The strange part? Arthur couldn’t see our Jo...and Clare and I couldn’t see his Henry.
I learned early on that was just how it worked with our two ghosts. First Street was little more than a lane, but it was enough to separate the two star-crossed lovers. Trapped in the two houses, they were apparently fated to forever reach but never touch, forever waiting but never reuniting.
Anyway, even after almost twenty years of being with Rhys, I’d still kept to my promise. I never mentioned her to either my husband or our daughter.
“Are you coming?” Jo’s impatient voice was in my ear.
“Jeez, Jo. I’m coming. Keep your shirt on.”
“You sound like your mother.”
I went quickly up the stairs and entered the guest room. It had been my bedroom. Long before that, it had been the room where Jo had died while staying with Esme.
Though more than two decades had passed since I moved out, Clare had kept the room almost exactly as I’d left it. My posters still hung on the walls, and the old bookcase stood by the window. The only major change was the bed. My childhood twin had been replaced with a queen-size bed, the one Rhys and I used whenever we visited.
And there were two new additions since our last stay. By the window stood a long, freestanding oval mirror, one of my mother’s favorite silk scarves draped casually over the top. And in the far corner, an antique mahogany secretary desk with carved ball-and-claw feet. The glass-doored upper cabinet had mullioned panels and adjustable shelves. The lower section was open, its sloped writing surface pulled down to reveal pigeonholes and tiny drawers inside.
The one window had already been opened by Ocean. As I stepped fully into the room, the door swung shut behind me.
And not from any breeze.
It was Jo. She wanted privacy.
She appeared before me, one hand on her hip. “Clare’s been gone for ten days. What took you so long?”
“So you brought me up here to chew me out?”
“In my day, you could have taken a slow train from California and still gotten to Connecticut before this.”
I sat down on the edge of the bed and shook my head.
“Some of us have real lives and real responsibilities, Jo.” I knew that she was upset about Clare being gone. But being a ghost and knowing what the afterlife was like, she should be dealing with it better than I could. Besides, Jo was strong-willed, but she also had the sweetest disposition. I’d never seen her cross, if this was how I could describe her mood now. “I’m here now. What’s wrong?”
“What did they tell you about what happened?”
Things started clicking into place. She couldn’t watch the news, or have someone casually stop by to fill her in. Her only sources of information were my mother, who was gone. And me.
“Arthur said she had dinner at his house and came home around eight,” I said. “Sometime after that, she went out to the carriage house to check on something. Arthur found her the next morning when he came by to return her platter. She didn’t answer the front door, so he went into the barn. That’s where he found her. The EMTs said she must have tripped and hit her head.”
“No. No. No. I was afraid of that.” Jo started pacing. “They’re making it out to be an accident. That’s not what happened.”
I sat up straighter. “What do you mean?”
“She did come back around eight. We were chatting in the sitting room. She was going on about the terrible casserole Arthur made for dinner. It was something I’d never even heard of.” Jo wrinkled her nose. “What in heaven’s name is tofu?”
That was the thing about talking to a ghost from another century. She loved to talk, but was often out of touch with the modern world. Tangents were par for the course. My mother never had long conversations with Jo while I lived here. I, on the other hand, usually enjoyed them.
Until now.
“Jo, get to the point.”
Her tone changed.
“Someone was in the barn.”
I froze. “What do you mean, someone was in there?”
“We saw him come in from the street. Clare switched off the kitchen lights so we could see better. We watched from the back window as he opened the barn door and went inside.” Jo paused, shaking her head. “Now that I think about it, the intruder could’ve been a woman. Hard to say. They were wearing one of those heavy hooded shirts. Not exactly stylish, but I see them often enough from the window. Every delivery person seems to?—”
