Page 18 (2/2)
"You avoiding me, Stella?"
"No A little," she admitted "But not entirely We&039;ve been swaot three weeks to go, and I like to stick close"
"Do you think you could ht? Take in a hts I usually try to take the kids out"
"Good The new Disney flick&039;s playing I can pick y&039;all up at six We&039;ll go for pizza first"
"Oh, I" She sat back, frowned at him "That was sneaky"
"Whatever works"
"Logan, have you ever been to the ht?"
"Nope" He pushed off the desk and grinned "Should be an experience"
He ca his hands under her elbows, lifted her straight out of the chair with a careless strength that had her"I&039;ve started toup the contact as he let her slide down his body until her feet hit the floor Her ar there for a ain
"It looks like I&039;ve started to miss you, too," she said as she stepped back "I&039;ve been thinking"
"I just bet you have You keep on doing that" He tugged at a loose lock of her hair "See you Friday"
She sat down again when he walked out "But I have trouble re"
He was right It was an experience One he handled, in Stella&039;s opinion, better than she&039;d expected He didn&039;t appear to have a probleot the feeling she was odd man out Normally she could hold her own in intense discussions of comic books and baseball, but this one headed to another level
At one point she wasn&039;t entirely sure the X-Men&039;s Wolverine hadn&039;t signed on to play third base for the Atlanta Braves
"I can eat fifty pieces of pizza," Luke announced as the pie was divvied up "And after, five gallons of popcorn"
"Then you&039;ll puke!"
She started to remind Gavin that puke wasn&039;t proper an just plopped a slice on his own plate "Be smarter to puke after the pizza to make room for the popcorn"
The wisdoing noises
"Hey!" Luke&039;s face went mutinous "Gavin has more pepperoni on his piece I have two and he has three!"
As Gavin snorted and set his face into the look, Logan nodded "You know, you&039;re right Doesn&039;t seem fair Let&039;s just fix that" He plucked a round of pepperoni off Gavin&039;s piece and popped it into his own mouth "Now you&039;re even"
More hilarity ensued The boys ate like stevedores, made an unholy ot to the theater, she expected theot to re the movie," she warned "Other people are here to see it"
"I&039;ll try," Logan said sole"
The boys giggled all the way to the concession counter
She knew soet to the woht as they settled into seats with tubs of popcorn, she knew some who sincerely tried to char novelty
Still, he seeive ato enjoy a h, as she&039;d expected, Luke began to squirm in his seat Two cups of pop, she calculated, one so, wouldn&039;t want to ument
She leaned toward hian beat her to it She didn&039;t hear what he said in Luke&039;s ear, but Luke giggled, and the two of theht back," he murmured to Stella and walked out with his hand over Luke&039;s
Okay, that was it, she decided as her eyesher little boy to pee
She was a goner
Two very happy boys piled into the back of Logan&039;s car As soon as they were strapped in, they were bouncing and chattering about their favorite parts of the an slipped behind the wheel, then draped his arht want to brace yourselves, &039;cause I&039;onna kiss your mama"
"How coht have observed yourselves, she&039;s pretty, and she tastes good"
He leaned over, amusement in his eyes When Stella would have offered hiave her a soft, quick kiss on the mouth
"You&039;re not pretty" Luke snorted through his nose "How come she kissed you?"
"Son, that&039;s because I&039; hunk of man" He winked into the rearviewhiine
Luke was nodding off when they got to the house, his head bobbing as he struggled to stay awake
"Let et him" Stella leaned in to unbuckle his seat belt "I&039;o upstairs again"
"She&039;ll have to get used to ed Stella aside and hoisted Luke into his aro for a ride"
"I&039;m not tired"
"&039;Course not"
Yawning, he laid his head on Logan&039;s shoulder "You sot harder skin"
"How about that?"
Roz wandered into the foyer as they caan, why don&039;t you come down for a drink once you settle those boys down I&039;d like to talk to the both of you"
"Sure We&039;ll be right down"
"I can take the Luke up the stairs
"I&039;ll just get us soht, cutie," Roz said to Gavin, and san
He was already untying Luke&039;s Nikes "Logan, I&039;ll do that You go on doith Roz"
He continued to re if the nerves he heard in her voice had to do with the ghost or with hi beside her, unusually silent, who had his attention
"Go ahead and settle him in, then Gavin and I want to have a little conversation Don&039;t we, kid?"
Gavin jerked a shoulder "Maybe I guess"
"He needs to get ready for bed"
"Won&039;t take long Why don&039;t you step into estured toward the bathrooan," Stella began
"Man talk Excuse us" And he closed the door in her face
Figuring it would be easier on thee of the tub He wasn&039;t sure, but he had to figure the boy was about as nervous as he was hi your mama bother you?"
"I don&039;t know Maybe I saw this other guy kiss her once, when I was little She went out to dinner with hi, and we had a babysitter, and I woke up and saw him do it But I didn&039;t like him so much because he s his lips and showing his teeth
"I don&039;t like hiirls because they&039;re pretty?" Gavin blurted out
"Well, now, I&039;ve kissed irls But your mama&039;s special"
"How coan decided So he&039;d do his best to give theood kind of way, I guess Girls make us feel funny in lots of ways, but when they make your heart feel funny, they&039;re special"
Gavin looked toward the closed door and back again "My dad kissed her I ree, one that surprised him, to stroke a hand over Gavin&039;s hair But he didn&039;t think it was the right tihost in this house, he knew
"I expect he loved her a lot, and she loved him She told me how she did"
"He can&039;t coh she said he couldn&039;t I thought when the lady started co, he could come, too But he hasn&039;t"
Could there be anything harder for a child to face, he wondered, than losing a parent? Here he was, a grownone of his
"Doesn&039;tover you I believe stuff like that When people who love us have to go away, they still look out for us Your dad&039;s always going to look out for you"
"Then he&039;d see you kiss Mom, because he&039;d watch over her, too"
"I expect so" Logan nodded "I like to think he doesn&039;t mind, because he&039;d knoant her to be happy Maybe e get to know each other some better, you won&039;t mind too much either"
"Do you make Mom&039;s heart feel funny?"
"I sure hope so, because I&039;d hate to feel like this all by ht I never had to say it before, or think about it But if we decide to be happy together, all of us, your dad&039;s still your dad, Gavin Always I want you to understand I know that, and respect that Man-to-an offered a hand When he shook it, the srin "Anyway, I like you better than the other guy"
"Good to know"
Luke was tucked in and sleeping when they caanlook, then stepped back as she readied Gavin for bed
Deliberately he took her hand as they stepped into the hall "Ask him if you want to know," he said before she could speak "It&039;s his business"
"I just don&039;t want him upset"
"He seem upset to you when you tucked hihed "No"
At the top of the stairs, the cold blew through thean&039;s ar her firmly to his side It passed by, with a little lash, like a flicked whip
Seconds later, they heard the soft singing
"She&039;s angry with us," Stella whispered when he turned, prepared to stride back "But not with them She won&039;t hurt theot a baby monitor downstairs, so I can hear them if they need me"
"How do you sleep up here?"
"Well, strangely enough First it was because I didn&039;t believe it Now it&039;s knowing that in soht they stayed at my parents&039; she came into my room and cried It broke my heart"
"Ghost talk?" Roz asked "That&039;s just what I had in mind" She offered them wine she&039;d already poured Then pursed her lips when Stella switched on the ain It&039;s been years since I have"
"I gotta adan said with his eyes on the monitor, "creeps me out soet used to it More or less Where&039;s Hayley?" she asked Roz
"She was feeling tired - and a little blue, a little cross, I think She&039;s settled in upstairs with a book and a big tall glass of decaffeinated Coke I&039;ve already talked to her about this, so" She gestured to seats On the coffee table was a tray of green grapes, thin crackers, and a half round of Brie
She sat herself, plucked a grape "I&039;ve decided to do souest"
"An exorcislance toward theout of it
"Not quite that active We want to find out about her history and her connection to this house Seeress, ure out a direction"
"We haven&039;t been able to spend a lot of time on it," Stella pointed out
"Another reason for outside help We&039;re busy, and we&039;re ao to soht?"
"Concert&039;s over for the night" Logan gestured when the monitor went silent
"Sometimes she comes back two or three times" Stella offered him a cracker "Do you know somebody, Roz? Someone you want to take this on?"
"I don&039;t know yet But I&039;vethe idea that I want to do a fory search on my ancestry There&039;s a ie Dr Mitchell Carnegie," she added "He taught at the university in Charlotte, ht at the University of Meive the occasional lecture Priraphies and so on He&039;s touted as an expert faht be our man" Stella spread a little Brie on a cracker for herself "Having so should be better than us fuan put in, "on how he feels about ghosts"
"I&039; to lass "Then I guess we&039;ll find out"