Tami Hoag - Magic

“Me too,” Rachel murmured. She bit her lip against the tears, but they fell nevertheless, down her cheeks and onto the bodice of the beaded dress.

“You mustn’t cry on satin, Rachel,” Addie said in gentle reproach. “It stains.”

She took the dress from her daughter’s hands and brushed it off before hanging it over the foot of the bed. She got up then and went to the dresser to fetch the hairbrush.

“We have to move, Mother,” Rachel said, watching as Addie plied the brush to the squirrel’s nest she’d made of her hair. “Do you understand that?”

“Yes,” Addie said, staring at their reflection in the mirror above the dresser. She didn’t want to talk about moving. The idea frightened her more and more. She didn’t precisely understand why they had to move. Rachel would explain it to her if she asked, but what was the point? The decision was no longer hers to make. Her independence had slipped through her fingers. Fighting it only made her tired.

“One hundred strokes a night,” she said, shuffling across the floor to stand behind Rachel. Slowly, gently, she drew the brush bristles through her daughter’s pale gold hair, “You’ll have to count, dear, I can’t get past forty anymore. Or is it sixty?”

“That’s all right, Mother,” Rachel said, smiling through her tears. “I’ll count.”

“No.” Addie brushed steadily, methodically, her ability to accomplish the simple task calming her. “Sing for me. You have a voice like an angel. Sing the aria from Zaïde . Mozart was an idiot, but he made wonderful music.”

Rachel took a deep breath, swallowing down the knot in her throat, and she sang the aria from Zaïde , “ Ruhe sanft”- rest quietly. It was a sweet song, the notes all purity and light and innocence. She was out of practice, but she had been blessed with a natural talent that made practice seem redundant. Her voice held an ethereal loveliness, a purity of its own that carried the song throughout the old house though she sang softly. And when she finished, the silence was absolute, as if the house itself were holding its breath in awe.

Addie put the brush aside and rested her thin, age-spotted hands on her daughter’s shoulders. “You’re a good daughter, Rachel.”

Rachel smiled. This was what she had prayed for, what she had pinned her hopes on, some sign from Addie that all was forgiven. There would be no emotional reconciliation scene full of hugs and kisses and tears of joy. That wasn’t the way of the Lindquists. But this, in its own way, was just as touching, just as meaningful. It was certainty every bit as precious to her. She had feared this moment would never come, that Addie would slip away from her and they would never be anything but strangers with nothing between them but bitterness.

She reached up to cover her mother’s hand with her own and wished fleetingly that she could have shared this moment with Bryan. But Bryan was gone. All she had now was Addie.

“Thank you, Mother.”

Addie sighed and shuffled toward the door. “Go tell Wimsey dinner will be ready soon. I just have to feed the bird first.”

That quickly Addie was gone. The fragile connection between reality and her mind was lost.

What a gift these last few minutes had been, Rachel thought, watching her mother shuffle away. Like magic.

Maybe there was such a thing after all.

Addie’s shriek pulled Rachel from her musings and catapulted her off the bed. She pulled her jeans on and ran out in to the hall, heading in the direction of her mother’s angry voice.

“I’ll get you this time, you ugly thing!”

Addie stopped halfway down the hall and flung a rock at the apparition standing wreathed in smoke near the secret door. Her form would have done a major league pitcher proud. The stone sailed high and inside, catching the ghostly figure squarely on the forehead.

He grunted in pain and fell back against the partially opened door, closing it and sealing off his own escape route. His sunken eyes went wide with panic. He turned toward the two women, raising his arms and his white cape along with it.

“I am the ghost of Ebenezer Drake!” he wailed, stepping toward them, smoke rolling out from behind him accompanied by a high-pitched wheezing sound. “I come to cast you from my-ouch!”

Addie let fly another stone, bouncing this one off his chest. Rachel grabbed her by one arm and attempted to drag her away from the advancing figure, but her mother shook her off long enough to reach into her pocket. She heaved a half-finished cheeseburger that hit her target smack in the face. Ketchup trickled down his long nose.

“Mother, come on!” Rachel insisted, pulling Addie down the hall. “We have to get the police!”

“Leave!” the ghost wailed. “Leave this house!”

Miles Porchind let himself into the study through the French doors. Dressed all in black in a vain effort to hide his considerable bulk, he waddled across the room with a flashlight in his hand, going directly to the portrait of Arthur Drake III that hung on the paneled wall behind the desk. He shined his light up at the man’s face.

“Thought you were so clever, didn’t you?”

“As a matter of fact, yes,” Bryan said, stepping out from behind the curtains. “I think I was awfully clever, don’t you?”

“You!” Porchind gasped, wheeling away from the wall. He made a dash for the door to the hall, grabbing the knob, twisting and rattling it. The door didn’t budge.

“Oh, that door sticks something fierce,” Bryan said mildly, flipping on a light. “You know how these old houses are. Actually, I like to think the ghost is holding it shut.”

“There is no ghost, you moron!” Porchind snapped, wheeling back around to face him, his florid face contorted with rage.

“No?” Bryan frowned in mock disappointment. “I guess that means Shane might get to use his gun after all.” He shrugged as the fat man blanched. “Well, that’ll make him happy. So, Mr. Porchind, to what do we owe this not-so-unexpected visit? Doing a little after-hours art shopping?”

“I came to claim what is rightfully mine!” he declared emphatically.

Bryan looked surprised. “Yours? Hmmm. I think the authorities might have something to say about that, seeing how you don’t own this house or anything in it.”

“Drake stole that gold.”

“From a notorious criminal.”

“I will have the gold, Mr. Hennessy,” Porchind said purposefully.

Bryan raised a brow as the man produced a revolver from behind him. “Deciding to follow in the family tradition, I see.”

“Shut up,” Porchind ordered, his breath coming in short gasps. “Come over here and take this picture down.”

Bryan shrugged. “If you say so.”

He sauntered across the room and easily lifted the heavy gilt frame from its hook. The wall behind it was blank.

“Where’s the safe?” Porchind demanded, his chest heaving like a bellows. Sweat beaded on his bald head and ran down the sides of his face in little rivers.

“There is no safe.”

The fat man’s eyes bulged as his cheeks turned crimson. “But-but-you told Rasmussen-”

Bryan grinned engagingly. “I lied.”

His admission met with a murderous look. “You rotten…”

Porchind lifted the revolver and aimed. Bryan swung the portrait sideways, catching the man hard across the stomach with the thick frame. Porchind staggered back as his breath left him in a gust. Suddenly his feet kicked out from under him, and he fell backward with a strangled squeal. The revolver discharged as he hit the floor, the bullet exploding into the fireplace, nicking a chunk out of the brick.

The study door burst open, and Shane Callan charged into the room with a nine-millimeter Smith & Wesson in his hands. He trained the gun on Porchind and smiled a purely predatory smile, gray eyes gleaming.