She and Cherry were sitting at Trib’s for lunch. They were the only ones there, as he opened at eleven and they’d shown up minutesbefore.
“Seeing as I only have thirty-five minutes till my vinyasa class,” Cherry said when Trib opened the door to them at ten fifty-five, “I figured you wouldn’t mind letting us in a smidgeearly.”
“Whatever,” he said. Today his bow tie was carnation pink and he wore a charcoal-on-black striped shirt, charcoal suspenders, and excellently tailored black slacks. He looked like a million bucks—at least, as far as his attire went. His mood, however, seemed distracted instead of its normal cheery one. “Have a seat. Wherever you want. I assume you want your regular,Cherry?”
No sooner had he minced off to the kitchen in his Italian loafers with their order than Leslie launched into her news. “So that means,” she said at the end of the story, “the ghost can’t be Dorothy Duchene. I’ve been looking at it allwrong.”
She and Cherry glanced up as Trib brought them water (no ice for Cherry—“it’s better for the digestion”) and a plate containing three small puddles of…something.
“This is my blueberry pâté, my homemade pear marmalade, and cherry-mint preserves. I’m sampling them today,” he said, placing a tiny basket of rustic-looking crackers next to them. “Enjoy, ladies. I’ll be tied up for a few minutes in back with Aaron finalizing the catering numbers for the mega-reunion on Sunday—that’ll be the pâté’s official debut, in fact. I’msoexcited. Incidentally, Luddy’s working on your order, and it should be out inplentyof time for you to get to your vinyasa class.” He gave them a slightly harried smile and rushed off to theback.
“I forgot he was doing the catering on Sunday,” Cherry said. “Maybe Iwillmake an appearance at the reunion. At least the food’ll begood.”
“Who knows—maybe one of your old flames will show up and you’ll be able to forget about stalking the blacksmith in town.” Leslie managed to say the words lightly, but inside she felt the unpleasant lurch of herheart.
She didn’t really know what to do—if anything—to mend the rift with Declan. Maybe there wasn’t even enough there to try. After all, they really didn’t know each other that well. And she couldn’t change the past, as much as she might liketo.
“The blacksmith is taken,” Cherry said, then looked at her sharply. “Isn’the?”
Leslie frowned and, to her embarrassment, realized her eyes were burning as tears gathered there. “Not somuch.”
“Oh dear.” Cherry reached across and patted her hand. “I’m sorry, Les. What happened? Want to talk about it? I promise not to make any jokes about too many irons in the fire or anything likethat.”
Leslie laughed reluctantly, then told her briefly what happened. “And that’s how I ended up watchingGlee—which, I’m not sure what all the fuss was about over that show anyway—at one in the morning. And I sort of woke up hearing that song, and that’s when I realized what itwas.”
“So the ghost must be someone who died in the eighties—or after, I guess. I’m not sure when the song came out. Early eighties, Ithink.”
“I was thinking…I wonder if it could be Kristen van Gerste,” Leslie said. “She was wearing a flapper dress that night,remember?”
“What about Kristen van Gerste?” Trib said as he set two plates on the table. One was a salad, heaped high with roasted fall veggies, sun-dried Traverse City cherries, and kale for Cherry. The other was Leslie’s sandwich, made from a crusty whole-grain loaf with house-made chicken salad, artichoke hearts, and roasted red peppertapenade.
Leslie’s mouth watered, for she hadn’t felt much like eating since her aborted dinner with Declan last evening. But she responded before taking a bite of her sandwich. “Whether it’s possible the ghost at Shenstone House is Kristen, not Dorothy Duchene, as I’dthought.”
“But don’t ghosts only haunt where they die?” Trib asked with a frown. “She was found in the woods, you know.” Then he stilled, his eyes widening hugely behind his glasses. “Unless she was killedat Shenstone House. Oh my God.” He clapped a hand over his mouth and goggled at them. “What if she was killed there and moved to the woods…” He looked white as a ghosthimself.
“Poor sweet, darling Kristen. She didn’t deserve any of that.” He blinked rapidly, then removed a pale blue handkerchief from his trouser pocket. “Damned Marcus Levin. If he hadn’t been such a prick, she’d probably still be alive today. Oh,” he wailed softly, removing his glasses to dab at his eyes. “It just brings it all back, doesn’t it? This, and the reunion, and just…all of it. It brings it all back like it wasyesterday.”
Since neither Cherry nor Leslie had actually been around at the time, neither could respond appropriately. Still, Leslie didn’t disagree with any of his sentiments—including the suggestion that Kristen could easily have been killed inside Shenstone House, and then, for some unknown reason, had her body moved and left in the woods. And the topazesstolen.
“I was going to see if I could find a picture of Kristen that night at the prom—to see if she looks like the ghost,” Leslie said as Trib was called back to thekitchen.
“That’ll be easy—she’d have been in the paper, not only as Homecoming queen but also, unfortunately, because of the disappearance, of course,” Cherry said. “Let’s see…theEnterprisewould have been the main paper in town at the time. You can look online, but the library probably has archives.” She glanced at her watch and grimaced. “If only I had time, I’d come and help youlook.”
“No problem, auntie,” Leslie said. “The guys are coming to sand the upstairs hallway and bedroom floors, so I was planning on clearing out of the house for most of the day anyway. I have to pick up a special order in Grand Rapids—the antique pulls for the guest bathrooms came in—and I’ll probably stop at the mall there, so I won’t get to the library till later thisafternoon.”
Plus, I don’t feel like doing much else of anything. Might as well go to the library. Bury my nose in a book—or some archives—there.
* * *
There wassomething about a library that comforted Leslie, even though she hadn’t been in one for ages—nor had she had much time to read for pleasure over the last ten years, due to her all-consumingcareer.
The smell of old books—especially in an older building like the one she visited in the larger city of Holland, the nearest library to Wicks Hollow—the tall ceilings, the shelves upon shelves of goodies… She wondered what would happen if the apocalypse came and people had to rebuild civilization. Wouldn’t everyone want to live in an oldlibrary?
She decided that if something likeI Am Legendever happened, she’d definitely take up residence in alibrary.
In hopes of ensuring the sanding guys would be gone by the time she got home, Leslie wandered through the children’s books section and found many of her childhood favorites. And then, because she was really feeling down and more than a little sadistic, she searched out the old historical romance novel about the blacksmith she’d read to pieces over theyears.
Whether it was fate or just good luck, she didn’t know—but not only did the library have the book, it was for sale in the used book section. The paperback—titledLove’s Forbidden Caress, by Theodora MacKenzie—was just waiting for her, with its aged taupe pages, bent cover in lurid pinks, golds, and oranges, and creased binding. Leslie snatched it up and enthusiastically paid a dollar for it at the librarycounter.
