Page 31 of My Inherited House Might be Haunted

Lips pursed, Mom turned and oriented herself to the nearest ghost at her elbow. “You, sir, what’s your name? Sebastian. Lovely to meet you, I’m Loretta. Oh? Sure, I’ll tell him. Rhett, they do all apologize for startling you. They thought you knew coming in what your aunt was doing.”

“Apology accepted, but whatwasshe doing?”

Also my question.

“Helping ghosts pass on.” Mom had her intent face—the one she wore when channeling her medium abilities and listening hard. “Huh. All right, so once a week she’d get together with Chelsea, and they’d do a massive passing ritual. The ghosts have spread the word amongst themselves to come here if they’re having trouble passing on, so they’ve been collecting all this time. Sebastian, when was the last time you saw Chelsea? Oh,three months ago? Oh my, I wonder if she’s just been passing ghosts on her own.”

Likely. Chelsea was an A-type. She wouldn’t let any task sit.

“What is this, ghost-to-ghost networking?” Rhett muttered.

I snorted a laugh. “Instead of Grindr it’s Hauntr.”

Rhett laughed outright and my mother rolled her eyes.

“You’re not helpful,” Mom informed me.

“Excuse you, that is not my task in life. I am to be cute and entertaining.”

She sighed again—the sigh of a woman who wondered if she was at fault for giving birth to me. I got this sigh a lot. I was immune to it.

Rhett batted those pretty eyes at me and quietly said, “You’re very cute, so good job.”

I couldn’t resist his look. I leaned in to graze a kiss over his mouth. Even such a simple brush of lips on lips was electrifying to me. A thrill like none other. Above his mouth, I murmured, “Why thank you.”

Momahemed. “Boys. Not now. You can fuck each other senseless later.”

Rhett winked at me and then focused. “All right, so who’s Chelsea?”

“She was your aunt’s last apprentice. Chelsea’s a very, very gifted medium and witch but also a Reiki master. People constantly come to her for house hunting, bad attachments, and whatnot, as she can cut the cords and then pass the spirit on.”

“Ho. So she’s like a ghost buster on steroids?”

“Pretty much. I can see why she and Ruth would team up to help ghosts pass on. Their talents combined would be the perfect combination.” Mom turned—a ghost clearly saying something to her—and listened hard for a second. “Ah. Almost everyone here wishes to pass on, or so they’re saying. Rhett, how about I give Chelsea a call? She’ll surely know more about all of this anyway.”

“I think that sounds great.”

“Okay.”

Mom whipped her phone out and started calling.

I took a moment to whisper, “Are you good with continuing this? Letting ghosts stay here and passing them on, I mean.”

“Yeah.”

I blinked, surprised there was no hesitation in him. No reservations. I certainly would have had to sit and think about it.

A sweet smile tilted his mouth up. “Because it’s too sad. Dying and not knowing how to move past this world, having to depend on the kindness of strangers, it’s too sad. How could I sleep at night knowing I could help them but chose not to because it’s not convenient? My Aunt Ruth would come out of her grave to smack me if I even considered not doing it.”

He was likely right in that regard.

“So I’m all for it, really. I want to open the house back up for witch parties, so why not?”

Considering how eager he was to learn of his abilities, this made sense, too. Also, witch parties sounded absolutely magical in many ways. I must make sure I was invited to these. If Aunt Ruth had known how open he was to magic, she might not have delayed like she had.

The phone call was finally picked up.

“Loretta!Wow, long time no speak. What’s up?”

---