Jeaniene Frost - One Grave at a Time

“I can explain,” Fabian began, throwing me a beseeching look over Bones’s shoulder.

“Allow me,” the female ghost replied in an accent that might have been German. “First, let me introduce myself. My name is Elisabeth.”

She dipped into a curtsy, first to Bones, then to me as she spoke, her voice even despite her obvious unease.

Some of the tightness left Bones’s shoulders as he bowed in return while extending his leg in a manner that had gone out of style centuries before I was born.

“Bones,” he replied, straightening. “Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

I hid a smile. Bones might be able to snub Madigan’s extended hand without a second thought, but he’d always had a soft spot for women. I settled for giving Elisabeth a smile and a welcoming nod while I told her my name. Hey, curtsying wasn’t something I’d ever done before, but I’d learn just to see Bones do that courtly bow again. He somehow managed to make even the formal gesture look sexy.

“Fabian did not think it wise to reveal my presence to the others,” Elisabeth went on, yanking my attention away from my musings. “That is why he bade me to wait inside for your return.”

She spoke mainly to me though her gaze flicked to Bones more than once in mild consternation. Guess word had traveled that Bones was less than thrilled with my new popularity among the living-impaired.

“Why is it a big deal if the others know you’re here?” I wondered out loud. Sure, some of the ghosts might grumble about Elisabeth’s being inside when they’d been given strict orders not to breach the house’s walls, but it wasn’t every day that Fabian enticed a hot babe to come home with him—

“I am considered an outcast by many of my kind.” The words were whispered so low, I almost wasn’t sure I heard her.

“An outcast?” I repeated. I hadn’t even known ghosts had outcasts. Jeez, looked like no group could totally get along no matter what side of the dirt they were on. “Why?”

Elisabeth squared her shoulders as she met my gaze. “Because I am trying to kill another ghost.”

Both my brows went up while a dozen questions sprang into my mind. Bones let out a low whistle before turning to give me a slight, jaded smile.

“Might as well be comfortable to hear the rest of this, so why don’t we have a seat?”

Fabian nodded toward the curtained windows. “Perhaps you could arrange for more privacy first, Cat?”

Right. The other ghosts might not be able to see our new, enigmatic visitor, but if they floated too close to the house, they might accidentally overhear the rest of our conversation with Elisabeth. I sighed.

“Wait here. I’ll be right back.”

Once I’d politely insisted that all transparent persons vacate the premises for the next hour, I returned to the family room. Bones sat on the couch, a half-empty whiskey glass in his hand. Vampires were one of the few who could honestly claim to drink for the taste since alcohol had zero effect on us.

Fabian and Elisabeth hovered in sitting positions above the couch opposite Bones. I sat next to my husband, tucking up my legs more for warmth than comfort. Predawn in the early fall at these altitudes meant chillier temperatures. If I hadn’t hoped to be in bed soon, I would’ve started a fire. Luckily for me, my cat, Helsing, took my seated position as a cue to jump from his window perch onto the couch next to me. His furry body was like a mini furnace as he settled himself across my legs.

“So,” I said, drawing the word out while I gave Helsing a few scratches around his ears, “how do you two know each other?”

“We met in New Orleans several decades ago,” Elisabeth murmured.

“June, 1935,” Fabian supplied before giving one of his sideburns a self-conscious rub. “I remember because it was, ah, unusually hot that year.”

I almost bit the sides of my cheeks to keep from laughing. Fabian had a crush on the lovely ghost! His lame explanation for remembering the exact month and year they had met when ghosts didn’t even feel temperatures was topped only by the cow-eyed look he darted her way before schooling his features to faux blandness.

Yep, he had it bad, all right.

“Okay, you two have been friends for a while, but you’re not here just for a social visit, so what brings you, Elisabeth?”

I assumed it had something to do with the ghost she wanted to kill, but if so, she’d be shit out of luck. For one, I wasn’t a contract killer of any species, and Bones had long since retired from that business himself. For another, I couldn’t even help my uncle willingly find a way to the other side. So offing a phantom was way outside my abilities even if I did have a sudden urge to go ghostbusting, which I didn’t.

She folded her hands in her lap, fingers twisting together. “Back in 1489, at the age of twenty-seven, I was burned at the stake for witchcraft,” she began softly.

Even though that was over half a millennium ago, I winced. I’d been burned before, and both times had been excruciating experiences.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

Elisabeth nodded, not looking away from her hands. “I wasn’t a witch,” she added, as if that made any difference in the horrific nature of her execution. “I was a midwife who challenged the local magistrate when he accused a mother of deliberately strangling her baby with its own cord. The fool knew nothing of the complications that birthing often wrought, and I told him so. Soon after, he sent for Heinrich Kramer.”

“Who was he?”

“A murdering bastard,” Bones replied before Elisabeth had a chance. “He wrote the Malleus Maleficarum , the Hammer of Witches, a book responsible for several centuries’ worth of witch hunts. According to Kramer, anyone in a skirt was like as not to be a witch.”

So Elisabeth had been killed by a homicidal zealot with a serious case of misogyny. I knew what it was like to be singled out by a zealot, and that made me even more sympathetic toward her.

“I’m sorry,” I said with even more sincerity this time. “However Kramer bought it back then, I hope it was long and painful.”

“It wasn’t,” she said, bitterness edging her tone. “He fell off his horse and broke his neck instantly instead of being stomped on and left to suffer.”

“Not fair,” I agreed, while thinking that at least Kramer would’ve gotten a taste of his own fiery medicine in hell.

Bones gave Elisabeth a long, speculative look. “Know quite a few details about his death, do you?”

Elisabeth met his gaze. In her half-hazy state, her eyes were medium blue, making me wonder if they had been as dark an indigo as Tate’s when she was alive.

“Yes, I’m the one who spooked his horse,” she replied defensively, oblivious to the pun in her words. “I wanted revenge for what he’d done to me, and to put a stop to the deaths of more women in the town he was traveling to.”

“Good for you,” I said at once. If she’d expected judgment, she hadn’t heard much about me. Or Bones. “Wish I could shake your hand.”

“Too right,” Bones said, raising his whiskey in salute.

Elisabeth stared at both of us for several seconds. Then, very slowly, she rose and floated over, holding out her hand to me.

I shifted self-consciously. Guess she didn’t know what a metaphorical statement was. Then I stuck out my hand, reminding myself that this was no different than all the other times I’d let ghosts pass through my flesh in greeting. But when her hand closed over mine, that usual tingling feeling followed by my fingers poking right through her didn’t happen. Unbelievably, an icy-cold grip squeezed back with the same firmness and consistency as my own flesh.