The Widow's Walk (12 page)

“You can joke all you want, Mike, but this is serious. We can’t let anyone else in.”

“I won’t say a word about anything ghostly to anyone. As long as things stay under control.”

Liz studied him.

Mike squirmed. “I think I’m going to take a nap.” He settled back on the sofa.

She tucked the blanket around him and kissed him on the cheek. “I’ll go help Mae with dinner.”

She didn’t believe him. He didn’t trust her. This was never going to work.

Chapter 19

Liz carried a tray of tea and fresh baked cookies into the bedroom.

Mike sniffed the aroma of chocolate chips and brown sugar. “For me?”

“Yes. For you.” She rested the tray on the floor, snuggled next to him, and slipped her hand beneath the collar of his robe to tickle his chest.

He pulled away like she’d stuck him with a pin. “What about the cookies?”

The joke did not amuse. “In a minute. I just wanted a kiss.”

Mike obliged with a quick peck on the cheek, no eye contact. “They taste better when they’re warm.”

Liz picked up the tray and settled it over his lap. “Why don’t you want me close to you?”

“You’re still limping, and I feel like I could sleep for a month. It’s hard to think about anything else but getting better.” He munched on a cookie and looked away.

“I feel great, and you’re back to normal.” Liz kissed him on the neck and brushed her lips across his cheek.

Mike put his hand on her back, then turned his attention back to a book.

Why was Mike acting like being near her was torture? For the week before and after he was hospitalized, she’d been a perfect wife and mother. No crazy compulsions. They’d put their financial plan into place, and had been talking things through. He’d been puttering, going out to retrieve wood, keeping the fireplaces going, eating and snacking. Happy.

Both their ghosts were quiescent, Mae and Kevin calm, albeit hovering over both of them. She was the one about to go crazy since the substitute gig ended and they were all home together, all day, with everyone watching her, waiting for her, or Elisabeth, to mess up.

Frustration bubbled inside, and she suppressed the urge to dump the cookies in his lap. “You aren’t being honest with me, Mike. I can’t fix the problem if I don’t know what it is.”

He kept the plate and moved the tray to the floor. “Liz, I just have no desire, no urge to . . . I’ve never had problems with performance. It all started after I touched the ghost.” He looked away.

“Things will be fine once you’ve recovered.”

“I hope so. Hate to think that part of my life is over forever.” He looked more interested in the cookies.

“Can’t we just cuddle? No pressure.”

“Sure.” Mike didn’t move closer, didn’t make eye contact.

Liz adjusted her pillow until she could sit with her arm and leg touching his.

He grabbed the plate and offered it to her. “Last two.”

“No thanks, I had plenty before.” Would he even be talking to her if it weren’t for the damn cookies?

He emptied the plate and got up. “Where’s Eddie?

“Mae is giving him a bath. It’s so hard for me to get up and down holding that little worm.”

“Mae and Kevin are the best.” He went into the bathroom.

“Yeah, but she won’t let me out of her sight. And Kevin insists on driving me to physical therapy, to the store, everywhere,” she called to him.

Mike brushed, the toilet flushed. He retuned to the bed and sat on the edge next to her.

“They’re just worried, that’s all. We’re all worried.” The tone of his voice, somewhere between a lecture and condescension confirmed her fears. “And you got the job of sleeping with me to be sure I don’t wander off at night. Otherwise, you’d be in the guest room.”

He jumped up and bristled, further lending credence to her theory. “That is absolutely not true. You’re my wife, for God’s sake. Liz we’ve both been sick. How can you even think about sex?”

“This isn’t about sex. When I was pregnant, when I had the flu last year–-we might have missed a few days here and there, but we could still talk to each other, cuddle, comfort each other. Those crystals have something to do with it. I felt much better after I took that pendant off. And the magnetic bracelet.”

Sandra gave her an aphrodisiac stone after she’d given Mike something to suppress his libido: A good way to drive them apart. Drive him crazy. Drive him into her arms instead of his wife’s. “She enchanted those stones.”

Mike laughed. “Oh come on. Liz. Do you really believe in witchcraft?”

“I didn’t believe in ghosts until a couple of years ago. Why not witches? For all I know there are fairies in the woods and pixies down by Smith Pond waiting for us to wander by.”

Mike burst into laughter. “I think you’ve been reading too much Harry Potter. But Sandra does paranormal investigations. I still think we should talk to her about our problem.”

Worry stabbed her at just the mention of Sandra and ghosts in the same sentence. The whole sad affair Sandra had unearthed about their past had to remain secret. Liz had to keep that woman away from her husband. “You promised to not tell her anything about this house. Or about us.”

“And I think that’s a mistake.” He slipped his hand into his pocket.

That damn key fob must be there. He carries it everywhere. If he’s really impotent, maybe that’s the reason. Either that or he and she are . . .
She shook her head to clear it. This wasn’t Elisabeth fabricating nonsense. This was the living, breathing Liz, the one whose husband was only sleeping in the same bed out of a sense of duty. Babysitting. Could he and Sandra be fooling around?

“Look, I know she’s your friend but I want you to stop going to her shop. I want you to get rid of that key chain. Stop taking all the potions she mixed. Then we’ll see if I’m right.” Accusing him of infidelity was a wild conclusion, and she wasn’t ready to jump that high yet.

“Maybe Sandra can help.” He took her by the shoulders.

“Where is that key ring? I’ll put it with my jewelry.” She didn’t tell him the pendant and ankle bracelet was buried in the back yard under a tree, wrapped in black silk, just like the book advised was the best way to cleanse and discharge a crystal.

“It’s downstairs with the keys to my truck. I’ll give it to you in the morning. I’m going to see if Eddie is ready for bed yet. The cookies were great, thanks.” He left the room with his hand in his pocket, probably figuring she couldn’t move as fast as he.

Wrong. The physical therapy had been very effective. She got to the landing in time to see a flash of silver as he got to the last step, and heard the clunk as he dropped the key fob onto the desk in the hall. So, he carried it with him all the time and just lied to her about it.

What was it that her friend Marti had said, just after she’d caught her husband cheating?
I knew, Liz. It was the way he acted: cold, disinterested, no affection. Like my touch was poison. If it ever happens don’t let yourself be fooled, or to be made a fool of, like I did.

Every move was being watched, monitored. Mae hadn’t left her alone with Eddie for a minute, claiming it was because of her bum leg. Her authority as a mother was gone, her privileges to come and go as she please restricted, her husband had given up but was too responsible to renege on his vows—yet.

She was penniless with a bastard child, a liability to him. Her housekeepers were working for her out of some misguided sense of duty. She couldn’t pay them, and she no longer had any authority. The worst part was they were so nice and accommodating about it.

Liz took the tray downstairs. She hated to even touch the key chain, but dropped it into a vase on her desk. Tomorrow she’d take it out and bury it with its mate, in full view of all three of them if they refused to let her out unaccompanied. She was in control of herself, and her ghost. No one was going to make her the village idiot.

Touching the damn thing comforted him somehow, but giving it up was the only way to convince Liz that his physical issues had nothing to do with crystals, or witchcraft, or Sandra Kensington. Elisabeth’s ghost had damaged him.

She’d find it when she came downstairs and hopefully that would put the issue to rest. Then there would be another one. Liz was losing her battle with Elisabeth, becoming more paranoid and flighty every day. Snapping at and suspecting everyone of being out to get her, even Kevin who didn’t even know what the word devious meant.

Maybe she’d always been like that and he’d never noticed it until adversity flushed out her demons. There were a lot of things he’d discovered about her that he never knew.

Mae and Kevin sat watching TV in the parlor, snuggled together like newlyweds. Eddie was sound asleep in Kevin’s arms.

A twinge of regret, jealousy perhaps, pinged inside Mike. Why couldn’t he and Liz sit together like that, holding their son, instead of arguing and pushing each other away? Why did every encounter find them at opposite poles these days? Being near her conjured anything but peace, Would she be there when he woke up? Would her ghost disturb his sleep and put him into another body slamming deep freeze? Would she turn on him like she’d turned on everyone else, imagining all sorts of devious plans to usurp her, ridicule her, control her, when there were none, while all people wanted was for her to be safe and happy?

It was time to go back upstairs, but he really didn’t want to. “I’ll take Eddie up.”

Kevin’s eyes were half closed, his head resting on Mae’s shoulder “Oh, yeah, sure. This movie is terrible.” He stood and handed the sleeping tyke over.

“‘Tis one of the worst I’ve seen in a while. Let’s get goin’. Mike’s dyin’ to get back to Liz.” Mae winked at him.

Despite the licentious insinuation, being near his own wife was more intimacy than he could stand right now, be it his recent illness, the ghostly aura, her paranoia, or all of the above.

As he headed up the stairs, Eddie’s head tucked against his chest thawed Mike’s heart a bit. But the front door closed, leaving him alone to look after both Liz and the baby, which was rapidly becoming a chore rather than a cherished ritual.

She looked up as he passed, scribbling on some papers while in bed, and a warm motherly smile curled her lips.

He sought refuge in the nursery, and watched as Eddie snuggled on his side, arms wrapped around his latest lovey: a plush tiger Mike had won for him at a carnival the past summer, when the weather was warm, and he enjoyed being a husband and father, and everything seemed right with the world.

Liz alternated between a note pad and typing into an electronic keyboard. Her nose scrunched as she rifled through notes. Disgusted, she piled everything on the floor next to the bed and slid under the covers.

“How’s the book coming along?” Mike sat on his side of the bed with barely enough strength to contemplate washing up and putting on his pajamas.

“I’m at a stalemate,” she answered. “I need more information about a certain dressmaker and some prints for illustrations. The only place to get them is at the William Morris Gallery in London. They don’t have it on any electronic data files, and I need to go in person to search the archives.”

“Well, that’s not a possibility right now. Financially, I mean. London wouldn’t be a bad place to go on a honeymoon, once the weather warms up.” Truth was he’d go to Alaska in the middle of winter to get away from this house.

“Yes,” she murmured, obviously still angry about their earlier argument.

Time to change the subject. “I guess Eddie is finally weaned.” Mike stopped but it was too late to retract the statement. Jeez, that medicine makes me do crazy things.

Liz’s snapped like a rubber band. “I suppose you think that’s a good thing.”

“Neither good nor bad, just a statement of fact.” He tried pulling his foot out of his mouth but was already gagging on it.

“It’s actually very sad for me, but I suppose a man can’t understand that.” Tears glistened in her eyes.

“I can appreciate how special that relationship is, and how hard it must be to realize your baby is getting older.” At one point, they’d talked about trying to have another baby, theirs, before Liz got any older. Always farfetched and now, under these circumstances, preposterous.

“Will Eddie hate me like Jay when he’s twenty, too?” Her voice trailed off like she’d dropped off a cliff mid-sentence.

“Children grow up, get lost in their own problems. I thought I’d never see Allison again. Jay reached out, but you didn’t want to talk to him.” Hopefully that would be the end of this.

“Yes.” Liz turned her back and curled around her pillow.

He should lie down, put his arms around his wife, and comfort her. Instead, he went to put on pajamas.

When he came out, she was either asleep or faking it, her facial muscles more tense than he ever seen. Was Liz examining her decision to marry him and allow him to stand in as the baby’s father in the bright light of all the troubles that had caused? What had ever possessed him to insist?

He flicked off the light and drifted to sleep, restless despite the exhaustion. When the chill ran through him, he knew before opening his eyes Elisabeth would be standing in front of the window. Mike’s heart raced. There was no way he’d go near her again.

He huddled against Liz, who lay on her side in between him and the specter. Her heart beat nearly half of his, which fluttered like a bird trying to get out of a cage. The ghost drifted into Eddie’s nursery. Mike ran to intercept her before she touched the baby.

The image dangled in mid air, on the other side of the walk-in closet, staring at the green silk dress swathed in a clear plastic bag, hanging amidst the other clothes. Elisabeth moved toward Eddie.

“Leave him alone.” Mike started toward the crib, prepared to put himself between her and the baby even if it killed him.

Elisabeth turned to his voice. Her lips moved in a silent chant that rang in his head as loud as if she’d shouted, “Such an angel. His father has never seen him or held him.” Her teeth clenched. She shook her head. Ghostly tears slid down her face, flashes of silver against gray, translucent flesh.

Mike shivered violently as Elisabeth drifted past him, back toward the window. She dissolved into a fog. He covered the sleeping baby with another blanket and, trembling from both fear and blood like frozen sludge in his veins, crawled back into bed. Had he conjured this by bringing up the subject of babies and children? Certainly he couldn’t fault his slumbering wife in any way.