He took the card with an awkward smile. “They told us you were coming out for the ghost problem.”
Heather chuckled. “The ghosts think we’re the problem.”
His eyes widened slightly. “Are they…dangerous?”
His fear of ghosts seemed to distract him from his uncertainty about her. She was used to the wariness of strangers. Her pale skin, silver hair, and ice-blue eyes made it impossible for her to blend in. Most of the time people struggled not to stare, but the effort to keep from staring usually ended up making the situation even more awkward. As a child, her grandmother told her the albinism that produced a lack of pigment gave her an ethereal look, like an angel.
Childhood bullies said otherwise.
Luckily, Heather was never really alone. The ghosts were never far away.
“They’re not usually a threat.” Heather shook her head at the security guard. “Poltergeists can be dicey because they can touch objects on our plane. The spirits I met tonight weren’t like that. They were patients of the hospital. Things should be quieter now, but you have my card if you need me to visit again.”
His shoulders visibly relaxed and he smiled. “Thanks, Miss Storrey.”
“Heather.” She offered her hand.
He paused for a moment and finally reached out, accepting her greeting. “Heather.” He released her hand and cleared his throat. “Sorry about before…I”—he shook his head—“I’ve never seen someone so—” He closed his mouth, obviously certain he was about to insert his foot.
“Unique?” Heather offered with a raised brow.
He nodded, eager to accept her description. “I didn’t mean any offense.”
“None taken.” And she meant it.
As a teen, his reaction might’ve bothered her, but with her thirtieth birthday coming up, she’d learned to be comfortable in her own skin. Every day she gave less fucks about the approval of others and embraced the reality that if she took offense every time someone gawked as she passed by, she’d never get a chance to smile.
Life was too short to allow others to determine her mood.
She hadn’t always been so self-assured. She’d spent much of her childhood envying her twin sister, Ashley.
Their unique birth made the local newspapers at the time. Although they were identical twins born only a few minutes apart, they were opposites. A rare genetic anomaly gave Ashley a head full of chocolate-brown hair, while Heather’s was snow-white. She dyed her hair for a year of high school in an effort to fit in. It hadn’t worked.
The security guard tucked her business card into his shirt pocket and tugged the brim of his hat. “Drive carefully.”
“Thank you.” She continued to her car, but as she reached for the door, a small hand slipped into hers, sending an icy chill up her arm.
Heather fought the urge to turn for a better look at the boy in the corner of her eye. Usually she heard the dead; seeing them and feeling their touch was rare. The few times it had happened, their forms were visible only in her peripheral vision. If she turned to look, they were gone.
“Please don’t let them take me back,” the boy pleaded.
He wore black breeches and a dirtied white loose-fitting shirt with laces. Maybe Jacobite? Either way, they were far from the fashions she would expect on a Southern boy from the 1920s, and his accent wasn’t the familiar Southern drawl of the area, either. Instead, it was notably British, bordering on Cockney. Definitely not from around Savannah.
So how did he get here and why?
“Who is after you?” she whispered.
“The witches. They pulled me out of the ocean. Please help.” The sensation of weight in her hand vanished, and his image thinned. The boy’s eyes widened with panic. “They’ll drive him mad!” The boy panted. “Promise you will protect him.”
Heather frowned. “Who?”
“My uncle. He thinks it’s his fault.”
Deciphering messages from spirits often resembled piecing together a jigsaw puzzle, but this time she had so few pieces. “What’s his fault?”
The boy glanced around, flickering in and out of view. “They’re coming. Protect my uncle. Please.”
“I will.” Heather nodded, without turning and losing the vision. “Tell me who.”
“Drake Cole.”
She blinked. She recognized that name. A few weeks ago, Drake put himself between her and a bullet. He was tall, with broad shoulders, a chiseled jaw, and strong hands. Other than a sizable jagged scar over his right eye, she might’ve mistaken him for Thor straight out of the Avengers movies. Unlike the Norse god, Drake’s deep blue eyes opened a window into the soul of a man who had lost too much for his young age.
He couldn’t possibly be the uncle of this boy who must’ve perished lifetimes ago.
Before she could question him further, the apparition was gone.
…
Drake Cole cursed under his breath as the top runner of the twelve-foot mahogany door missed the track inside the pocket of the wall. His voice was more of a grunt as he bore the weight of the antique door against his shoulder and glanced up at Jax perched at the top of the ladder. “I can’t hold it much longer.”
“I’m sorry,” she muttered, readjusting the slides. “If you can lift it just half an inch more, I should be able to…” The track creaked as the wheels caught the groove. “Got it!”
Jaxton Raine was a college intern from SCAD. When the Savannah College of Art and Design first opened, Drake had accepted a few students to intern with him, but eventually he stopped. Mingling with mortals served no good purpose. It led to complicated friendships that required more lies to hide his secret. Jax had been the first apprentice he’d agreed to mentor in years.
Apparently, she’d been a proud Girl Scout for most of her life, and she also fostered a strong interest in woodworking with an emphasis on furniture construction. When she’d heard the Juliette Gordon Low house had a restoration project underway, she researched the contractors and looked him up. Her tenacity made it
