetic. Like I said.”

“Why didn’t anybody tell me about this?” he said. “You all knew. Why didn’t I?”