Sarah Gilman: Ghosts of the Falls

Spending time with Dutch would only make it worse—for both of them.

“This is a very bad idea,” Jade muttered, meeting her own stare in the mirror. The knots in her stomach fluttered in anticipation. “Damn it.”

She took her usual braid down and brushed her hair until it fell in waves to her elbows. A job in the woods had not merited packing sexy clothes, so she selected a clean pair of jeans and a silken blouse—business clothes. The spicy scent of cooking drifted in through the open window from the grill behind the cabin.

“Jade?” Dutch called from the porch.

She checked the mirror one last time and hurried to the door. Dutch waited there, dressed in a dark green button-down shirt that brought out his eyes.

“Evening.” He reached for her hand and kissed her fingers. “You look lovely tonight.”

The contact stirred her internal butterflies into a flying frenzy. “Thanks.”

“I hope you like fish.”

She inhaled. “Whatever that scent is, I like it.”

He squeezed her hand and led her around to the back of the cabin, a private yard surrounded by thick bushes. A small fire burned in a stone pit and a white cloth covered a picnic table. Two plates offered roasted fish, wilted greens, and fresh bread.

He pulled a bottle of wine from an ice bucket. “I caught the trout myself and picked the herbs in the woods. The rest I got from the market across the street. Sorry about the plastic dishes. It’s all they had.”

“Not at all.” She joined him at the table. “This looks wonderful.”

“I’m glad.” He poured the wine.

She touched a cluster of wildflowers set in a plastic cup in the middle of the table.

He cleared his throat. “At the risk of sounding corny, the flowers you left by my stone meant a lot to me. No one has ever done that before. Thank you.”

A comfortable silence fell. Jade slowly ate the delicious food and cleaned the plate. As they finished the bottle of wine, they chatted about little things: The fish recipe that had been a favorite in the logging camps where Dutch had worked. How Jade had initially picked up the viola as a child just to annoy her brothers but had come to love it more than any other hobby.

The bottle dried up and she brought her the instrument outside.

“Any requests?” She stood in front of the fire.

He sat on the ground, dark-blue twilight framing him, and rested an arm on a bent knee. “Your favorite piece.”

She lifted the viola to her shoulder and began the slow, uplifting solo that had attracted her to the instrument when she’d been little. Her mother had played the song on an antique record player. Playing with her eyes closed to not get distracted by Dutch’s unwavering gaze, she gave herself over to the music. The piece took five minutes to complete, and as she prolonged the last note, his warm fingers touched her cheek.

She opened her eyes. Dutch pressed his lips to her shoulder, her neck, her jaw line, and paused, his mouth a hair’s breadth from hers. She set the instrument and bow on the table.

A hand on her nape, he pulled her against his mouth, his other arm firm around the small of her back. His unyielding grip spurred her heart rate and filled her body with simmering heat.

Jade dug her fingers into his thick hair and nipped at his lower lip. His lips curved against her skin, and he lowered her into the grass on her back. Bold. But she trusted that he’d stop if she asked him to, and such confident passion in a man sang to her desires.

Stretched out at her side, he stroked her throat and claimed her lips again. As she returned and deepened the kiss, she ran her fingers from his rough hand up his arm to his chest, the soft cotton of his shirt at odds with the hard angles and curves underneath.

He broke the kiss but stayed close. “Jade. It’s been over a century since I’ve been close to anyone. You can’t imagine what it was like to hold you on the bridge today. What it’s like to hold you now.”

She lifted his wrist from her shoulder and ran her fingertips slowly down the inside of his fingers, across his palm, and up the hairless underside of his arm. Following the path with her lips, she made her way to his neck. She licked the soft skin below his ear and blew across the spot.

He shivered and lifted her into a sitting position. He kissed her, his lips and tongue relentless, his sugary, wine-tinged taste addictive. Tilting her head back with his hands, he dropped his mouth to her neck, licking and pressing her skin between his teeth, certain to leave marks.

“More,” she groaned. She trusted her instincts and her body. She’d wanted this before the first drop of wine had passed her lips. Hell, she’d been drawn to him the first time they’d spoken.

In an effortless motion, he laid her back down in the grass and held her gaze, his fingers on the top buttons of her blouse. She nodded, and he parted her shirt, baring her skin and her white lace bra. The friction of his rough palms against her belly made her arch into his touch. He bent forward and pressed his mouth to her left breast, licking her nipple through the thin lace. She hissed in a breath through her teeth and dug her fingers into his shoulders.

He returned his ministrations to her lips, though he pressed more of his weight onto her body. Warm pressure.

“So lovely,” he said against her mouth as she drew in air.

She smoothed her hands under his shirt, up the planes on his stomach, and pressed his nipples between her fingertips. The groan from his throat bordered on a growl.

Shoving the cotton out of the way, she licked first the right nipple, then the left, dragging her fingernails along his back.

He stiffened in her arms. Gasping, he jerked away from her and collapsed on his back.

“Dutch!” She sat up and knelt at his side. “What’s wrong?”

“Not again…” He stared at her, his brow furrowed. He sucked in a sharp breath, faded and vanished. Jade lost her balance and fell forward on her hands. His clothing lay abandoned beneath her palms.

“Dutch, are you still here? Answer me!”

The silence lengthened, and she scrambled to her feet. A faint voice reached her ears, the rhythmic sound rising above the buzz of the evening crickets.

Aaron. Oh, shit, what had her brother done?

Every muscle in her body tensed and adrenaline seared her veins like an acid wash. She took off full tilt toward the river.

…

Running in the fading light of evening, Jade stepped on a loose rock in the path and went down hard, face first into the gravel. Pain shot up her leg. Her cheek burned. Cursing, she shoved herself to her feet. Her brother’s voice, louder now, guided her down the narrow side path. She reached the edge of the river.

Her brother, silhouetted by a lantern, knelt on a large granite outcrop, facing the rapids. He held a book close to the light and read out loud in Latin.

“Stop!” She reached him and snatched the book from his hand. “What the hell are you doing?”

He stared up at her with a tight grin, his severe features made more so by his cropped hair and the shadows cast by the lantern. “You’ve never seen an exorcism before?” He lifted his fingers to her injured cheek, giving her a rare glimpse of the caring brother beneath the cold exterior. The brother whose leg still bore scars from protecting her from a dog when they’d taken a shortcut through the wrong yard as kids.

“What happened?”

“I tripped, running down here in the dark.” She clutched the book to her chest. A far more gifted clairvoyant than Jeremy or herself, Aaron didn’t need the benefit of the ghost’s presence or the grave. But he did need the book.

“Why is your bra showing?”