***
Day seven of Mina and Sienna being in Mooresville
I couldn’t do this. I really, really couldn’t do this.
“Shit,” I grunted and walked up the driveway.
“Can I help?”
Mina jumped a foot and whirled like a startled cat, instantly on guard. Her eyes were wild, and her entirely too short hair spun spectacularly around her head as if she’d been in a commercial trying to sell a certain brand of shampoo that was for luxurious, sleek hair.
The cat that we’d bought together, the one that I knew didn’t like me—although dislike was too mild a word for what this cat felt for me—hissed and growled, causing us both to turn our heads and stare at the evil shit.
“Wow,” Mina said. “She never hisses and growls like that at anybody.”
I saw her pause as the memories hit, and I barely resisted the urge to back away.
Oh, this was not good either.
“She used to hiss at my husband like that,” Mina said, a slow smile curving over her lips. “When we got her, Taco used to love to lay on my husband’s chest.” She grinned at me, not asking why the hell I’d walked up her driveway when I didn’t even live on the street. “Then, one day, the cat grew up enough and decided that she no longer liked my husband. He hadn’t hurt her or bothered her in any way, she just decided one day that she hated him and that was that.”
That was all true.
I’d kind of liked the cat. In fact, I had even thought that I had bonded with that cat, dammit!
Then, one day, she just up and decided that I was no longer an acceptable human being and showed her displeasure with me by hissing and spitting at me any time I came too close for her comfort.
Like right now, for instance. I was presently within a ten-foot radius of Mina, and the cat was protecting her owner like a dog would have done.
“And now she’s doing that to you. How odd.” She studied me for a long moment. “Why are you here?”
That was the thousand-dollar question. Why the hell was I here? I shouldn’t be here. I damn sure shouldn’t be in her driveway, talking to her.
The only good thing was that it was dark so she couldn’t see the color of my eyes due to the shadows.
“I live down the street,” I lied. In actuality, I lived in the camper that was right here on this same property that she was on. It was far enough away, though, that it seemed like it was the next property over, but it wasn’t. “I saw you struggling with the grill and thought that I’d offer to help.”
Her lips pursed.
“My husband used to have a problem with me manning the grill, too,” she murmured. Those watchful eyes were still scrutinizing me. “I can do it, though.”
I doubted that.
The reason I had a problem with her using the grill was because she didn’t know what in the hell she was doing. And she proved that moments later by squirting about half the bottle of lighter fluid onto the grill and holding out a match.
“You don’t have the charcoal on there,” I told her. “That is what you’re supposed to saturate with the lighter fluid.”
She looked at me over her shoulder.
“I don’t have any charcoal.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose.
“Then how did you expect to light this grill and keep it lit?” I questioned, barely keeping the exasperation out of my voice. “Or were you just in the mood to light a fire?”
I stared pointedly at the hamburger patties that were incredibly way too fat, and needed to be smashed down at least an inch, knowing damn well and good that she didn’t intend to just light a fire.
“You sound like my husband,” she said, and the buzz of electricity between us was enough to cause me to groan. On the inside, at least. On the outside, I was calm, cool and collected.
“Maybe your husband just knew his shit,” I suggested mildly. “I think there’s a bag of charcoal at my place. Give me a minute to run down there. Take those inside and smash them down until they’re about an inch thick. Oh, and make sure you wash your hands when you’re done.”
I could’ve kicked myself at that last comment.
That’d been something else I used to say to her.
She’d gone into nursing school, and her hand washing habits had gone from good to excellent. If we went to a store and she touched a cart, she washed her hands. If we went to dinner, and she touched a menu, she washed her hands after. If she had to shake someone’s hand, she washed her hands after.
Being a nurse had clued her in to the diseases that were a daily part of the world that she lived in. The things that could cause her harm if she didn’t take the necessary hygiene steps to prevent them.
Germs also became a constant battle. I, of course, teased her mercilessly about it back then, and apparently, it was something I continued to do to her now.
Shit.
I’d called Sienna ‘Sugar Girl’ the other day, and now I was teasing my wife about things that the old me—the dead me—used to tease her about.
Son of a bitch, I really needed to get the fuck away from here, or she was going to figure it out.
I could already see the wheels turning in her head.
“I can cook these inside,” she murmured. “On the griddle.”
That was true. She could.
But I didn’t want her to go quite yet.
That’s not what I said, though.
“That’s true. You could,” I agreed amicably.
She eyed me.
I could see those wheels turning, and I had to resist the urge to leave. Again.
“Do you want to stay for dinner?”
I looked at all the light in the house, and I shook my head.
“No.”
Her mouth pursed. “Then I think I’ll cook them on the griddle. Goodnight, Mr. Ghost.”
With that, she walked inside, leaving the grill, and the puddle of lighter fluid, in the middle of the driveway.
It was only after I’d put it all away and had walked back to my trailer, that I realized this was going to be a lot harder than I thought.
I wanted to stomp into my house, gather my woman up in my arms, and crush her to me while I held her enough to start making up for the six years’ worth of holding her and cuddling that I’d missed out on since I had ‘died.’
“Dammit. Damn. Damn,” I grumbled. Then fell back on the shitty, cold bed and closed my eyes.
I needed to stop.
Really. I needed to.
But I didn’t.
And within two weeks, she would have all the evidence she needed.