Page 56 of Chasing Your Ghost

“Your eyes are so green in this light,” he told her in a near-whisper.

He’d noticed the shade of her eyes shifted depending on the light, looking darker and browner indoors, but this was his favorite shade—a peridot green with flecks of gold.

She shrugged and bit her lip. “Yeah, they do that. The perks of having hazel eyes.”

He inched closer, close enough to see the two freckles that graced her skin just below the corner of her left eye; she had a sprinkle of lighter ones across her nose and cheeks, but the two below her eye were his favorites.

“They’re beautiful,” he murmured, his eyes fixed on hers. “You’re beautiful.”

She wet her lips, seemingly also unable to avert her gaze from his. Her lips parted, words poised at the tip of her tongue and—

“Riley?” Hugh’s voice shouted from the main house. “I’m making coffee. Do you want some?”

Riley flinched in surprise, and Asher pulled back, the shout enough to jar him into suddenly remembering that he was dead. He had no business flirting with Riley. None at all.

“No thanks, Hugh!” she called back, and Asher wished her refusal of the offer could take them back to that knife-edge moment of expectation and electrical charge.

But it couldn’t. He’d remembered the important fact that there was no future for him. Not with his family. Not with his friends. And not with Riley. He couldn’t let himself forget that again. It would only lead to both of them getting hurt, and hurting her was the last thing he wanted to do.

So, he drifted away from her, putting some much-needed space between his phantom body and her real one. The move proved to be unnecessary as Hugh walked out of the house seconds later, his presence cutting through the lingering tension.

“I’m going to head to my shop in a few minutes,” he told Riley. “I thought I’d ask you if you wanted to come along. I won’t be there for long. Just wanted to grab some paperwork and chat with the new sales clerk.”

Riley looked from Hugh to Asher, her eyes searching his face.

“You should go,” he told her, swallowing when he saw the flash of disappointment in her eyes. It was for the best, though. Whatever had been happening between them needed to remain in the past and never happen again.

She made it so easy to forget that he was nothing more than a ghost, and that was a dangerous thing. A reckless thing. He couldn’t let it keep happening. He was gone, and he needed to start accepting that.

“Okay,” Riley said, replying to both him and Hugh. She sent her stepfather an unconvincing smile. “That would be great.”

16

“As soon as I’m done here, I’ll get right back to looking for answers,” Riley assured Asher as she set down her water bottle and lilac duffel bag.

Hugh had offered to drive her to her ballet lesson since Edith was at work, but Noah and Chris had been heading to weight training around the same time. She’d gotten a ride with them again, even though it meant she was forty minutes early. Luckily, the mirror-lined studio was empty, so she could spend the time warming up.

“Riley, it’s okay,” Asher replied. “You’re allowed to have a life outside of helping me.”

She knew he was technically right, but she felt guilty. Even though she’d enjoyed the outing and seeing more of the historic area with its townhouses, old-timey streetlights, brick sidewalks, and occasional cobblestone streets, going with Hugh to his furniture shop in Old Town the previous day had taken up valuable time. And now she was wasting more of it at a ballet lesson.

She sent Asher a forced smile before sitting down on the sprung wooden floor of the studio and beginning her stretches. “I just don’t want you to disappear again before we figure this out,” she explained quietly.

They were alone, but she’d had enough people overhear her talking to ghosts in the past that she’d learned to whisper in public spaces, even when it seemed nobody was around.

“I made you a promise,” she added, a lump forming in her throat. “It’s already taken me too long, and I haven’t even found anything.”

The closest thing Riley had found to what Asher had experienced was the plotline of a low-budget movie, but even that didn’t fit. The last of her hope resided in the books she’d ordered, but there was no guarantee she’d find what they were looking for in them.

“Maybe there’s nothing to find,” Asher sighed. “Maybe I’ll just keep getting dragged back to that place unless I move on.”

Riley straightened, her stretches forgotten as she looked up at him. “The books I ordered should be arriving today or tomorrow. Maybe we’ll find something in them.”

“Maybe,” he said, but it didn’t take a mind-reader to know he didn’t think they would.

She hated seeing the flat hopelessness in his eyes—hopelessness she’d caused by suggesting they find out what made him different. Maybe she’d been wrong in not urging him to move on. Maybe she should have let him and the mystery of his disappearances go.

“I’m sorry, Asher,” she whispered. “Your story just didn’t make sense to me, but I shouldn’t have encouraged you to stay, not when you could get pulled back there at any moment.”

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