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S HEA

Can ever dissever my soul from the soul of the beautiful Annabel Lee...

Annabel Lee

ANNABEL’S LIGHTHOUSE PRESENT DAY

FINGERTIPS AS LIGHT AS THE TOUCH of a wispy feather traced along Shea’s neck. They were warm as they trailed down to her shoulder, and then in an instant they shifted. A frightening cold, so cold that it burned her skin. Nails speared her skin like icicles, and Shea lay there frozen. An oppressive weight held her down. She tried to suck in air, but it was as though something had closed off her airway, blocking the passage to her lungs. She was drowning. She was drowning, and she couldn’t break free...

Shea shot bolt upright in bed. Her T-shirt clung to her, soaked through with sweat. Rivulets of sweat trailed down her face. She flipped off the covers and leapt from where she’d been sleeping—no, where she’d been having a night terror.

The dream had been so real! So terrifying! One moment she had been enveloped in the sensation of love and warmth, and the next it was as if someone had thrown her into the depths of Lake Superior and then stood by to watch as Shea fought for her last breath.

Annabel .

Shea shook the webs from her fuzzy mind. No. A ghost couldn’t induce a vision. She couldn’t influence Shea’s mind like that or twist her thoughts. But then the mind could conjure many strange things while in a dream. The vision was still vivid in Shea’s mind, only this time, as she replayed it, she saw herself in Annabel’s place, with Pete standing on the shore.

No. No.

Pete would never have stood on the shore like that. Pete would have plunged into the waves to rescue her. He would have battled the freezing temperatures. He would have drank the entire lake if need be. That was Pete; he took care of what was necessary. For her.

Was that not romantic enough?

Shea whimpered as her conflicted emotions sent a wave of guilt through her. She spun from the bed and yanked her curls back from her face, tying them into a knot where they would hold for a bit until she could find a hair tie.

She sought refuge in the kitchen, snatching a cold Coke from Holt’s “icebox.” The vintage word for refrigerator now soured on her tongue. Holt. Holt had disappeared to Canada like a guilty man on the run.

But guilty of what? He had tried to save Pete, hadn’t he? He’d been the one to call the EMTs and to summon her.

And what about the tales of Annabel and the mysterious Rebecca that had consumed Jonathan Marks—until his bloody death in the very sitting room beyond where she stood? It was all horrendous, but Holt could not have any ties to it. Fifteen years ago, Holt would have more than likely been away at college. He’d have no incentive to murder Jonathan! Not to mention, Holt didn’t come into possession of the lighthouse until years later. There was no motive. None. It made no sense.

Shea popped open her Coke, strode through the entryway, and opened the door to the chilly spring night. Lake Superior was insistent with its waves, but not angry. Shea wandered across the yard, barefoot, toward the embankment. She stared over the dark expanse of the lake, glowing in places where the moon reflected off its surface. The Porcupine Mountains and the forest were mounds of blue, dark against the clear night.

What was she missing? In this entire morbid story surrounding the lighthouse, what was she missing?

Annabel. A woman drowned, left to die by a husband who allegedly stood by and watched as she sank beneath the waves. An unknown lover—maybe the lighthouse keeper? But what part had he played in the thwarted love and the horrible death?

Rebecca. An unknown piece to a story that seemed unimportant, yet Shea was told not to ask about her? Yet, Rebecca was potentially intertwined with Jonathan.

Jonathan. A pacificist, a naturalist, a scientist, supposedly as unmoved by emotion as a rock, losing his mind and committing suicide rather than face Rebecca’s story.

Captain Gene. A mysterious man who had fathered Penny, but whose whereabouts were unknown, along with the supposed missing pieces that would put definition to the story of Annabel, the life of Rebecca, and the reason for Jonathan’s death.

It all hinged on Captain Gene.

But someone—a force, a person, a spirit?—didn’t want the truth exposed. They were stifling the truth and convoluting the channels until all that was left was muddied water, a story of broken hearts, and death.

So much death.

Shea blinked as her eyes focused on movement down the shoreline. Her breath caught at the sight of the wispy, white vision of a woman, a lantern swinging by her side, her nightgown blowing against her legs. Long, white-blond hair blanketed her shoulders. Her pale skin was illuminated by the moonlight.

“Annabel,” Shea whispered.

She stepped forward as the woman moved toward the water, entering it, the waves lapping at her legs. Shea was helpless to do anything, to say anything. She stared in shock as Annabel walked deeper and deeper into the lake, until finally she turned and looked directly at Shea.

A moment passed, their gazes meeting across the expanse as though connecting across time.

Go to him . Shea heard the voice in her head.

Annabel slipped beneath the waves.

“I know you won’t believe me, but it was Annabel. I saw her.”

Shea plopped onto a chair next to Pete. He was sitting propped up on the couch, a mound of pillows supporting him. His hair was ruffled, his cheeks covered with a day’s growth of whiskers.

“Say that again?”

“I said I saw Annabel, Pete. Last night on the shore. She was carrying a lantern, then just walked into the lake and disappeared beneath the waves.”

Shea didn’t add the part when she’d heard Annabel whisper Go to him . Which made no earthly sense. She could hardly hear a whisper beside her with the crashing of the waves, let alone hear a whisper from several yards away.

Go to him . What did that mean? Go to Pete?

Pete held up a hand. “Okay. Let me ... let me focus.”

“Is it time for your pain med?” Shea offered, popping up from the chair to go retrieve it.

“Shea.” Her name on his lips brought her attention back to him. “You need to calm down.”

Shea shook her head. “I feel like I’m on the cusp of figuring it out and losing my mind. If I could just find Captain Gene, then I think we can solve everything! And sidenote, I don’t believe in ghosts, but I’m seeing them! Do you not see the problem here?”

“Hey.” Pete spoke with firmness this time. “Calm. Down.” He emphasized each word, and it caught Shea by surprise. He never told her what to do. That was her job. She told him what to do and—

Shea snapped into awareness and heard her own fickle thoughts, the wildness in her words. She stared at Pete. “Am I losing it? Like Jonathan Marks did?”

“Hardly.” A slight smile quirked Pete’s mouth upward. “Sit down, would you? Take a deep breath.”

Shea did as her aloof and boring husband requested. Only he didn’t seem aloof this morning—or boring. No, he seemed different somehow. What had changed since their last massive blowup? Him? Or maybe her?

“I don’t know what to do, Pete.” She was surprised by the watery sound of her voice.

Pete reached out to her with his good arm, and she took his hand. “You’re not losing your mind, Shea. You’ve undergone a lot of stress the last few days, and I know you’re not sleeping.”

“I am,” Shea admitted, “but fitfully.”

“Right. And then there’s us.” Pete let his words hang for a moment before continuing. “It’s a lot. I get it.”

Shea bit the inside of her lip. She felt like she might cry , for pity’s sake! “This was all for a book. A stupid book. And now—look at you. I don’t know who I am anymore. I don’t like who I am, but I don’t know what I’m supposed to be.”

There.

She’d said it.

Out loud.

She’d admitted to her weakness. Shea didn’t know who she was anymore, or maybe who she had ever been. She just knew what she wanted . A dream. A carefully calculated dream of a bestselling book, a life of traveling and exploring, a husband who doted on her and shared her interests, and...

“I wanted you to think I hung the moon.” Shea whispered her final thought aloud.

Pete’s eyes turned glassy. His grip on her hand tightened.

“Why would I think that?” he asked.

Shea’s gaze shot up to meet his in surprise. There was honest confusion.

He continued, “Why would I make you larger than you are, larger than you’re capable of being? That’s not fair to you. To have expectations of you that you can’t fulfill ? Why would I do that?”

That took her aback. Shea tried to catch up to what Pete was saying. “But—”

Pete scowled. “Stupid love songs and stories—they put ideas in people’s heads that are unrealistic. Hang the moon, swim the ocean, go to the ends of the earth. Am I supposed to make you my god? Am I supposed to worship you? How would that be kind to you, Shea? Those expectations would crash and burn really fast.”

Shea blinked. It was all she could do. His words made sense but were so counter, so different from how she had wished him to be. She had wished Pete would hang the moon for her, fly to the stars, spin the world on its axis.

Pete’s thumb moved back and forth, caressing her hand. “I chose you, Shea. The good, the bad, the ugly, the day-to-day mundane of you. I chose you because that’s the gift I was given. I just had to say yes to it. And I did. I mean ... God gave me you. No bells. No whistles. Just you.”

Shea couldn’t breathe.

Pete finished, “And I’ve always been content with that.”