“I don’t think that’s correct. Granddad said it was guilt that killed Obed. The man woke up, saw Caleb standing there, and was so afraid of what might happen that he died instantly. There wasn’t even time for Granddad to ask him what happened to Valentina.”
Alix looked down at the table. “Has he danced with many people?”
Jared gave a little laugh. “As far as I know, that’s the only time my grandfather has danced with anyone.”
Alix heard the love in Jared’s voice at the word “grandfather.” She wondered what it was like to grow up with a ghost for a relative. But right now she wasn’t ready to nonchalantly discuss such things. She glanced at the metal box. “What are we going to do with Valentina’s journal? We can’t very well hand it over to a ghost. Well, maybe we could. But …” She looked at him for help.
“I think there’s only one thing we can do with it,” Jared said, his face absolutely serious.
At first she didn’t know what he meant, then she saw the sparkle in his eyes. Her face was just as serious as his. “We must use it to protect the floors.”
Jared grinned. “My thoughts exactly. Do you think that if we give Victoria this journal, we could prevent her from tearing up Kingsley House looking for Aunt Addy’s diaries?”
“I don’t know. Sometimes Mom is easy to persuade and sometimes she’s impossible. She might insist on writing Aunt Addy’s story first.”
“There goes the wallpaper,” Jared muttered as he put a stack of pancakes in front of Alix.
“These look good. I was beginning to think you only knew how to fry fish.”
“And you’d be right. I found this carton in the fridge and told myself I could do it. How much harder could pancakes be than a skyscraper?”
Alix gave her first smile of the day—a small one—as she took a bite. “These are quite good.”
“Thank you,” he said, putting another plate on the table and sitting down. He motioned with his fork to the box. “What are we going to do with this thing?”
“Give it to Mom on the condition that she swear a blood oath not to dismantle anything in the house looking for Aunt Addy’s journals?” Alix’s head came up. “Maybe Caleb knows where—”
“Don’t even say it. Of course he knows where they are. I’ve asked him a thousand times. Maybe you could ask him—” He broke off as Alix’s face seemed to lose color. “Too soon?”
“Oh, yes,” she said. “Much too soon. Too bad Mom ca
n’t see him. I’m sure he’d tell her.”
“Probably. He likes pretty women.”
“It’s more than that. Mom is a ringer for Valentina.”
Jared paused with the fork on the way to his mouth. “What?”
“I told you all of this,” Alix said. “Or as much as I could before you changed the subject. I saw Parthenia’s wedding. She looks like Jilly and the man she married looks like my dad. It’s interesting that he was named John Kendricks and now he’s a Kenneth. He—”
Reaching across the table, Jared put his hand over hers. “What about Valentina and Victoria?” His eyes were intense.
“My mother was Valentina. I saw her at the wedding and Caleb told me how they met. It was quite funny. He—” When Jared abruptly stood up, she could see that he wasn’t listening. “What’s wrong?”
He turned away so Alix couldn’t see that he was shaking in fear. He could clearly hear what he’d said to his grandfather just before Alix arrived. He even remembered his tone of sarcasm mixed with anger.
“You’re waiting for the return—or the reincarnation, whatever—of the woman you love, your precious Valentina. And you’ve always been faithful to her. I’ve heard it all before. Heard it all my life. You’ll know her when you see her, then you two will go off into the sunset together. Which means that either she dies or you come back to life.”
“Jared, are you okay?”
He took a breath and turned back to her. Above all else, he didn’t want Alix to figure out what he was thinking. He tried to look cheerful. “I hate to do this but I have to go back to the house for an hour or so. For work. Want to go with me?”
“Not yet,” she said.
“I can’t leave you alone. I’ll call Lexie and—”
“No!” Alix said. “I’m not an invalid and I’m not going to imagine that I’m seeing ghosts everywhere.” She paused. “There aren’t any in this house, are there? And can Caleb …?”