Scrooge and the Single Girl Read online

  But it wasn’t Will. It was Missy.

  Her own dear, sweet Missy. Curled in a ball and fast asleep among the rags.

  Jilly opened her eyes. The sun shone in the window. The storm had passed at last.

  “Omigod!” She bolted upright, pressed her palms together and cast her gaze heavenward. “Please, please, let it be true…”

  “What the hell?” Will sat up. His hair stuck out in spikes and he had morning beard-shadow sprouting on that sexy cleft chin of his.

  Jilly overflowed with fondness. She grabbed him and hugged him, hard. The empty snack bag, caught between them, crackled in protest as she squeezed.

  “Wha…huh?” He was so adorable, so totally at a loss.

  She laid her head against his broad chest and heard the strong, steady beat of his heart. “Will, I just know it. I just know that it’s true.”

  “What? I don’t get it. What’s the—”

  “Uh-uh.” She beamed up into his frowning face as a single tear born of hope and joy slid down her cheek. “Not right now.”

  He saw the tear and rubbed it away with a gentle thumb. “Not right now, what?”

  She pushed at his chest. “No time to explain.” Windmilling her feet, she got them free of the hampering afghan. Then she threw herself at the end of the bed, scrambled off it and raced for the stairs, which she took two at a time, a neat trick, as the stairs were very steep and very narrow.

  Will was right behind her. “What the—?”

  “Oh, you’ll see. Just wait. You’ll see.” She hit the kitchen floor at a run and raced to her boots, grabbing one and then the other, swiftly shoving her feet into them.

  “I take it we’re going outdoors.” Will pulled on his own boots.

  “Yep. But don’t worry. We’re not going far.” She grabbed her coat and turned for the door.

  Outside it was bright and utterly gorgeous, if you didn’t mind blinding vistas of sparkling white. Jilly hustled to the end of the porch and then started trudging through the snow, which was several inches deeper than it had been last night. She hadn’t laced her boots and the snow came to her knees. She hauled one leg up, shoved it down, and then repeated the process all over again. The snow packed in over her open boot tops. It was cold on her feet as it melted with her body heat. Did she care?

  Not in the least. Her heart was beating, loud and hard. Anticipation was an actual taste in her mouth—sharp and tart. “She’s there, she’s there. She has to be there….” She said it under her breath, a chant, an incantation, a prayer—as she slogged the ten feet from the porch to the woodshed.

  She flipped the cracked leather latch. The plank door swung into the shadows beyond, creaking as it moved. The snow had piled up at the sill. Jilly stepped over it and down, onto the packed, cold dirt floor of the shed.

  “It’s in here? Something in here?” Will was right behind her, so close his warm breath stirred her tangled hair.

  All at once, she was frightened. She didn’t want to look. What would happen when she looked? Would reality turn sad and empty? Would her dream prove to be just that, nothing more than a transient projection of her hopeful heart?

  Will clasped her shoulders with his strong hands. “Hey. You okay?”

  It was enough. The sound of his voice, those fine, steady hands. She could manage it now. She could face looking into that box.

  “I’m fine.” She patted his left hand with her right. He let go. She stepped forward, toward the box in the corner at the edge of the stacks of waiting firewood. One step and then two.

  And right then, as Jilly lifted her foot for that third step, Missy rose from the box, good ear first, followed quickly by her sweet little head and her furry kitty shoulders.

  “I’ll be damned,” said Will, amazed.

  Missy yawned hugely and lazily blinked her amber eyes at them, obviously just awakening from sleep.

  Jilly was on her in two more steps. She reached down and scooped the cat up and buried her face in soft, warm calico fur. Instantly, Missy was purring, her body revving against Jilly’s cheek. “Oh, Missy baby,” she crooned into her cat’s sweet tummy. “Merry Christmas, sweetheart. Merry, Merry Christmas.” Overcome with gratitude, Jilly tipped her head back and sent a breathless prayer heavenward. “Thank you, Mavis. Thank you so much….”

  Missy was squirming, reaching for Jilly’s shoulder. Jilly let her climb up where she wanted to be.

  “Thank you, Mavis?” Will asked from behind her.

  Jilly whirled his way and opened her mouth to tell him everything. But before she let the words escape, she thought again.

  The trouble was, he seemed such a practical man—except for his holiday phobia, which, while irrational, was certainly understandable, given all the awful things that had happened to him at Christmastime. If she told him that she was absolutely certain his dead grandmother had dropped in for a visit two nights in a row, she had a pretty clear picture of what would happen next.

  He’d figure the bump on her head had scrambled her brain, after all. He’d whip out his cell and dial 911. And most likely, by now, the phone would be working again. He’d have a helicopter full of EMTs and life-support equipment on its way here in five minutes flat.

  And Jilly wasn’t ready to go. Not yet. At the very least, she wanted her chance to rummage through the boxes in the back of that closet upstairs, a chance to see if the real Mavis had looked anything like the woman in her dreams.

  She said, “It was just a little prayer, you know? A prayer of gratitude.”

  “To my grandmother?”

  “Well, this was her place, after all. I kind of feel that she’s here, watching over us. Don’t you feel it, too?”

  He was looking way too skeptical. “How did you know the cat was out here?”

  She gave him a huge, bright smile. “Just feminine intuition, that’s all. Just a feeling I had.”

  He wasn’t buying. “For plain intuition, you were pretty damned excited to get out here and have a look.”

  “Intuition’s like that sometimes. I have it and I’m just jumping up and down with enthusiasm over it.”

  He muttered something under his breath. She decided she’d probably be happier not knowing what. “We checked this whole shed, carefully, yesterday.”

  “And we missed her. Or she wasn’t in here yet. I don’t know, Will. I told you. It was just a feeling I had, that she’d be here this morning.” She knew what he needed. Distracting. She cleared the distance between them and held out her purring cat. Missy purred all the louder and pawed the air, reaching for him. “Here. Hold Missy.”

  He jumped back so fast, he almost tripped on the snow-packed doorsill behind him. “Damn it, Jilly.”

  “Aw, now. What kind of attitude is that? You can do it. Come on. Now’s your chance to make up for all that meanness yesterday.”

  “It’s freezing out here,” he grumbled, shoving his hands in the pockets of his slept-in jeans. “We should go back inside.”

  “First, you take Missy.” She gave him her most serious look and schooled her voice to firmness. “Do it now.”

  And what do you know? He did. He yanked his hands from his pockets and held out his arms. Missy went to him eagerly, pawing for his shoulder, cuddling close, getting going with an outboard-motor-sized purr.

  “Tell her you like her. Tell her you’ll never reject her affection again.”

  Reluctantly, happier to see the damn cat than he ever would have admitted to the woman in the fluffy pajamas, the snow-filled boots and shearling coat who was now beaming happily up at him, Will petted the animal and made his apology. “Listen, Missy. It’s great to see you. How about we let bygones be bygones?”

  Jilly’s wide smile got even wider. “Good job. Let’s go inside.”

  “Oh, ye of little faith,” Jilly teased when she found out that yesterday he’d left the cat supplies in the car.

  Will was only too happy to trudge out there and get everything. While he was outside, they got power again, t
he old fridge revving to life and the overhead light in the kitchen popping on.

  “Ta-da,” Jilly sang out when he came through the door, indicating the light above with a flourish. “Now you won’t have to fool with the generator.”

  Once Missy was comfortable and digging into a nice, big bowl of cat food, they made some instant cappuccino and enjoyed their morning bowls of Froot Loops. Will had turned on the radio when they first came back inside, so they already knew that the storm had been a huge one. It was going to be a day or two—or even three—until a county snowplow could possibly get around to that long, winding driveway out there.

  That fit in just fine with the plan that was beginning to take shape in Jilly’s mind. She ate fast.

  Will asked with an amused lift of a bronze eyebrow, “Going to a fire?”

  “I want to get upstairs and check in that closet. Remember, you said you thought you could find a picture of your grandmother in there?”

  He sipped from his mug. “What I want first is a bath and a shave. That okay with you?”

  It wasn’t. She was shamelessly impatient to see Mavis. But it wasn’t her house and the treasures upstairs were not hers to investigate on her own. “Oh. Well, sure. No problem. I’ll wait.”

  Her expression must have given her away. He suggested, “Look. Why don’t you just go ahead and get after it? I think most of the pictures are in a couple of albums in a cardboard file box. You know the kind I mean?”

  She nodded, and managed to restrain herself from licking her lips, she was so very eager.

  “I’ll be up to join you in a while. If you haven’t figured out who Mavis is by then, I’ll show you.”

  “Terrific.”

  “I still don’t get why you’re so jazzed over this.”

  “Uh, well, I’ve been staying in her house. And you’ve told me so much about her. I’m beginning to feel as if I know her. I want to put a face to my idea of her.”

  “Whatever.” He shrugged and dipped up another big spoonful of cereal. She figured her explanation must have satisfied him, because he didn’t ask her any more questions.

  Will tried his phone again before he went to take his bath. Same as before. Nothing but static.

  “Try yours.”

  She went upstairs, dug hers out of her purse and pressed Talk.

  He was waiting for her at the foot of the stairs. “Well?”

  “More static.”

  “I guess it’s you and me and Missy, for now.” He gave her the sweetest, most rueful grin.

  “Merry Christmas, Will.”

  “Humph.”

  “What was that?”

  “Do I have to say it?”

  She just looked at him, patiently.

  “Oh, what the hell. Merry Christmas, Jilly.” He went in the bathroom and shut the door.

  She headed back up the stairs. She was going to get dressed and then she was going to get in that closet and check out those photo albums.

  There were lots of boxes and a couple of trunks pushed back in the crawl space behind the closet, between the outside wall and the Sheetrock paneling. Jilly had the flashlight Will had left on the dresser last night, so it didn’t take her long to find the file box. She dragged it out into the light. When she took off the dusty lid, she discovered two dog-eared photo albums, a baby book and more boxes full of loose pictures, mostly old, mostly black-and-white.

  The baby book was Caitlin’s. It had a teddy bear on the cover and the words All About Baby in faded pink letters. Inside were all of Caitlin’s baby statistics, lovingly entered in a careful, round hand, from birth weight and length to favorite songs of the day—by the Andrews Sisters and Frank Sinatra. There was a lock of glossy black hair. Jilly smiled at that. Caitlin’s hair was still glossy black, kept that way, no doubt, with a helping hand from Clairol. Her first word, “No,” was noted, and the date of her first baby step. The pages for baby showers and friendly advice were blank, signs of the life they had led, a mother and daughter, up in the mountains, all on their own. There were a few photos glued onto the final pages: baby Caitlin in only a diaper, lying on her back on a bed, and Caitlin as a toddler, holding a toy shovel, standing in the clearing outside with the old house behind her, squinting into the sun.

  The two photo albums, on quick examination, appeared to be roughly chronological. The first held very old pictures in sepia tones, carefully posed, of people Jilly didn’t recognize. The men wore bowler hats and spats, the women high-necked white shirtwaists with mutton-chop sleeves. The second was page after page of yellowing black-and-whites. Jilly took note of the slim dark-haired girl who appeared about midway through that second album. She thought she could see the resemblance to Caitlin and Will—and to the Mavis of her dreams.

  But it was after she moved on to the boxes full of snapshots that she found what she was looking for, shots of an old woman out in the clearing, with three little boys who had to be Aaron, Will and Cade. A picture of that same woman sitting in the chair in the living area, knitting what looked like the afghan Jilly had slept beneath just last night. And another of the woman and Caitlin, standing side-by-side on Main Street in New Venice, in front of the Highgrade. In that one, Caitlin was laughing, dark head thrown back. Whatever the joke was, the old woman seemed to be in on it. Her face was crinkled with humor, but she had her hand over her mouth, as if to keep the laughter in.

  Jilly stared from one picture to the next. Her cheeks felt too warm and her heart was racing. She was looking at Mavis, she was certain of it. Because the old woman was the same woman she had seen in her dreams.

  Chapter Ten

  Jilly’s first reaction was elation. She felt lifted up, vindicated. Her dreams were verified as truth.

  Close on the heels of excitement, a shiver of dread crawled beneath her skin. This really couldn’t be happening. She hadn’t really been visited by the spirit of Will’s dead grandmother two nights running. Had she?

  She heard Will’s step on the rickety stairs. A frantic thrill raced through her, followed swiftly by the odd urge to toss everything back in the box and shove it into the closet, to pretend she hadn’t been looking through it, hadn’t found the face from her dreams.

  But then again, what was to pretend? Will had no idea of the things she might have seen.

  He came through the curtain and she turned, still holding that picture of Mavis and Caitlin on Main Street. “I think this must be your grandmother. Am I right?”

  He crouched beside her and took the picture. He smelled so good and clean. His face was smooth, his hair still wet. “Yep. That’s my grandma.” He lightly touched the wrinkled face. “She always covered her mouth when she laughed. She had false teeth that never fit right. I think she might have been embarrassed about them.”

  Jilly was quiet, recalling the beautiful teeth of the Mavis in her dream. It was the first wrong note in this whole symphony of magical happenings. Maybe in the spirit world, you could have the things you’d never had in life, including a set of white, perfect teeth.

  Or more than likely, the voice of reason whispered wisely, your dreams were just that: dreams.

  It was all rationally explainable, really.

  She’d wandered into Will’s room sometime that first night, forgotten she’d been in there when that tree branch fell on her head, but incorporated the buried memory into her dream. At some point, she had seen a picture of Mavis. Someone at some time or another had mentioned to her that Will Bravo once had a dog named Snatch. After all, she and Will had grown up in the same small town. And now her two best friends had married his brothers. She probably subconsciously knew things about Will she had no clue of at the conscious level.

  And Missy in the rag box? Just what she’d told Will: intuition. Nothing more.

  Will was watching her. “What’s going on?”

  “Huh? Oh, nothing.”

  “You look sad.”

  Sad? Was she? Maybe a little. She’d grown rather enamored of the whole idea that her dreams might be
visions, that Mavis McCormack had come to communicate with her from beyond the grave. It did make her just a tiny bit sad to admit that it all added up to nothing more than her subconscious playing a few cute tricks.

  However, she could deal with feeling sad. She wasn’t sure how she would deal with having to accept that what she’d seen in her dreams was real.

  She smiled at Will. “Maybe I am sad. I’ve been thinking about your grandmother, wondering what her life was like. It seems that she must have been lonely. So many years living up here, all alone.”

  His brows drew together. “To me, she just seemed comfortable, at peace with herself and the world she lived in. I was only a kid, though. What did I know?”

  He had on a charcoal-gray turtleneck sweater and he’d pushed the sleeves to his elbows. She laid her hand on his forearm. “I’ll bet you did know. Better than just about anybody else.”

  He looked down at her hand and then up into her eyes.

  And everything changed. All at once, she was acutely aware of the silky hairs on his arm, the warmth of his flesh, of hard muscle beneath taut skin. She watched his Adam’s apple move up and down as he swallowed—and found she was swallowing right along with him.

  She dragged her gaze downward and let go of his arm, fast. “Come on,” she said briskly, grabbing the scattered photos, dropping them into the open box. “Help me put these away. We have so much to do and only so many hours to do it in.”

  “Jilly.”

  She made herself look at him. And there it was again, that burning awareness, that lovely blooming feeling in her stomach, the sense of connection, of being pulled into him, the certainty that something absolutely wonderful was about to happen very soon….

  Not.

  They’d been over that. He didn’t want to get anything started, and that was fine with her.

  He was the one who looked away that time. When he looked back, the dangerous moment had passed. He asked, suspiciously, “What, exactly, do we have to do?”