When the wind got too cold, she slipped back inside, giving the studio doors a wide berth. Then, she heard the noise. Footsteps in another room. Someone in the house with her.

  “Ray?” she called out. “Is that you?”

  The footsteps in the other room stopped, but no voice called out in reply. Billie went still. Had someone broken in? Or had one of the dead followed her inside? She opened her heart by a fraction, just enough to sense if there was spirit present in the house, but she felt nothing.

  A thud sounded from down the hall. The kitchen.

  “Who’s there?” She had to force herself toward the sound.

  The doorframe splintered as a baseball bat smashed into it, the force of it an inch from Billie’s face. She startled back to see a woman clutching the weapon in both hands.

  Christina. Winding up for another swing.

  ~

  “Get out!”

  The baseball bat swung again, bashing the door jamb. Billie skidded backward, hands up to calm the woman down. “Easy. Put the bat down.”

  “What are you doing in my house?” Christina advanced with the bat clutched in both hands. A mask of anger twisting her features. “Get out!”

  Billie backed further down the hallway, hoping she wouldn’t get cornered by the woman. She seemed crazed. “Christina, put the bat down. Please. I’m not breaking in.”

  “Who the hell are you?” Christina spat, thrown off by the intruder addressing her by name.

  “Just put the goddamn bat down and we’ll talk.”

  The weapon lowered a half measure as Christina scrutinized the woman before her. “I know you from somewhere.”

  “My name’s Billie. We met once.” Billie watched the bat lower a little more, wondering exactly how to explain her presence to the woman who once lived here. “I’m a friend of Ray’s.”

  The rage in the woman’s eyes was swapped out for confusion as she squinted at the stranger. “Where is he?”

  “At work.”

  Like a switch being flipped, the anger bled out quickly and the bat came down, dangling limply in the woman’s hand. Christina glanced up at Billie and then looked away. “Right. Didn’t take him long, did it?”

  Billie felt her own fear burn off. “What are you doing here?”

  “You don’t get to ask me that!” The rage flared up briefly before dissipating again. The bat fell and rattled loudly against the floor and then Christina turned away. “Jesus Christ.”

  Her guts gave out, hating everything about this sordid scene. The last thing Billie needed right now was this drama. She could leave, just walk out the door and abandon the woman to her torment. Why was she even here?

  Hearing the sound of the tap running, she crossed into the kitchen. Christina stood over the sink, splashing cold water over her face. When she straightened up, Billie took note of the red-rimmed eyes, the shaky hands.

  Billie handed the woman a towel. “Are you all right?”

  “Did he say when he’d be home?” Christina said, ignoring the towel.

  “No.” Billie watched the woman compose herself in a framed mirror. Even with the bloodshot eyes, Christina was dishearteningly beautiful and Billie felt small before it. Weakened almost, as if the woman’s bearing was kryptonite. She had felt fragile enough experiencing the echo images of this woman in the house, standing before the genuine article was withering. Pushing it away, she steeled herself for the worst. “Why are you here?”

  “Because it’s still mine. Or half of it is.” Christina looked over the nearly empty kitchen and then back to the woman in the doorway. “What’s your name?”

  “Sybil,” she replied. She never went by her proper name. She wasn’t sure why she did now.

  “You’re living here now?”

  “No.”

  “But that’s the plan, isn’t it?” Christina’s eyes ran up and down the interloper, coldly evaluating. “You two will be nested in soon. In my house.”

  “I won’t live here.”

  “How noble of you,” the woman sneered. “It didn’t take him long to find someone new, did it?”

  Billie clenched a fist, suddenly hating this woman with her perfect looks and snide derision. “Are you seeing someone?”

  Christina didn’t respond, but her lips pursed and her eyes broke away first. Billie had to push down the simple urge to march out, to walk away from this mess. She didn’t need the hassle, but she didn’t want to back down either, no matter how grey the issue of exactly who was the trespasser here.

  Billie looked down at her shoes. The toes were scuffed, the boots not new. “I don’t want to fight with you, Christina, but I don’t want to get pulled into a mess that doesn’t involve me.”

  Christina wasn’t quite ready to call a truce. “Doesn’t involve you?” she snapped. “You’re right in the middle of it.”

  “This is between you and Ray, and I can’t speak for him.” Billie moved to the counter where her drink was. The mug was warm but not hot. “If you want to wait for him to come home, that’s fine with me, but I’m not going to fight with you.”

  The house creaked it was so quiet. Christina let out a long sigh and sank into one of the chairs as if suddenly exhausted by it all.

  “Do you want some tea?” Billie asked. She looked into her mug. “Actually, it’s honey and lemon. I couldn’t find any tea.”

  “He doesn’t drink tea.” Christina gaze held steady on the floor.

  Billie blew on the mug, even though it was lukewarm. “Can I ask you something?”

  The other woman shrugged without looking up from the floor.

  “Have you two figured out what you’re going to do with this house?”

  “Neither of us wanted to deal with it at the time,” Christina said. “I know he wants it. He loves this house, but I can’t be tied to it anymore. I want out.”

  “What does that mean?”

  The woman shrugged a second time. “It means we either sell it or he buys me out.”

  Billie slid down the cupboard and sat on the floor. “I guess the latter option is out.”

  “Who has that kind of money lying around? I suppose a payback arrangement could be made, but that would take a long time.”

  “And,” Billie added, “it would bind the two of you together for a long time.”

  “There’s that.”

  “Nothing’s ever easy, is it?”

  “No.” Christina rose from the chair and brushed her hands together, as if she’d gotten them messy. Her fingernails were deep crimson. Crossing to the doorway, she noticed the splintered wood from where it had been hit. “I’m sorry for nearly taking your head off. Will you tell Ray that I need to talk to him?”

  “Sure.” Billie got to her feet. “Will you be all right?”

  Christina ran her thumb over the battered wooden jamb. “I don’t know what possessed me to come back here. Sometimes, I just charge into things before thinking them through.”

  “We all do that.”

  “Goodnight, Sybil.”

  Billie followed the woman out the front door to the porch just as a pair of headlights flashed their eyes. A car pulled into the driveway, the driver’s side door swinging open. The look on Mockler’s face was slackjawed confusion.

  Christina marched past him to her car parked on the street. “We need to sell the house, Ray,” was all she said.

  Billie leaned against the post and folded her arms as Mockler’s head snapped back and forth between the woman on the porch and the woman marching to the street.

  Billie gave him a tiny wave. “Welcome home.”

  Chapter 16

  SHE SHOULD HAVE checked the kitchen before offering to make breakfast. Billie managed to get the coffee brewing, but was stymied as to what to make. There were eggs, but no frying pan to cook them in. Checking the refrigerator a second time revealed no bacon, yogurt or fruit. There was no cereal or even bread to make toast with. Digging through a lower cupboard yielded a pot, but Billie was damned if she could remember how to poach or even soft-boil an egg. She always got the timing wrong.

  Leaning against the counter, she rubbed her eyes vigorously to wake them up. Last night’s sleep had been nil, interrupted constantly by awful dreams that terrified her in the moment, but, now, with the grey light of dawn, she could barely remember. An image or two lingered. One was of Christina sleepwalking through the house, her eyes without pupils, glowing eerily with a milky light. The other was of a man with flies in his mouth looming over the bed, while Mockler and Christina slept. Each time Billie had drifted back to sleep, another nightmare came, scaring her awake again.

  It was the house itself that was haunting her, the residual energy of tension and bad blood that clung to every room. Her abilities, although closed off, picked up on the echoes of emotions and twisted around her REM sleep. Her initial reluctance to spend the night in Mockler’s house was right on target, but she wanted to do it for him, to make an attempt at least. She didn’t know what she was going to tell him, but she couldn’t spend another night in this house, let alone live here.

  Fortunately, the question of her moving in hadn’t come up. Thrown off guard by Christina’s sudden reappearance, he had apologized to Billie for having been ambushed like that. He must have imagined the worst because he seemed relieved to learn that they had had a quiet talk. She omitted the part about Christina almost taking her head off with the baseball bat.

  They didn’t have sex. The pop-in visit from the ex had put the kibosh on any romantic overtures. They had talked quietly for a while on the sofa, Mockler apologizing again for how she had been bushwhacked. The last thing he wanted, he’d said, was to have his past poison their relationship. It had been rocky enough. When he suggested that they get some sleep, Billie panicked anew, realizing again that she hadn’t thought this through. There was no way in Hell that she was sleeping in the same bed he had shared with his ex. He’d think she was being silly, balking at that, but men didn’t understand these things.

  She needn’t have worried. Mockler had sorted that out, leading her upstairs to the guest room. Smaller than the master bedroom, but he had been sleeping in this room since Christina had moved out. She asked why and he had told her that he never liked how the morning light filtered through the eastern facing windows. The guest room, he pointed out, faced west. She wasn’t sure if she believed his answer, but didn’t press the matter.

  When he came downstairs, Billie was hovering over the pot of water on the stove. “That won’t boil if you watch it,” he said.

  She leaned into him as he kissed her cheek. “How long do you leave eggs covered if you’re soft-boiling them? Is it two minutes?”

  “No idea. I never make them way.” He poured coffee into a mug and then took her cup. “Refill?”

  “Please.” Billie kept an eye on the clock. “Do you own a frying pan? All I could find was this pot.”

  “Most of the cookware was hers. I keep forgetting to get one.”

  “Then, how do you cook your eggs in the morning?”

  “I don’t,” he said.

  That tore her eyes from the clock. “What do you mean?”

  Taking down a tall glass, Mockler took three eggs from the carton and cracked them into the glass. “Cheers,” he said and then gulped it all down.

  “Barf!” Billie just stared at him in disbelief. “That is totally vile.”

  “No, it’s simple and easy. The four second breakfast. Done.”

  The thought of cold, raw eggs soured her appetite. “And you expect to kiss me with that mouth?”

  He lunged at her, making kissing noises. She squealed, batting him away. “What other vile surprises are you keeping from me?”

  “Did I mention my collection of severed heads in the meat freezer?”

  “Oh shit.” Taking the pot to the sink, she drained off the boiling water. “Damn.”

  “How many minutes was that?”

  “I lost track,” she said, flushing the eggs under cold water. “I don’t suppose you have egg cups, do you?”

  Rifling through a cupboard, he placed a small glass on the counter. “I have a shot glass.”

  “That’ll do. Do you have time to sit with me while I eat eggs like a normal person?”

  “I gotta run,” he said, adjusting his tie. Coming up behind her, he slipped his arm around her waist. “You were tossing and turning a lot last night. Did you get any sleep?”

  “A little,” she fibbed. “It’s always hard to sleep in a new place.”

  “Maybe you can catch some shut-eye later. Do you have plans today?”

  “I’m going to stop by the Doll House. See the ladies. I’m working tonight.”

  “Damn,” he groused. “Our schedules never line up, do they?”

  “You could stop by the bar after work.”

  “If I finish up at a normal hour, I will.” He set his bag on the counter and rifled through it, pulling out files and paperwork as he dug. “Have you seen my keys?”

  “Did you check the bowl in the front hallway?”

  “They’re not there.” He glanced over the kitchen one more time and then went out to the hallway. “Maybe I left them in my other jacket.”

  Billie set the egg in the shot glass and tapped at it with a butter knife. Shell fragments flew onto the paperwork Mockler had left on the counter. Gathering up the documents, she noticed a couple of large photographs tucked in the files. She snuck a peek and immediately regretted it. Two gruesome crime scene photos of a dead body lashed to a tree. The victim was naked, but she couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman. There was something coming out of the head. Horns?

  “Whoa,” Mockler said, sweeping back into the room. “Don’t go looking at that stuff.”

  “Sorry, I snooped. What is that?”

  He took the photos from her and stuffed everything back into the bag. “Just work.”

  Billie’s mouth dipped into a slight grimace. “That looks really bad.”

  “It is.” He kissed her forehead.

  “Do you want to talk about it? I know you’re not supposed to, officially, but I won’t tell.”

  “You’re sweet, but no,” he said, heading for the door. “See ya later. Make yourself at home.”

  The floor shuddered as he shut the door. Billie turned to her breakfast, but pushed it away, her appetite gone. Dumping it into the trash, she put the cups in the sink and went to get her boots from the hallway. Making herself at home wasn’t an option.

  ~

  “It was a disaster,” Billie stated.

  “Don’t listen to her,” Jen shot back. “It wasn’t a disaster.”

  Tammy wasn’t sure who to believe, but knowing Jen’s need for perfection in all things, she was inclined to side with Billie. “Doesn’t sound all that bad,” she said. “I mean, no one passed out or got food poisoning or anything.”

  “Lift it up a tiny bit,” said Jen. “There.”

  Clutching the long shelf at each end, Billie and Tammy held the piece in place while Jen drove the screws in. A sliver of peace and Billie savoured it. Hanging out at the Doll House and kvetching over banal problems with her friends felt like old times. If only she could hang on to this.

  “Are you finished?” Tammy groaned. “This is getting heavy.”

  “Almost there,” Jen replied through the screws clamped in her teeth.

  “So meeting the new boyfriend didn’t go so well. Who cares? There’ll be other opportunities.” Tammy turned to look at Billie. “Unless you’ve dumped him already.”

  “Hilarious.” Billie rolled her eyes. “I just wanted it to be nice, you know. Normal. But everything flopped as usual.”

  “You know,” Tammy said, pointing at Billie, “for once, you set the expectation too high, not Jen.”

  “I don’t do that,” Jen peeved.

  “Please,” Tammy dismissed. “You set expectations for a trip to the corner store. But you?” Tammy turned back to Billie, “You normally don’t expect much out of anything. This time you did. You set them too high. Jen’s become a bad influence on you.”

  “Well, we can’t all live in chaos, Tammy.” Jen stepped back. “Okay, you can let go.”

  The shelf remained in place against the wall. Tammy brushed her hands off. “I don’t live in chaos. I just don’t cling to expectations; therefore, I don’t get disappointed.”

  Even Billie wasn’t buying that. “Come on. You don’t set expectations?”

  “Occasionally, but I don’t fret if it doesn’t work out. I just adapt.” Tammy sat up, swinging her feet to the floor. “When I plan a photo shoot, I’ll have a vision for how it will go, but things change and screw up or break all the time. I drop the vision, adapt to the screw-ups and roll with it. Nothing is ever perfect, but the good stuff never comes out of perfection or a plan going exactly as it was supposed to. Something better comes out of the unexpected, the chaotic.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with setting your goals high or striving for perfection,” Jen said.

  “No. As long as you don’t insist on perfection. Or the expectation.” Tammy rose and pointed to the wall behind her. “Remember when you were renovating this place? You wanted this wall to be exposed brick, but when you and your dad tore off the drywall, there was no brick and you were so upset because it ruined your plan. But, you improvised and painted it hot pink. That looks way cooler.”

  “That’s different,” Jen dismissed.

  “No, it isn’t. You were in tears because it wasn’t going to be ‘perfect’. But, in the chaos, you adapted and came up with something better.”

  Jen folded her arms, unwilling to give an inch.

  “The pink does suit the place,” Billie conceded.

  “So, what’s your point?” Jen said. “We shouldn’t have tried?”

  “No, go ahead and try. Just give up the need for it to be perfect.” Tammy pointed a finger at Billie. “You should throw the party next time.”

  “Me?” Billie leaned back. “No. My parties are always flops.”

  “That’s exactly why you need to have one,” Tammy insisted. “At your place. Zero expectations. Just us and Kaitlin, Adam and Kyle. And your new beau.”

 

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