Psychic Dreams: A Paranormal Women's Fiction Novel (Glimmer Lake Book 3) Page 18

  “You think…” Kara blinked hard. “You think a ghost—”

  “We think Rosemarie used you to continue her mission,” Monica said. “None of this is your fault.”

  Kara stared at the empty wall across from her bed. “What’s her mission?”

  “To destroy Grimmer,” Robin said. “To destroy every part of it that’s left.”

  Chapter 24

  “Well, she took that better than I expected,” Robin said. “And she gave us pictures.”

  Monica shut the door of the minivan. “I just wish her memory of the location was a little better, but at least she gave us Carlisle Creek. That’s a starting point.” She started backing the car out of the parking space. “You think she’ll tell Jake?”

  “Would you?”

  Monica shrugged. “I have no idea. Do you think she believed us?”

  “Oh yeah.” Robin nodded. “Come on, if you were in her situation—having dreams that you couldn’t explain, waking up in strange places, starting fires for reasons you didn’t understand—wouldn’t you believe something supernatural was causing it?”

  “I just hope she can work through the guilt.” Monica turned and headed out of the lot. “I could see it all over her face, and none of this is her fault. The poor girl had no idea what she was doing.”

  “Mark has already talked to a lawyer about it, and he’s been looking up cases of weird behavior caused by medication.” Robin was texting as they drove toward the highway. “He’s hoping if he can give Sully and Gabe any reason not to charge her, she might be able to get probation or counseling or something instead of jail.”

  “I wish she hadn’t confessed,” Monica muttered. “It’s kind of hard to get past that.”

  “But that just goes to her being confused and frightened. I don’t think it’s a bad thing.”

  Monica wasn’t going to debate that. She was far more suspicious of law enforcement than Robin was. “The main thing for her is that she knows, no matter what, we do not think she’s responsible for all this. She needs to know we are in her corner.”

  Robin smiled at Monica. “You know who I’m impressed with?”

  “Jake?”

  Robin nodded.

  Monica’s heart felt so full. “He’s sticking with her. Did you see him? He’s like a dragon guarding that girl.”

  “He gets it from his dad. Velasquez men protect the people they love.”

  She nodded and tried to blink away the tears before Robin saw them.

  No luck. “Don’t cry. It’s a good thing.”

  “I just wish they didn’t have all this hanging over them.” Monica forced the words through the lump in her throat. “They should be young and enjoying a romance, not worried about ghosts and fires and jail time.”

  “We’re going to figure this out. We have a lead on the cabin now, and I’m going to look in the archives for pictures of Corbin Sanger.”

  “Why?”

  Robin frowned and leaned back in her seat. “I have a theory about that cabin in the woods, and I have a feeling I know why Rosemarie woke up after all these years.”

  Monica dropped Robin off at Russell House to relieve Grace from front-desk duty. They’d both been chipping in hours while Monica dealt with the fallout from her house fire. She called the adjustor on the way to her property and got an update on the claim. By the time she arrived at the house, she was feeling a little calmer.

  Which was why she was able to smile when she saw Gabe Peralta and his son Logan tossing burned shingles and other detritus in a dumpster in front of the house. Logan paused and stood up straight, waving at her with heavy brown work gloves on his hands.

  She parked at the base of the sloped driveway and rolled down the window. “Hi.”

  “Hey, Ms. Velasquez!” Logan kept waving.

  Gabe leaned against the porch posts with his arms crossed over his chest, his biceps straining against the blue uniform shirt he wore. He was wearing dark sunglasses, and the silver sprinkled in his hair winked at her in the midday sun.

  Damn it, why was he so attractive? Just really ridiculously hot.

  She got out of the car and walked toward them. “What are you doing here? I think my insurance is going to send people over to do all that.”

  Gabe shrugged and tugged off the work gloves he was wearing. “I had to come by and get a few more details for my report. Logan was with me, so I told him it would be nice to at least clean up the driveway, you know?”

  The driveway of the house was filled with torn-up wood, shingles, and wet insulation from where the firefighters had ripped open the attic to attack the flames.

  “Thank you both so much.” She pointed at the minivan. “Logan, there’s a little cooler in the center console of my van with some sodas in it. You can grab one if you want.”

  “Oh cool.” His face lit up. “I didn’t know minivans had stuff like that.”

  She remembered what Robin had said that morning. “They’re the utility belt of vehicles.”

  Logan snickered. “Like Batman.”

  “Exactly.”

  Gabe cocked his head at her, the corner of his lips turned up. “You have a way with teenage boys.”

  “I had three of them.” She walked to him and looked up. “Trust me, it gets better.”

  The half smile turned into a full one. “I’ll have to take your word for it.” He looked over his shoulder at the house. “Have you been inside yet?”

  She took a long breath. “No. Jake did a walk-through right after the fire was put out, but he’s been focused on Kara. Sam and Caleb wanted to come up, but I told them to wait until the insurance was done because they’ll want to start fixing stuff right away. That’s just their personality. And Sylvia’s all the way in Berkeley.”

  Had it only been two days? How had it only been two days?

  Gabe propped one foot on the first step of the porch. “Want some company?”

  Did she want the company of a man she’d had sex visions about while she went through the wreck of her life? Debatable. Did she want a trained firefighter to walk her through a house with fire damage?

  That was an easier answer. “Sure.”

  Gabe held his hand out for the keys and then opened the door, blocking Monica from walking in right away. “From what I can see, it’s very repairable. But the drywall and floors…”

  Monica walked into the entryway and froze.

  Disaster.

  Oh.

  My.

  God.

  Disaster.

  She wasn’t going to cry. She told herself she wasn’t going to cry. It was just stuff. Nothing was irreplaceable.

  But she did. She couldn’t help it.

  “Shit.” She took a shaky breath, and the tears started falling. “Dammit.” She wiped her eyes and hardly even noticed when Gabe’s arm came around her shoulders.

  It wasn’t just the destruction, it was the work. All the work it would take to put her life back together. To replace everything. To supervise the reconstruction. She was barely getting out from under the avalanche of work that Russell House had been, and now all this…

  “I give up.” She sniffed. “They should have just let it burn down. I’ll get a room at Bailey’s.”

  “Okay.” Gabe’s voice was steady. “You’re not going to live in a room at a boarding house. I want you to focus on the big stuff.” He handed her a clean cotton handkerchief from his front pocket. “Is the house still standing?”

  Monica nodded.

  “And you have good insurance.”

  “Yeah. Yeah, we do.” She took another shaky breath. The living room was a disaster. Everything was waterlogged and already smelling musty. The stone fireplace was the only thing that had escaped the water damage. Ink ran down the walls from their family pictures. Gilbert’s old recliner was sagging to one side. Her immaculately kept couch was soaked. All the windows were blown out, and their hardwood floors were warped and cracking.

  They walked toward the kitchen.

>   “Appliances are all still good,” Gabe said. “No damage to any of your dishes or anything like that. Anything that was waterproof is still fine.”

  “Mm-hmm.” All Monica could do was shake her head. The smell of smoke was everywhere, mingling with the smell of damp and mildew.

  “The drywall is all going to have to go,” Gabe said. “So you’ll get all new walls. Fresh paint everywhere. New ceilings. You like that popcorn texture shit on the ceiling?”

  “No.” She sniffed. “Gil and I hated it, but it wasn’t a high priority, you know?”

  “Well, you won’t have that anymore. You’ll be able to get everything exactly the way you want it. Redecorate the rooms. Freshen everything up.” He kept talking to her as they walked down the hall and pushed open the doors to all the bedrooms. “You can make everything exactly the way you want it. You have a home office? Exercise room?”

  She stared at Sam and Caleb’s room that still had car posters and school pictures on the walls. They were curling off now, wilting in the damp, smoky air. “I was using the boys’ desk in here for a home office.”

  “See? You’ll be able to completely redo that now.” Gabe walked her through the remains of her home and forced Monica to see the possibilities and not just the destruction.

  “You’re good at this.” She wiped her eyes with the handkerchief. “You must do this professionally or something.”

  He chuckled, and the sound shook something loose in Monica’s chest. She looked up at him and Gabe looked down, meeting her eyes.

  His arm was around her shoulders. Her eyes were wet with tears. Her gaze landed on the carved architecture of his mouth. His lower lip was fuller than his upper. They looked soft but firm.

  Capable lips. Lips that knew what they were doing.

  “I really want to kiss you right now.” Gabe’s voice was rough. “But you’re upset and I’m pretty sure I’d be taking advantage of that. Then there’s that whole subject of a sex vision we haven’t talked about.”

  Her libido was not in favor of his restraint. Booooo! Kiss him, Monica! “Did I say we were going to talk about it?”

  “I’m an investigator, Mrs. Velasquez.” His lower lip was flushed. Bitable. “I’m going to need to know every detail.”

  “For professional reasons?”

  “For very unprofessional reasons.” His eyes never left her mouth. “Val said something to me about groveling.”

  “Right. Because you doubted our formidable psychic powers. I think you can hold off on that for a while since we have a ghost arsonist we need to catch.”

  “It seems unbelievable, but that statement isn’t even the strangest thing I’ve heard today.”

  She frowned, still staring at his mouth. “I’m almost afraid to ask.”

  “Something about political action via K-pop memes on TikTok. I have no idea what Logan was talking about.” His arm around her shoulders tightened.

  “Give up now and nod politely. He’s going to speak an unknown language for about five more years.” Monica allowed herself to lean her breast into his chest. She wasn’t imagining things. He groaned.

  Gabe smelled so good. It was like cedar and clean laundry and leather all put together and why did that smell so good? If she put her face in the crook of his neck, would that be bad? Probably unprofessional. But not illegal or anything. Too forward? Probably not very conducive to solving a decades-old mystery that could destroy the town.

  Monica said, “So we have a ghost arsonist.”

  “And a mysterious cabin that has something to do with all this, but we don’t know where it is.”

  “And my house is destroyed and my front-desk manager is in the hospital because of the ghost arsonist.”

  “Right.” That seemed to snap him back to reality. He moved his arm from around her shoulders and cleared his throat. “How is she?”

  “In a lot of pain but feeling safer now that she’s not on her own trying to deal with all this.”

  There was that little smirk again.

  “What?”

  Gabe hooked his thumbs in his front pockets. “I’m just saying… sometimes it’s good to remember you don’t have to do everything yourself.”

  “Are you trying to point out I’m a workaholic?” She turned and walked back down the hallway. Did she put a little sway in her step? Of course not. She was just being very careful where she walked. And maybe that made her ass sway. A little.

  “I know you’re a workaholic, and I don’t mind that. I’m just not too sure about you and your friends charging into the woods to tackle ghosts. What if the next person this ghost possesses is a big burly guy and not a girl who barely comes up to my shoulder?”

  “We’ve dealt with ghosts before.” She opened the front door, happy to have been distracted by Gabe and his smell and his lips. “We’ve dealt with murderers.” She turned as he was locking the front door. “Trust me, we can handle whatever is at that cabin.”

  He faced her with a frown and dropped the key into her waiting palm. “You are not going out to that cabin alone.”

  “We haven’t even found it yet. Don’t get bossy; it’s a surefire way to piss me off.” Monica saw Logan wandering around the side yard, staring into the thick stand of trees that surrounded the property. “Just keep in touch with Sully. Val will tell him when we’re ready to go into the woods.”

  Gabe nodded, then glanced at Logan. “Hey, bud, you ready to go?”

  Logan turned; he looked distracted. “What?”

  “You ready to go?”

  “Oh.” He started back toward the porch. “Sure thing, Dad.” He crumpled the Coke can in his fist. “Thanks for the Coke, Ms. Velasquez.”

  “You’re very welcome.” Monica waved as they walked up the driveway and to Gabe’s truck. “Gabe, thanks for helping me go through the house.”

  “Sure thing.” He opened Logan’s door and waited for the young man to climb in before he shut it. “Don’t go into the woods without me.”

  She waved at him. “We’ll be fine.”

  “Don’t—”

  Logan rapped hard on the window and yelled, “Stop flirting with Jake’s mom.”

  “You should bring him by Russell House tomorrow.” Monica waved at Logan. “Jake is working on the boat. He could hang out again. I think they had fun the last time.”

  “And I told you I’d help you tag trees.” He nodded. “So I’ll see you then.”

  Monica watched them drive off down the cul-de-sac before she got in her own car and headed to the library. They had a ghost arsonist to find, and Robin was waiting.

  Chapter 25

  Monica found Robin at the library, going through boxes of old photos from Grimmer.

  “Any luck?”

  Robin kept her voice down. “Not so far. There was a lot documented around the time the dam was constructed, but before that?” She shook her head. “Really spotty.”

  “If you can’t find anything here, our best bet is finding that cabin.”

  “Yeah.” Robin propped her chin on her folded hands. “You know what I’m thinking?”

  They’d been friends for almost forty years. Of course Monica knew what Robin was thinking. “You think Corbin Sanger is still at that cabin.”

  She nodded slowly. “We both know domineering men have a problem letting go. Even after they die.”

  Robin’s grandfather had hung around the attic of Russell House for years before Monica, Robin, and Val had managed to banish him. Who was to say Corbin Sanger wasn’t as stubborn?

  “Yeah.” Monica sat across from her. “It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve had to get rid of one.”

  “Rosemarie might have gone off the rails in death, but I think she burned that house down—the first one—because she was trying to protect Bethany. I think she was trying to keep her father from going after her sister and things got out of control.”

  “And eighty years later, her distant cousin comes back to the mountains and stumbles onto the cabin Corbin is haunti
ng.”

  “Corbin wakes up maybe?”

  Monica drummed her fingers on a picture of three Depression-era girls standing in front of the Grimmer schoolhouse. “Corbin wakes up, forcing Rosemarie to wake too. She’s angry and confused. She’s lashing out, trying to finish her father off and using the one person she identifies with the most.”

  Robin nodded. “Rosemarie isn’t the real problem. Rosemarie is trying to protect her cousin from Corbin.”

  She flipped through a stack of black-and-white pictures from Grimmer. Old men, many with beards. Dressed in overalls. Smoking pipes. Boots propped up on a split rail fence. “Corbin Sanger could be any of these guys.”

  “Yeah.” Robin sighed and set down the stack of pictures. “I think Kara might be a better bet if we want to get an idea of what he looks like. Because unless I can draw him, there’s no guarantee we’ll be able to summon him. And if we can’t summon him—”

  “We can’t banish him.” Monica tapped her fingers on the table. “Why don’t you head back to Bridger and talk to Kara? I’ll keep at this for a while and try to find some old maps from around Carlisle Creek. There have to be maps somewhere in here.” She glanced around the quiet reading room of the Glimmer Lake library. “I can tell Gail I’m looking for historical stuff for Russell House if she gets curious.”

  “Okay. Val’s going to get off work soon. Should I call her?”

  “Maybe see if she can go to Bridger with you. I’ll be fine up here, and you might need someone to drive you home if you get tired.”

  Robin nodded. “How was the house?”

  Monica fell forward and banged her head quietly against the lacquered wood top. “My life is a disaster.”

  “I’m so sorry.” Robin ran a hand over Monica’s hair. “You know you can stay with us as long as you want. Or take a room at Russell House if that’s easier. Let someone else do the cleaning for a while. It’s the slow season.”

  Monica lifted her head. “That might be the way to go. Jake’s at Russell House. I can use his kitchen if I want to cook.” She covered her face with both hands. “I just want my house to magically be back to what it was. Even the parts I didn’t like. The idea of doing…” She waved her hands around. “…all this is exhausting. I don’t have the energy or the time. I told Gabe I was going to abandon the whole thing and get a room at Bailey’s.”