A Valentine Wish (Gates-Cameron 1)

“Where have you been?” she demanded without preamble as she appeared in the corner of his bedroom.

“That,” Dean told her as he finished unbuttoning his shirt, “is none of your business.”

He took his shirt off and tossed it over the chair. From what he’d heard earlier, it wouldn’t be the first time Mary Anna Cameron had seen a man without a shirt on.

Anna looked a bit taken aback by his bluntness. “Its something wrong?”

“No.” He sat on the edge of the bed to kick off his shoes.

“Would you like me to leave?”

“Yes. No.”

He ran a hand through his hair, wishing he knew what he wanted, where Mary Anna Cameron was concerned. He only knew that his feelings toward her were becoming more confused by the day. And that every time he saw her, he was more aware of how beautiful she was. There were parts of him that didn’t seem to understand how completely inaccessible she was to him.

She stood with her hands clasped in front of her, watching him closely. “You look tired.”

“Yeah. I guess I am.” He took a deep breath and looked at her, remembering the favor she’d asked him. “I spent the afternoon at a dedication of the new library. Margaret Peavy Vandover, your stepfather’s granddaughter, was there, as well as other descendants of people you knew.”

Anna’s eyes widened. “Charles’s daughter?”

He nodded.

“I remember when she was born. He and his wife were running the inn then. They sold it to that strange couple by the name of Harvey.”

“So you’ve been here at the inn ever since...?”

“Since we died? I told you. Sometimes here. Sometimes at that other place.”

“Can you leave the inn? Go into town? Get into a car, maybe?”

“No. Ian tried once. Once we reach the boundary of our property, we find ourselves back at the waiting place.”

Dean was too tired to dwell on the oddities of her existence. “Oh.”

“Did you find out anything at the dedication? Anything about us, I mean?”

“Very little. I met a man named R. J. Cooley. He’s the grandson of Jeffrey Parker.” He watched for her reaction as he said the name.

She reacted with a flicker of her eyelashes and a tinge of what might have been a blush on her pale cheeks. “Jeffrey has a grandson?” she asked a bit weakly.

Dean nodded. “R.J. talked about his grandfather and his grandma Wanda.”

“Wanda? Wanda Nisbet? Jeffrey married her?”

“I don’t know her maiden name, but apparently she was a friend of yours.”

Anna snorted. “A friend? Hardly. We were rivals from the day we started elementary school. Everything I had, Wanda had to have a better one. Every boyfriend I ever had, she tried to steal. I always thought she was secretly in love with Ian, but he never acknowledged her existence.”

“She must have gotten over him. She and Jeff were married for nearly fifty years and had four kids.”

Anna’s expression turned wistful. “I always knew Jeffrey would make a wonderful father.”

“If it makes you feel any better, apparently Jeffrey never really got over you,” Dean said grudgingly “He told his grandson that he had never forgotten you.”

Anna’s face brightened. “How sweet.”

“And he never believed the rumors about you. He thought you were an innocent bystander, in the wrong place at the wrong time.”