A Valentine Wish (Gates-Cameron 1)

Both Sharyn and Mae looked confused by his words.

“What do you mean?” Sharyn asked. “No one around here would do anything like that. Oh, sure, there have been a few school kids who’ve done things over the years—boys trying to scare their girlfriends, practical jokers, you know the type. But it’s unlikely something will happen to you.”

“Whatever made you say that, Dean?” Mae asked, puzzled. “Has something already happened?”

He shook his head, uncertain why he was so reluctant to discuss the incident in the attic, and afterward on the garden path. “Forget it. It wouldn’t work, anyway. I’d never fall for it.”

Smiling, Mae glanced at Sharyn. In unison, they recited, “He doesn’t believe in ghosts.”

“I think he’s made that clear enough,” Sharyn added wryly as Mae laughed.

Sharyn didn’t stay much longer, nor did Dean encourage her to. He walked her to the door, bade her a polite, if brief, good-night and locked the door behind her with a sense of relief that he and his aunt were finally alone again in their new home. He was tired, and he had a long day of manual labor ahead of him tomorrow. He wanted to turn in early.

“Good night, dear,” Mae said a short while later, rising on tiptoe in the doorway to her bedroom to kiss her nephew’s cheek.

“Good night, Aunt Mae. Sleep well.”

She smiled. “Are you worried that the ghost stories over the dinner table will make me have nightmares? Or is it your dreams that concern you?”

He smiled chidingly. “Hardly I’m too tired to dream tonight, anyway.”

“Is that it?” she murmured, suddenly looking a bit sad. “Or have you simply forgotten how to dream, Dean?”

He frowned. “I don’t know what you—”

She brushed off his words with a shake of her head. “Never mind. I’m just tired, myself. Good night.”

She closed her door politely in his face.

Still a bit bewildered by her comment, Dean headed for his own bed. He really needed some sleep.

SOMETHING WOKE HIM in the middle of the night. Not quite a noise. Not quite a feeling. But something...

She was standing in the corner of his bedroom, among the shadows created by the soft glow of a night-light through the open bathroom doorway. Shewas still wearing the long white dress. And she still looked at him as though she desperately needed something from him.

Her lips moved. This time, he thought he heard her. Her voice was a soft, faint whisper, little more than a musical breeze.

“Lies,” she said, the word shivering down his bare spine. “Everything she told you ...lies. We didn’t—it wasn’t—oh, damnation.”

Her form shimmered. Still groggy and disbelieving, Dean rubbed his eyes.

Her voice dropped even softer, a hint of sound at the very edge of his hearing. “Help us,” she whispered with more than a touch of demand in the plea. “Please...help us...”

And she was gone.

Dean shook his head slowly, as though to clear it. Then he looked back at that now-unoccupied, shadowfilled corner.

A straight-backed chair sat there. The white shirt he’d worn earlier lay over it. A dream, he told himself.

He thought he knew what had happened. Despite his smugness with his aunt earlier, he had allowed his dreams to be influenced by Sharyn’s fanciful stories. Still mostly asleep, he’d sat up in bed, spotted the white shirt and transformed it in his sleep-dazed mind into the beautiful woman he’d seen earlier.

Shaking his head in self-disgust, he fell back on the bed, staring at the ceiling with eyes now fully alert. What a first day he’d had here! He sincerely hoped it wasn’t an omen.

He scowled. He believed in omens no more than he believed in ghos

ts. He refused to allow his new life to be marred by silly superstitions. Everyone dreamed. Daylight would dawn, and life would go on. And soon this episode, like the others, would be forgotten.

But even as he closed his eyes and tried to force himself back to sleep, he thought he heard that soft, floating whisper. “Please...help us.”