Rings On Her Fingers (Psychic Seasons Read online

  That wasn’t all his gut was telling him. He figured Julie knew more than she thought she did; there had to be something, some detail, that would help him run the slimy little crook to ground. Discrete inquiry had proved Logan had not been at his office for several days; he’d bolted. The question was whether he had cut his losses and run or was hanging around waiting for a chance to make trouble. If he had to bet, Zack would pick the latter; it would explain this feeling he kept having that the other shoe had yet to drop.

  First thing tomorrow, he decided, he would go and talk to Julie. Eloise would probably be there since, if he remembered correctly, it was her night to keep Julie company. After their not-quite-a-fight last night, he thought having a bit of a buffer between he and his sister was probably a good idea, anyway. Sitting outside of her house for an entire night had given him a lot of time to think, and he had come to the conclusion it was well past time they patched things up between them.

  He had been surprised and somewhat blindsided by the depth of feeling he had experienced while spending time with her. Zack finally admitted to himself that he loved his sister, pure and simple. It was impossible to shove those feelings down anymore; he missed having her in his life; they’d been important to each other as children, and he hoped she felt the same way. It had seemed as though she did, at least for the first part of the evening.

  With these goals firmly in mind, he locked up his office. Right now, he had two thoughts in his head: a quick meal and getting some sack time. He’d been running without sleep for more than 36 hours and it was time to recharge.

  * * *

  At the same moment Zack was locking his office door, Logan was flat on his belly in the woods near Julie's house peering through the eyepiece of a high powered set of binoculars and swearing a blue streak under his breath. He'd expected Julie to be there alone; but instead, through the windows, he could see several women laughing and talking in front of the fireplace. Where had all these women come from? She didn't have that many friends; he had picked her precisely because she had so few connections; it made his job a lot easier. And, as he always did, he blamed Gustavia; these had to be her cronies, especially the one with purple hair.

  If he had seen Lola snoozing contentedly on her new bed, he would have gone ballistic, but he didn't. Instead, he weaseled his way back out of the low brush and hiked back to his campsite. Julius followed, listening in on Logan's internal dialog and growing more and more certain the young man's sanity was eroding: his thoughts were still coherent, but chaotic and becoming darkly violent. Still, underneath the seething anger, there was something of that keen mind left, maybe enough to keep him from tipping over the edge; but only if someone could find a way to reach him, and Julius didn't think he was the one for the job.

  * * *

  "It sounds like Logan is a total loser, and you're way better off without him. Julie wins the bad boyfriend prize," Amethyst declared with the total conviction that comes from being slightly buzzed.

  They killed the second bottle of wine.

  "Hey, I'm not the only one who's had some bad boyfriends; Gustavia dated at least five of the seven dwarfs: Happy, Sleepy, Grumpy, Sneezy and Dopey. Happy was nice enough, but not too deep. Sleepy spent a lot of time in bed. Grumpy lasted less than a week with his bad attitude, and Sneezy had the worst hay fever I have ever seen. His nose was always red and runny."

  "What about Dopey? Dumb or always high?" Ammie asked.

  "A little bit of both," Julie replied with a smirk.

  "Well, you dated the dwarfs lesser known cousins: Arty, Farty and Smarty."

  Amethyst snorted at that one. "Okay, I'll bite. Describe please."

  "Arty was an art major who spent hours talking about Rene Magritte. He was all about the this is not a pipe thing. Smarty had a high IQ, and asked everyone their number. He even used it to insult people. If he thought you weren't smart, he called you a ninety. But, Farty, he was a rare find. He thought he could control his farts, and his goal was to fart the alphabet before the end of the year."

  "Eww," Ammie and Kat expressed disgust in unison. "How do you fart the alphabet? No one can do that."

  "He was totally convinced he could do it. The facial expressions he made were priceless, though." Gustavia giggled at the memory.

  Julie held up both hands in surrender. "Yeah, I broke up with him the day he swore he did the W and cried about it."

  Ammie and Kat both burst out laughing.

  "Then, Gustavia dated a whole series of twisted nursery rhyme characters. Let's see. There was Little Jack Horny and Wee Willie Winky. No explanation necessary."

  Gustavia shrugged to indicate her innocence.

  "Then came Tom, Tom the Plumber's Son."

  Just say no to crack, Gustavia quoted as everyone continued to laugh. "Julie cured it, though. She dropped a quarter down there and squealed, Oooh, look, a piggy bank."

  "Oh, and we can't forget Peter, Peter Garlic Eater or my own personal favorite: Little Boy Blue." Julie waggled her eyebrows with a wicked grin.

  Gustavia screamed with laughter. "Oh, my Goddess, I had forgotten him."

  This time Kat had to ask. "What was his thing?"

  "Blue was his favorite color--in women's panties."

  "So, he wanted you to wear blue panties all the time?"

  "Not me, him."

  "Stop, you have to stop before I wet myself." Ammie rushed toward the bathroom laughing so hard she could barely see where she was going.

  "He was almost as bad as Nudie Rudy. It's okay to give your jiggly bits an airing whenever you want; as long as you do it in the privacy of your own home. But keep your snake in the basket when you're at mine, please." Julie’s lips wrinkled in disgust.

  More screams of laughter.

  "You two are horrible."

  "I'm sure we were no picnic for some of them, either. We went through some weird phases of our own."

  Gustavia nodded emphatically. "Yeah, there was the we are only going to date older men phase. Julie thought for a moment. "Was that before or after the we are only going to date younger men phase? The theory behind that one was we figured we could train them up the way we wanted them."

  "How did that work out for you?" Amethyst smirked as though she'd been there herself.

  "About like you'd think."

  "I can't remember them all, but there was a pissed off rocker phase and the one where we kissed everyone on both cheeks and wore berets."

  "But enough about us; you guys must have a story or two. Spill."

  Amethyst kicked it off. "Let's see. I don't think mine were quite so funny, but there was the guy who had more hair on his back than Sasquatch. I could have lived with that, but he made this weird humming sound every time he kissed me. It creeped me out after a while."

  They all agreed this was a sensible reaction, as they passed around the third wine bottle.

  "And there was another one who had cold feet. Not the fear of commitment kind but the oh-my-God-did-you-smuggle-a-block-of-ice-into-bed kind. I think he had a circulation problem."

  She went on. "But the worst one was this guy who told me he loved me just the way I was, and then spent four years trying to turn me into Nancy Normal. I actually had the bad taste to marry that one."

  Surprised she had not known this about her friend, Gustavia offered a hug of sympathy then let Amethyst finish her story. The laughing was over; this was clearly a painful memory, and probably way past time to let go of it.

  "It was right after high school. We thought we were so grown up, and even though our parents warned us not to, we eloped. He said my not being conventional was one of the things he loved most about me. But he couldn't find work so he took a job in his dad's insurance agency; and, before long, he was acting more like his father than like himself." She sniffed back a tear. "He started wearing suits and ties and asking me to tone it down in public. Then he asked me if I could stop seeing auras and I left. Just packed my stuff and ran one day while he was at work."

 
; "He was an idiot." Gustavia tended to get hotly angry whenever she perceived an injustice.

  Ammie's tone was sad. "No, he was just young. We both were."

  Kat spoke. "I don't have any stories. I was fifteen the first time I saw spirits. By the time I was sixteen, I was blind. It seemed like too much of a burden to put on anyone so, I've never even been in a relationship."

  Tears of sympathy streamed down Gustavia's cheeks as she sat down next to Kat and took her hand. "Oh sweetie, that's so sad."

  A look was passed between the other three. A look that plainly said they intended to remedy the situation one way or another. Let the matchmaking begin.

  "I didn't mean to bring you all down," Ammie said as she elbowed Gustavia lightly. Gustavia took the hint, and with a wicked glint in her eye, proceeded to out Julie's newly forming relationship. "Julie kissed Tyler."

  "Hah!" Kat nearly shouted with triumph.

  "Fine," Amethyst replied as she grabbed her purse, pulled out a ten-dollar bill and passed it to Kat. "Fine, you win. I should know better than to bet with you anyway."

  Eyes widening in surprise Julie said, "You bet on whether I would get together with Tyler?"

  "No," Kat laughed. "We bet on how long it would take for Tyler to make his move; the two of you getting together was inevitable."

  Julie frowned. "I don't understand. How do you figure? I thought he had a thing for Gustavia until just before he kissed me."

  Amethyst said, "Oh honey, how many excuses does a man have to make in order to spend time with you? You've known him for, what--a week or so? And he volunteers to sleep over in a haunted house to protect you from your possibly psycho ex?"

  "Well, when you put it like that, it doesn't sound terribly appealing. Besides, I've only known you and Kat for about a week, and here the two of you are, ready to sleep over in a haunted house to protect me from my possibly psycho ex."

  Amethyst rolled her eyes. "That's because we love you."

  Julie was overwhelmed at the simple statement; the matter of fact way it was made allowed for no mistake that the sentiment was genuine. As she looked at the other three women, the burden of losing the last of her family eased a little. She had a new family.

  * * *

  Estelle’s heart soared; the girl had a good solid circle of women in her life, even if they had some odd ideas at times. And hey—as a ghost, was she really in any position to have an opinion on whether auras were real or not? There was a click that sounded faintly bell-like as she realized one of her objectives in remaining earthbound had just been met.

  She was just about to zip out of the room when Lola—who had been sleeping quietly on her bed—opened one lazy eye and looked right at her, then the other eye opened. As the dog lifted her head, Estelle could see Lola was considering whether to raise the alarm, so she hissed a low-pitched shushing sound while sending reassuring thoughts. This was enough to quiet the dog. Lola tilted her head to the left as if appraising the apparition before her, then gave her best doggy grin before settling down and going back to sleep. Relieved that she had not created a scene, Estelle sped out to the gazebo roof to find Julius.

  Chapter 25

  Over the next two weeks or so, they made no progress on the search, and it began to look like they never would. Julie's life settled into a pattern; and, as the days wore on, with no further sign from Logan, everyone began to assume he had left town for good. Amethyst and Kat took occasional turns sleeping over; but, thankfully, it had been decided Julie was safe enough, with Julius keeping an ear out and Lola in the house, to stay alone during the day. Grateful for her friends, she was equally grateful for the time alone.

  Tamara had recommended Julie to her friend Allison, a clothing designer, and Julie spent several days shooting her new line. The work was interesting, paid well, and artistic enough to be satisfying on that level, so Julie agreed to take on several more commercial commissions. With the extra money, she could probably pay for new windows by next spring.

  Left on her own, she would have chosen to forget all about missing family fortune, but Gustavia and Tyler wouldn't let it go; plus, with Julius popping in every now and then to see if there had been any progress, and looking more anxious every time, it was clear he wasn't going to let it go either. His visits were fairly brief since, without having Kat as an available conduit, it took a lot of his energy to speak; though Julie noticed when he remained quiet and only partially materialized, Julius could spend more time glowering at her than she cared to deal with. At least he and Estelle had both agreed to ringing the doorbell before they appeared. It was especially important for them to give her some warning now that there were more clients in the studio.

  Gustavia stayed in touch with Zack; the two were no longer actively sparring off of each other at every possible opportunity, but they were still uneasy when in the same room. His frustration at not being able to run Logan to ground made him more short-tempered than normal. At his insistence, Gustavia had a state-of-the-art security system installed in her tiny cottage.

  It was Kat who suggested a Saturday night brainstorming session, if everyone was agreeable; some of the spirit's anxiety had begun transferring itself to her, and she was feeling the pressure of the passing time. Everyone showed up for dinner and, after scarfing down some pizza, they all trooped up to Julius' rooms.

  "I've said since the first night I stayed here that it felt like I was missing some small, but vital, clue." Tyler pulled out his voice recorder and keyed it back to the beginning of Estelle's description of Julius' death. "Maybe if we give this a listen, something will jump out at us." He hit the play button.

  "Once he was gone, we put things back to rights; and, after that, Mary Lou never changed a thing. She kept it like a shrine after he died." Then after a pause of several seconds, "It was here in this bed that he sat up with the firelight glittering in his eyes, stared over our heads and said, Use the key with the magic garden; they will show you the hiding place. Follow the light. Then he looked right at me and said, don't forget. Key--magic garden. He was upset, agitated. At the time I thought it was just restlessness. In his last weeks he was in a considerable amount of pain and his muscles twitched a lot, but I think he was gesturing toward something to his left."

  Kat gave a little shiver at hearing Estelle's voice for the first time and knowing it had come out of her own mouth. The short clip played through and, for long seconds, nobody spoke.

  "You're right; there's something there, but I can't quite put my finger on it." Gustavia was thoughtful as she tried to picture the scene in her mind: the man, ravaged by illness, surrounded by family.

  "Play it again." Ammie ordered. She'd caught something in the wording that didn't sound right, but lost it again.

  They listened closely for a second—then a third—time before Ammie looked up, a slow smile spreading across her face, "The firelight. There's no fireplace in this room," she stated as comprehension dawned on her.

  "That's it!" Tyler all but shouted. "Julius said something about the fire going day and night, but I didn't catch on."

  "He died in this bed, but not in this room." Julie moved into the living room of the suite with everyone following her. "They must have moved his bed in here." She stood, facing the fireplace in the approximate position she thought the bed would have occupied. "If the bed was here and he was trying to point to something on his left, it would have to be the stained glass window."

  As one, they all turned toward the vividly colored window with its floral motif. Then Julie bent to read the engraving on the small, brass plaque affixed to the wall below. She turned back to the others, eyes widened in surprise, "it's called the Magic Garden," she said. "It has been here all the time, big as life and right in front of us."

  Kat remained where she was as the others rushed to the window to examine it in detail. It was a spectacular work of art with its brightly colored flowers, each petal delicately detailed, set in an oak frame elaborately carved with leaves and vines. Across the top
of the frame the word solstice was etched deeply into the wood.

  As Tyler neared the window, he saw, mounted on the right-hand side, two seemingly decorative, wrought iron brackets each holding an L-shaped rod that laid flat against the wall. One simple touch had the rods swinging, hinge-like, to rest against the trim with the long end of the L sticking out about four inches. The end of the upper rod had been hammered into a square shape while the lower one remained rounded. At first he thought they might have once been part of a shutter or drapery system, but he realized whatever was attached to them would, when closed, stand at right angles to the window rather than cover the glass; so neither option made much sense.

  Gustavia, always sensitive to the feelings of others, realized Kat had been relegated to the sidelines and, pulling her back into the group, described the window while guiding her friend's hand over the raised leading strips between the glass pieces. It was Kat who, while running her braille-trained fingers over the carved frame, found two tiny, raised key emblems among the vines near each of the brackets.

  "So, it was use the magic garden with the key; maybe these brackets have something to do with the key," Julie said.

  "Ammie, can you see anything?" Gustavia asked as she poked and prodded the raised wooden keys.

  Amethyst refocused her eyes, "No, not anymore. We were so excited that whatever residual aura might have been there, we have overlaid with our own."

  "Let's get logical." Tyler got out his notepad, sat on the couch, and motioned for the others to join him. "We've got the first part of the puzzle, and we know the key has to interact with the window." He jotted this down on the paper. "And, those carved keys were not placed randomly; they have to mean something. There are two symbols. But Julius only used the word key not keys so we know we are probably looking for a single key; one that can somehow be used with a window."