HauntMe (3 page)

With her eyes shut she could picture his strong, tan hands
grasping at her breasts, kneading her flesh, one hand dipping under her dress
and finding the lacy bra beneath. His skin was warm against hers, his rough,
calloused thumb and index finger tugging at her nipple. Minerva moaned, “I miss
you.”

I’ve been here all along.

He had. She’d kept him alive in her memory, talking to him
every night when she pulled the vibrator from her bedside drawer. It had never
been cold silicon that pleasured her, not in her mind—it was his cock, warm and
firm between her legs, thrusting again and again as she moved the vibe in her
hand, leaving her wet and panting against the sheets, smelling her own sex in
the air.

The leather of the chaise seemed to move beneath her,
shaping itself against the outline of her body, holding her close. The afghan
folded itself up between her legs, pressing hard against her cunt. The fabric
rubbed against her and she shifted her hips to find the best angle. The
sequined dress was raised above her waist now. The yarn of the blanket felt
rough against the tops of her thighs, buffered against her cunt by her panties.

“I wore red for you today,” Minerva told her husband. Red
panties, matching her lips and her shoes—his favorite color.

It’s perfect.

She concentrated on his voice, remembering the lilt in his
vowels. The Earl Grey scent in the air intensified and she sucked it in through
her nostrils. She wanted him. The memory of him, the ghost of him—it didn’t
matter what it was, Minerva knew what she wanted. She opened her mouth. A
warmth pressed against it, his tongue hungry and demanding. She whimpered,
parting her lips farther. A slick wetness licked at her bottom lip then dipped
inside her mouth, the flesh of his tongue hot against her teeth. She bit down,
softly, jokingly, as she’d done to Bram many times.

She heard a deep male chuckle that warmed her down to her
pussy. Juices formed between her legs. She tasted his tongue with her own, the
citrus of the tea, the heat of the man. His tongue tickled at the top of her
mouth and as she sucked harder, pulling him farther inside her, she felt a
weight press down against her hips, against her chest, Bram’s body leaning in
to her, trapping her against the chaise.

It should have scared her but it felt so familiar.

Minerva kept her eyes squeezed shut, trapped between the
chaise and the heaviness of whatever pinned her—a memory or the ghost of her
husband. She twirled her tongue against his, mixing their saliva, humming with
pleasure. His legs curled between hers and she opened her thighs wide, reaching
up and running the toes of one foot along his calf, feeling the masculine hairs
of his legs, the muscles beneath his skin.

He was naked, just as he’d been the last time she’d made
love to him, in their bed. His erect cock pressed against her stomach and she
shifted her body upward, sliding him south. Bram’s warm shaft stopped against
her clit, grinding into her. The moisture of his pre-cum soaked into her
panties, mixing with her own wetness. His mouth still held hers, enraptured.
She reached up and felt strong, naked arms beneath her fingers. One of his
hands buried itself in her hair, pulling her face to his as he kissed her.
Their noses mashed together and she whimpered—she couldn’t breathe. Without
speaking he pulled back, letting her take a moment.

This is what she had loved about being married—a man who
knew her utterly, who understood the nuance of every sound almost before she
made it. He knew what meant “stop” or “pause” or “oh yes, more please”, the
latter being most common in their relationship.

She reached up for his hair, wanting to feel the silky
softness of the dark, close-cropped curls she remembered. His cock moved
against her cunt, straining into the thin, red fabric of her panties separating
them, and Minerva opened her eyes, wanting to see him…

There was no one there.

Minerva sat up, gasping with desire and disbelief. The
illusion was broken. The pressure on her body, the taste of Bram’s saliva in
her mouth—they were gone. There was no one on top of her. The dressing room
mirror, floor to ceiling, showed her the truth—a solitary woman with snarled
curls, a face flushed with desire, silver-sequined dress stretched and exposing
one of her breasts to the air, the pale skin heaving as she inhaled. Red
panties peeked out where the fabric of the dress was raised to her waist. The
afghan was tangled between her legs.

“Bram?” she said to the air.

There was no reply.

But she’d felt him, hadn’t she? She’d imagined his voice for
years, but surely she couldn’t have dreamed up an encounter that felt as real
as this one. She wasn’t
that
starved for sex, was she? Her vibrator and
her memories, certainly, had kept her hormones under control.
’Til death do
us part, and beyond.
She’d remained loyal, more out of pain than because
she thought her husband would genuinely want her to be alone forever. But she
wasn’t so far gone that she would make up a ghost.

Was she?

Ghosts aren’t real, Nerv
, she told herself. This time
it was her own voice rather than his. Was she letting this psychic stuff get to
her? It was an acting gig, nothing more. Sure, she got some pleasure from
helping her audience to move on, but it paid the rent and for extras like her
pool or trips to the salon. The latter were business expenses, of course. Gotta
look good if you’re on TV.

“Ghosts aren’t real.”

She nodded to herself and disentangled her legs from the
afghan, folding it and laying it on the back of the chaise. Whatever that had
been, it had been a figment of her imagination, nothing more. She’d gotten
spooked and needed calming down. Her mind had provided Bram as a coping
mechanism.

The moisture between her legs reminded Minerva that she was
anything but calm. She was primed for sex and there was no one around to give
it to her.
Sigh.
She adjusted herself in the mirror, pulling the gown up
over her left breast and down across her thighs. She straightened her hair as
best she could, the unruly curls disobeying her as always. Then she moved into
the tiny bathroom adjoining the dressing room to brush her teeth and do her
business.

A soft, cool breath seemed to brush her back as she left,
raising tiny hairs along her skin. With everything she’d experienced today, the
touch was so small that it went nearly unnoticed.
Not real.
She could
rationalize away anything. She had to if she wanted to stay sane.

In the cramped bathroom, Minerva splashed water on her face,
cooling her skin. Her heart still raced and she could feel her pulse between
her legs. She hadn’t been this turned-on in a long time. She cupped more cold
water in her hands, savoring the wetness against her fevered fingers. She
lowered her face to the pool in her hands, submerging it, taking a moment to
blow bubbles in the water, thinking about the times she and Bram had giggled in
the bath, blowing against each other’s stomachs. Her heart ached with missing
him. She longed to talk to him in person, tell him about the hallucinations—the
man in the audience with blood on his hands, the almost-sex with the ghostly
remembrance of Bram himself. The feelings were polar opposites, fear and
pleasure, but both confused her.

Minerva let the water fall between her fingers, listening to
it trickling down the drain. She pressed her hands to the sink’s cold
porcelain. In the tiny bathroom mirror, she examined her face. The pink was
leaving her skin, and her green eyes were a bright-jade contrast to her pale
complexion. Her mascara was smudged. They were finished taping for the day so
that didn’t bother her. Brown curls fanned out riotously around her head like
the mane of a lioness. Minerva bared her teeth in the mirror as if she could
summon the courage of the animal.
Chiclets
, she thought—what Bram had
always fondly called her teeth. Perfect and straight—an actress’s teeth, not a
lion’s.

But she had a courage all her own. She simply had to summon
it. Somehow.

A few minutes later, Minerva exited the bathroom, breathing
normally now. She smiled at the sight of the rumpled afghan on the chaise. It
brought back memories of sex with Bram before they’d married, when she’d still
been a young, struggling actress and her dressing rooms had been much smaller.
A post-performance fuck had always taken the edge off. How she missed him.

Then Minerva turned her head and saw the dressing room
mirror.

Blood-red letters were scrawled on the shiny surface—
VICTOR
GRA
—

Her eyes flew to the door. It was locked, as she’d left it.
Nothing else in the room was disturbed. She sucked back a scream.

Bram

He hadn’t meant to scare her. He’d been euphoric upon
touching her body, tasting her mouth with his own. He’d gone too far in wanting
to feel the heat of her against him, to suck her panting breath into his
nonexistent lungs.

When she’d denied him, he wanted to shout,
I
am
real. I’m right here!

But he’d lost control and the body he’d briefly managed to
manifest had disintegrated back into the ether. As he’d watched her exit to the
washroom, her gorgeous, shapely ass had set up another wave of desire and with
it, power.

He’d felt his ghostly fingers return. In a moment of
desperation, he’d picked up a tube of lipstick and begun to write on the
mirror.

Victor Grayson was the man’s name. Bram hadn’t been able to
finish writing it, but it was a start. Now the question was, what would his
wife do with the information?

Home

So. Ghosts were real. That was the latest conclusion of the
day.
Awesome.

That was sarcasm. It was anything but awesome, but what
could a psychic do when confronted with evidence? Sure she was a fake, and a
good one, but how could anyone have gotten into the dressing room when it had
clearly been locked, and without her noticing? How could anyone fake the way
her husband had touched her? The two feats combined went far beyond her bag of
tricks.

Minerva took a cab home from the LA studio to her house in
Santa Monica, knowing that driving with her shaky hands and racing mind
wouldn’t be the smartest idea. She tipped the driver generously and stepped out
of the cab, closing the bright-yellow door behind her.

She was feeling calmer already. A slight breeze filled the
warm California summer air, and the sun had just set. She loved dusk. Shadows
cast by the lush trees in her front yard danced across the pale cream of her
Spanish-style house. The multimillion dollar home was small, but more than she
needed, and the yard—giving her several lots worth of space away from the
neighbors—more than made up for it. It was meticulously maintained by a company
owned by Rachel’s uncle. Networking was everything in Minerva’s career and it
extended to the rest of her life.

Though “calmer” meant that Minerva’s hands still shook like
leaves in the wind as she fished her keys out of her purse, but when she
reached the front door and smelled citrus, she steadied herself.

“Bram?” she whispered, her voice tentative with hope. There
was no response except for a warm gust across her legs. She opened the door and
pressed the code into the home alarm keypad, her red nails clicking on the
buttons. She waited for the beep and the reassuring female voice stating,
“Armed.” Having the alarm system installed had been one of the first things
she’d done after moving into the house. Since Bram’s murder she’d never felt
entirely comfortable living alone.

Minerva kicked off her heels as she moved inside, leaving
them by the door. A sheen of sweat covered her feet and, as she walked over the
hardwood floors, the contact of wet skin on wood made a slight sticking noise.
Her dress felt heavy and damp as well and she knew it wasn’t from the humidity
in the air—it was a perfect summer evening, no rain on the horizon. She needed
a shower. Maybe later a swim?

She dropped her purse and keys on an antique side table and
surveyed the room. Photos of Bram and of her cousin’s children sat atop the
white brick fireplace. A lush couch and shag carpet to warm her feet kept this
room cozy on cool evenings, and large windows let the light in as the sun rose
each morning. Though she had a bright kitchen and dining room, Minerva often
drank her breakfast in here, sipping a kale smoothie, or out in the backyard on
an Adirondack chair by the pool.

She thought about that shower but first padded barefoot to
the kitchen and started the kettle boiling. Minerva had to dig to the back of
the cupboard, past her tins of fair trade, shade-grown Ethiopian coffee beans,
to find what she was looking for—a single box of bagged Earl Grey tea she kept
for when Bram’s mother visited twice a year. The kettle whistled, its
shrillness startling her as it broke the silence. She pulled out a mug and
dropped the bag in then grabbed her laptop computer from the main room and moved
outside, punching in the back door’s alarm code before sliding the glass door
open.

She inhaled the night air, setting the mug on the wide, oak
arm of her Adirondack chair. She balanced the laptop on the other arm and sank
down onto the wood. Sequins scraped across the boards of the chair but Minerva
figured that between the collapse onstage and near-sex with her
husband-from-beyond-the-grave, the dress was done for anyway.

The clean blue water of the pool stretched out in front of
her, sparkling beneath Chinese-style deck lanterns. It was set in the ground
with rocks surrounding the water, created to mimic a natural setting. A small
waterfall at the far end gurgled. The sound of it and the smell of the tea
worked to calm Minerva further. The waterfall, as tiny as it was, reminded her
of her honeymoon with Bram.

“Are you here, Bram?”

There was no response, not even from her own mind.

She powered up the laptop.

Over the years she’d kept in touch with the detective
assigned to her husband’s homicide. They’d never caught the killer, but Minerva
knew that wasn’t the fault of Detective Andrews.

Nor had Bram’s murder been his own fault.

For the first few years after his death, she’d blamed him.
He was supposed to be the person who grounded her, a high school science
teacher who kept her sane with stories of the kids he taught and who paid the
bills on their modest apartment while she pursued her dreams.

She pulled up bookmarked websites that she hadn’t looked at
in years. Newspaper articles about Bram’s murder—the details of the case had
been shocking and while not front page news, it had taken up more than a few
inches in the middle of the papers. It wasn’t every day that a high school
teacher was found with his heart cut out.

The articles said little beyond that and “gambling debts”.
It had humiliated her parents and broken Bram’s mother’s heart—not to mention
Minerva’s own.

She’d had no idea about the money he’d gambled away or the
horrible people he owed more to. The thugs, Detective Andrews said, who’d
likely killed him and cut out his heart as a warning to others.

The man she’d seen tonight had been holding a heart. There
was no way it was a coincidence. Minerva knew the tricks behind every illusion,
and little shocked her anymore. But no one else had seen him. How could an
illusion reach just her? Drugs? An actual psychic warning, to match an actual
ghost? Could the man be the same one who killed her husband?

You’re a
fake
psychic, remember
.

But what was the alternative? Was she losing her mind?

She pulled up her email client and typed Andrews’ address.
It filled in automatically after the first two letters.
Any updates?
She
wrote.
Does the name Victor Gra-something (didn’t catch the end) mean
anything to you? Someone passed on the tip. Any new sketches to look at?
Thanks, Minerva

There hadn’t been any progress on the case in the past few
years but he’d always been kind to her.

Minerva had cursed Bram, wished him to hell a thousand times
for getting himself killed and for losing their house and forcing her out of a
promising acting career and into the phone psychic business. She’d found a
talent and risen through the ranks to combine her intelligence—what better to
scam people with?—and the natural charisma she had as an actress to start her
own show. Adding sex to the psychic mix made her something new, something
perfect for her edgy, hip network courting the eighteen-to-forty-nine
demographic. She couldn’t complain—it was a hell of a lot of fun and
occasionally she helped people.

Bram’s death had been the start of an amazing career. And
she’d trade it all to have him back.

“Bram?” Minerva felt silly calling out to a ghost in her
backyard. Where did she think he was hiding, in the pool?

There was no answer. She stared at the water for a long
time, letting her tea grow cold. Then she closed the computer and moved inside.
Might as well take that shower.

She was careful to turn on the house alarm again behind her.
The woman saying “Armed” sounded like an old friend.