Page 75 of Old Flames

“No complaints,” Jules said. “Are you saying the women are hysterical?”

“No,” she said. “That’s an old trope. I’m saying the women were targeted.”

Dizzy, Jules sat on the nearest chair. “Aurora may not be a girl’s girl.”

“It could be anyone,” Daphne said. “That house is over a hundred years old. We can’t know everything that went down there. Just the other day, at a property on Whitehead, they found a trove of letters lowered into an old well. We know the original homeowner fell to his death back in the late eighteen hundreds. The letters date back to the 1960s and show the residents pleading with the original owner to quit tormenting them. Can you imagine? Who knows who’s knocking on those doors at night. It could be Old Man Jacobsen himself.”

Jules had never considered that. It might help to broaden her understanding of the spiritual makeup of the inn.

“How about you?” Jules asked. “Did you experience anything?”

“I had so-called dreams, too,” Daphne answered. “I slept with a string of rosary beads under my pillow, just in case, and then, Sunday morning, I found this.” She extended her hand to show off a gold ring. “It belonged to Felix.”

Jules considered the simple wedding band. “How do you know?”

She recalled the incident well. Daphne was visibly shaken and reluctant to share details. If she believed it to be true, there was no point questioning her or demanding proof. But Daphne could back up her statement. She slipped off the ring and showed her the inscription.

Daphne, Always

“Did you find it,” Jules asked, “or did it find you?”

“Maybe Aurora intervened,” Daphne said. “If that’s the case, I’m grateful. But I’m glad to be out of that house. I sleep better. My mind is clear. Knowing what you know, why did you return?”

“Oh . . . I don’t know.” Feigning ignorance was the best Jules could do.

“Are you at least getting any writing done?” Daphne asked. “What are you working on?”

“Line edits for my next release,” Jules replied, glad to switch topics. “I can’t wait to turn it in. And you?”

“The children.”

“Which children?” Jules asked. The grandchildren she wouldn’t give her mother or some other batch of kids?

“The children that the navy rescued aboard the William and Wildfire slave ships, the ones buried at the memorial site. Can you imagine their suffering?”

Jules had no trouble imagining it. She’d felt their pain so acutely on the trolley tour that she nearly lost her mind.

“I’m compelled to give them a voice,” Daphne said.

Throat tight, Jules nodded her encouragement.

“I’m approaching it through a series of short stories,” Daphne continued. “From the perspective of the mothers left behind on the continent and the children themselves. I follow their journey until they reunite on the other side.”

“Do you believe there’s any real chance of that?” Jules asked. If, for example, her mother had returned to stardust, there would be no grand reunion at the pearly gates.

“I have to believe it,” Daphne said. “Love can’t be lost forever. That’s my idea of hell.”

Jules managed to avoid Leo the rest of the day. She didn’t go to him, and he didn’t come to her. At midnight she resumed her vigil, returning to her spot in the garden. But if summoning a spirit required focus, she was doomed to fail. She could only think of Leo, and the only haunting was her desire for him. She needed to feel his hands on her body, watch his eyes turn feverish, going mad for wanting her. She wanted to taste his mouth again, lose her fingers in his hair, press her body to his, feel the scrape of his teeth on her tender nipples and his fingers inside her, and . . .

I’ve got to get out of here.

Jules raced indoors, leaving behind the night blooming flowers, the moist earth, the bright moon, and the shadows that moved between the trees. She frantically touched herself in a hot shower until she came, her forehead pressed against the tile wall, and the aching subsided. Except it didn’t.

Jules woke up spent and covered in sweat. She’d dreamed of Leo all night. In these dreams, he called her July and my love. She twisted in her sheets, her lust for him an ache in her throat, a rope around her waist, a throbbing between her legs. Somehow she made it down to breakfast. He wasn’t there. Waiting at the usual table was a bouquet of dry lavender. She brought the flowers to her nose and breathed deeply but felt no joy. Nothing was as good as him. The coffee was bitter, the food tasted bland, and the fresh scent of lavender failed to intoxicate her.

She ate quickly and returned to her room, not trusting herself among the well-rested, well-adjusted newcomers to The Aurora. Her desire for Leo was the warden that kept her locked in, for her own good, or his? Or no one’s, possibly. They were adults. What were these stupid rules that she’d invented to keep them on the straight and narrow? What did it matter? When things eventually fell apart, it would hurt, but she was no stranger to pain. She was, increasingly, a stranger to pleasure in any form. She was dry and unyielding earth. She didn’t have to submit to his needs, but couldn’t she give in to her own?

These were the thoughts that had shocked her awake last night, not some fantom knock on her door. How easy it would have been to leave her room, climb the stairs to his suite, slip into his bed. He would not turn her away, nor would he let her down. For all his patient waiting, she’d make it worth his while.