Page 15 of Haunted By the Highwayman
The modern phrase sounds odd falling from his lips. But it sounds exactly like something Rick would say. The idiot. The adorable idiot who’s so much more vulnerable than I ever thought.
“How could he ever think that?” I say.
Jack shrugs. “I really have no idea. I simply come bearing the message because I want my two pets to be happy.” He gives me a quick, dashing grin. “Of course, you’re my favorite pet.”
“Well, thank you,” I say, face heating up. “Can I ask you something? If I hadn’t stepped in, were you ever going to let Rick come?”
Jack laughs. “Oh, eventually,” he says.
I laugh too. “And what about you?” I ask.
He narrows his eyes. “Whataboutme?”
His warning tone might scare Rick, but not me. I know he’s just a big, ghostly softie.
“I’ve been reading this book.” I tap the guidebook in an accusing manner. “It says you and Robert Hanson were never heard from again. Did you end up together?”
A flicker of pure despair crosses his face. His proud mouth twists with pain and his forceful eyes dull behind the mask.
“No,” he says. “We fled the authorities, both going our separate ways. I chose America. He was heading for France, I believe. I was too cowardly to ever try to find him again. To confess the depths of my admiration for him.”
“You, cowardly? But you seem so brave.”
“A façade,” he says. “Oh, I was brave in matters of physical force. I fought many a duel in my youth. But in matters of the heart—”
“Not so much?” I guess.
“I feared that to Robert, our dalliances were merely part of the excitement of the open road, the camaraderie of thievery. Thegame. And as you know, such entanglements were serious crimes when I walked the earth in my physical form.”
“Yes,” I say, anger curling in my chest.
“Moreover, I didn’t want to be the one to admit to too much tenderness.” He’s looking at me closely now, his eyes regaining that piercing quality that makes me feel like he sees right inside my head. “Do you understand?”
He’s obviously talking about me and Rick, but I’m not done with Robert.
“Maybe you could still fix things,” I say.
Jack’s mouth twitches in a tiny smile, full of bitterness. He blames himself. He thinks he doesn’t deserve this.
“You’re very kind, pet,” he says. “But I fear it’s too late.”
“Is it? I mean, is Robert like… you?”
“A spirit? Perhaps. I could try to find him... in theory.”
“Why not in practice?”
He grimaces. “The aforementioned cowardice.”
“Come on. That’s weak. If I can do it, so can you.”
“What do you mean?” he says.
“I mean, I’ll tell Rick I love him if you tell Robert you love him.”
Then the two of them can go off together and have their happy-ever-after. However that works for ghosts.
He thinks about it for a long moment, staring out my bedroom window at a copper-tinged tree that wouldn’t have been planted until years after his death.
