Page 56 of A Ghost of a Chance

He had to try. For them both.

Chapter Seventeen

Despite her vow, Osanne waited in the churchyard for Rafe. Other spirits drifted past her. She glared at her gravestone. It was more weathered and moss-covered each time she awoke. Even her marker aged more than she did.

She had no one to blame but herself that he hadn’t come. Small consolation that Rafe had probably found solace in the arms of Ben’s sister, Kitty. Such devotion clearly deserved a reward, and Rafe must have found that irresistible. Osanne should wish them well, but the oppressing darkness in her silenced that noble idea.

How foolish to have believed that this half-life—not a life at all, really—could be better than oblivion. She would rather cease to exist than continue on in this hellish isolation.

She hovered above the ground without purpose. No pranksters threatened the villagers. No pull toward Ravenswood Manor—Rafe’s home. No song played in her mind. No burning need to discover her brother’s fate.

If they had performed the ceremony Rafe mentioned, she could have moved on to whatever fate awaited her, and Rafe could have moved on to a real life. One where he didn’t feel an irresistible pull to see her every year. She would be gone.

If there were even a sliver of a possibility that she might be restored to life, she would gladly take the chance so they could have a real life together. Either way, he would spend a lifetime with a living, breathing woman who loved him.

A low wail seeped out of her. “Oh, Rafe. I would have risked it for you.”

At dawn, when that light appeared, she would go to it, either to nothingness or to Heaven and eternal rest. Her parents had believed in Heaven. Everyone she knew believed in it. Were they all wrong? It no longer mattered. Heaven or oblivion; she welcomed either.

“So you’ve changed your mind?” A familiar and so very dear voice broke the silence.

Rafe!

He leaned against a tree, so silent and dark that she had not seen him.

He came back!

Suddenly light and beauty adorned the world. The full moon shone brighter, gilding the trees with silver, and the little stream giggled. Even the calls of night birds sounded like a celebration.

She raced to his outstretched arms and focused on pushing back to touch him so forcefully that he staggered. He laughed and pulled her in. Rafe kissed her with a new hunger. A new peace and wholeness and courage crept over her. All was right with the world.

When their mouths parted, he looked down at her with eyes that glittered in the moonlight. “Will you come with me?”

“Anywhere.”

He took her hand. Oh, the joy of his hand in hers! He led her to the vicarage where his friend, Peter Brown, waited on a bench under a bare tree, a lantern hanging from one of the branches. The vicar stood at Rafe’s approach.

Rafe settled on the bench, and Peter resumed his seat.

“Peter, would you please tell us why you think Heaven is real?”

Osanne laughed. “This isn’t necessary.”

Rafe grinned at Peter. “She thinks it isn’t necessary, but I want her to hear you speak.”

“You told him about me?” Osanne gaped at Rafe.

Rafe turned that grin on her. Every star in the sky glittered with new brightness.

Peter drew a breath. “I believe that the soul is immortal and that this time on earth is only a brief moment in our eternal existence. After this life, we go on to a place of rest and dwell with God and his angels. The bible tells us about Heaven, sometimes referring to it as paradise. When our Lord Jesus Christ was about to give up his life on the cross, he told a thief who believed in him in Luke 23:43, ‘this day thou shalt be with me in paradise.’ There are many references to Heaven and paradise—such as the kingdom of God, eternal rest, mansions—as a place where God dwells and where His children go after this life. I believe that is a real place where we rest from our worries and sorrows after we leave this life.”

Osanne chewed on his words. She had been brought up to believe in God, and had done her best to be a good person. If she believed in God, then it stood to reason that she could believe in Heaven, too.

Rafe fixed a solemn gaze on her with those bright, pale eyes. “I cannot tell you of a surety whether or not Heaven is real, or if there really is some sort of life beyond what we know now. But Peter is one of the most honorable men I have ever known. I believe what he tells me, that Heaven truly exists. But what I believe doesn’t matter. What you believe is what matters.”

She put a hand on his cheek. How she adored him!

His and Peter’s earnest expressions and her years of churchgoing, not to mention a faith she had forgotten she’d once possessed, brought a new surety, a new courage.