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  Rachel put an arm around Thea’s shoulders. “Quit fretting, Mom. You’ve done a good job with Josh and me. Grandma told you that we were going to live long lives. That’s enough. That’s more than most parents know.”

  Thea sighed. Did any parent feel secure in the way they raised their children and the choices they made?

  “Come on. It’s a beautiful day. Let’s go sit on the porch swing.” Rachel hooked her arm in her mother’s. “Your aura needs brightened up. No more thinking.”

  “No more thinking,” Thea agreed. But as she turned to leave the studio, she stopped and frowned up at the rafters. “Something’s different.”

  Once Rachel concentrated, she felt it, too. “Someone’s been here.”

  “Impossible.” No one could enter the studio unless they accompanied Thea. This was her studio. Her calling.

  “What then?”

  Thea frowned. “I don’t know.”

  Chapter 3

  Rachel patted the seat, and Thea plopped onto the swing next to her. The air was warm. The sun was bright. She loved her children, and they loved her. Maybe that’s all a person could ask out of life.

  She and Rachel talked for half an hour until Rachel had to return to town and help Isak in his bakery. Too young, Thea thought. They were getting serious too young. Only nineteen. She was nineteen when she married Gabe, and look what happened.

  Rachel reminded Thea of herself at that age--the same rosy idealism, the same naivety. They even looked a lot alike with oval faces, creamy complexions, and soft bodies that only stretched to five-four. Rachel, however, inherited her father’s dark coloring instead of Thea’s honey-gold hair and gray eyes, and luckily inherited Gabe’s sunny, easy-going disposition instead of her mother’s brooding, introverted personality. Alike, but different. Maybe the differences would save Rachel from the mistakes she’d made.

  It was odd, she thought. Josh looked so much like Gabe, but his personality was similar to her own. And Rachel looked like her, but had her father’s happy, go-lucky outlook on life. Was happiness inherited? she wondered.

  According to her mother, Thea was always too old and too serious for her age. A congenital worry-wart. So was Josh. And they were both searching--for answers, for direction, for meaning.

  Thea blamed her doubting nature on the weaving, but her mother laughed at that idea.

  “You were always a sober sides,” she said.

  After her children were born, Thea was convinced that a child came into this world, not only with a life map, but with his personality intact. Parents had to work with what they got.

  Weaving added to life’s mix for Thea, opening her eyes to the harsher aspects of fate. Her first, personal blow didn’t come until she found Gabe naked with Melissa Smith in his arms, tangled in the sheets of their cottage’s bed. The man she loved. The man she trusted for seventeen, wonderful years.

  “At least you were happy for a long time,” Cynthia said. Cynthia’s marriage had lasted only two years, and those years were long ones. She swore she’d never marry again. “Too stressful,” she said. “Too much work and pressure.” Of course, for Cynthia, most things were difficult, and if they weren’t, she made them that way.

  “Gabe’s a man,” was Nancy’s opinion. “What else can I say? So he screwed up. Big deal. It’s like a cookie jar. If the lid’s off, a man’s going to sneak a treat.”

  Shari agreed with Nancy. “Melissa’s been throwing herself at Gabe for months now. Your mom’s been sick, and you’ve been spending a lot of time with her. This is Gabe’s way of dealing with stress, a one-shot moment of weakness.”

  But the betrayal haunted Thea until she asked Gabe to leave. Rachel was fourteen when they divorced, and Josh was seventeen. Had she made a mistake? That was five years ago, and she still missed him.

  Thea glanced down the rolling, green hill to the stream in the distance. Josh squatted on the bank. Her beautiful, dark-haired, dark-eyed son had the same lanky frame as his dad. When did he lose his sense of direction? Thea thought back. He graduated from high school, started college, and then dropped out. He’d been struggling ever since.

  If Gabe were still around, would it make a difference? Could he give Josh some fatherly advice that would help him plug into something, anything? Did she dare peak at his bookmark without permission? No, she shook her head. In her mind, that would be unethical, a meddling mother who’d gone too far.

  Thea pushed herself out of the porch swing and started for the house. Rachel was right. No more thinking. She had dishes to rinse and load into the dishwasher. She had a new quilt to sew.

  At the door, she stopped and tilted her head. The strange vibes were back. What were they? She waited for them to pass, then she entered the house.

  She stopped just inside the door, put a hand to her throat, and stared. Standing by the old, pine table with his hand resting on a heavy chair was Gabe. Or an almost-Gabe. It was him, all right, but transparent--see-through.

  Thea took an unsteady breath. What the hell was going on? The last time she’d talked to Gabe’s grandmother, he was living in Arizona in an artists’ colony, as successful there as he’d been in Emerald Hills.

  Her heart raced. Was this some strange kind of trick? One of the gifts her family had inherited? What did Gabe want? Why was he here? Had thinking about him summoned him somehow?

  Chapter 4

  Gabe’s mouth moved, but no noise came out. No voice.

  Thea watched him, amazed. What was he doing here? He looked good. He’d aged better than she had. His long frame was still sinewy thin. He wore faded jeans and a stained T-shirt. His wavy, dark hair brushed his shoulders. His eyes blazed. He wasn’t his usual, mellow self. There was an urgency, an intensity about him as he tried to communicate with her again.

  He was waving his hands, frustrated, when footsteps flew up the wooden stairs to the deck outside. Just as the door burst open and Hannah rushed into the room, Gabe disappeared.

  Hannah ran straight to Thea and demanded, “Was that Uncle Gabe? Why did he leave?”

  “You saw him?” Thea asked.

  “Of course. He was talking to my mom when I got out of school.” At ten years of age, Hannah’s gift was still growing. Thea’s niece had been born with the ability to see dead people and talk to them. It never frightened her, but it did make her an extremely eccentric little girl.

  “Talking to your mother?” Thea tried to sort out her thoughts, but they were too jumbled. “How? What about?” He wasn’t a Patek. He didn’t have their kind of talents. What sort of things had Gabe learned since he left Emerald Hills? How to transport? And talk to ghosts?

  Hannah shrugged. “They both evaporated when they saw me. Must be serious if they think I’m too young to hear.”

  Thea smiled and changed the subject. She needed time to think. The vibes had been Gabe. Had he tried to visit her earlier in the week and hadn’t perfected it yet? Was that why those vibes were so chaotic? “How was school today?” she asked, trying to sound normal.

  “The usual.” Hannah walked past her to the dining room table and ran her finger around the bowl of whipping cream. “You didn’t save any for me.”

  “There’s chocolate pavlova.”

  Hannah scooped up a slice and took a big bite.

  “Does ‘the usual’ mean you had a good day?” Thea asked.

  “Miss Dickerson got mad at me,” Hannah said, “but it wasn’t my fault. I almost had my math paper finished when a dead kid walked through the wall to talk to me.”

  “You know the rule,” Thea said. “No ghosts at school.”

  “Tell him that. He’d just died and was scared. I told him to wait for the light and to go to it.”

  “Did that help?”

  “No, the light already came and went. He missed it. He thought he was stuck here.”

  Thea sighed. “No wonder you tried to help him. Don’t worry about it. If Miss Dickerson gets too mad, I’ll go to school and talk to her.”

  “No teac
her wants you to visit,” Hannah said. “That’s the only thing I have going for me. You make all of them nervous. So do I.”

  “Did you finish your paper?”

  Hannah’s lips curved into a naughty grin. “When I told Miss Dickerson that the little boy hadn’t left yet and I could ask him to appear for her so he could explain, she let me finish my work after school.”

  “That’s the type of thing your mother would have done,” Thea said, smiling too.

  “I know. She’s the one who told me to try it.”

  Thea laughed. Her older sister was just as naughty as a ghost as she’d been while she was alive.

  Hannah’s smile crumpled. “I wish my mom could have healed herself like she did everyone else.”

  Hannah’s mother was four years older than Thea, and everyone thought that she’d get the gift of weaving, but instead Aggie was born with the talent of looking into people’s eyes and prescribing a natural remedy to cure them.

  “Impossible,” Thea told Hannah. “Your mother’s bookmark was too short. At least she died fast of an aneurysm. There was no hospital, no lingering.”

  Thea was jealous of Aggie when they were growing up. She thought that their mother loved Aggie more than her. Later, she realized that their mother knew Aggie’s life was going to be short and sweet, and she simply wanted to make the most of it until Aggie was gone.

  “The least she could have done was marry somebody healthier than she was,” Hannah complained.

  “You know what they say, ‘Love is blind.’” Thea rumpled Hannah’s hair. “Besides, that’s why she hurried to get pregnant for you. She looked in your dad’s eyes and knew he was too sick to keep healthy very long, and she wanted to have a baby with him.”

  “Then she should have started younger.”

  “She didn’t meet your dad until she was thirty-three. She had you when she was thirty-five. That’s about as quick as a person gets.”

  “Poor you,” Hannah said. “You got stuck with me.”

  “Hey, I got lucky and didn’t inherit you until you were three-and-a-half. I missed the terrible twos.”

  Hannah laughed. “If I turn out horrible, you can always blame Mom. She gives me all kinds of advice when she pops in.”

  “Lucky you,” Thea teased. “Two moms to heckle you.”

  Hannah licked the last of the pavlova off her fingers. “I wonder why Dad didn’t stick around like Gabe did.”

  “What do you mean, like Gabe did?”

  Hannah stared at her. “You don’t know?”

  “Know what?”

  Hannah chewed her bottom lip. “Gabe died this afternoon. A car wreck. He told Mom that a semi swerved into his lane. He wasn’t ready.” She frowned. “Maybe that’s why Dad went to the light. He had plenty of time to get ready. Gabe’s not very good at being a ghost yet.”

  Thea’s knees buckled. She sat down, hard, on a kitchen chair. Her heart seemed to stop, and her mind went blank. A ghost. She hadn’t even considered that. Gabe couldn’t be dead. It was impossible. His bookmark was nearly as long as hers. What would she do? How could she go on?

  “He’s trying to learn,” Hannah went on as if nothing had happened. “There’s something he wants to tell you, something so important he stayed for it.”

  Thea licked her lips. She felt empty inside, as if all of the air had been knocked out of her. “Gabe can’t be dead. His bookmark was long and happy once we got together again.” Okay, she’d cheated and looked after their divorce. Without permission. So sue me, she thought. But something wasn’t right. He wasn’t supposed to be dead.

  “Tell him that. He kept saying he had unfinished business.”

  “What was it?”

  “Beats me. No one talks to a kid about anything serious.” Hannah grabbed her backpack and said, “I’m gonna watch some cartoons, okay? I don’t have much homework.”

  “Are you all right?” Thea asked.

  “Me? I’m fine. You?”

  Thea didn’t reply. This was not supposed to have happened. It ruined her plans for the rest of her years. And how in the world could she tell Josh and Rachel that their father was dead?

  Chapter 5

  Thea reached for the wine bottle on the table and poured herself a glass. According to Gabe’s bookmark, she was supposed to get angry with him, to punish him until enough time had passed that they could be happy together again, and then he’d wander home. He was supposed to be alive when he returned, not a spirit.

  Damn! Damn! Damn! She pounded her fist on the table. It hurt. Both her hand and her heart. Tears stung her eyes and she blinked them away. The damn idiot! He would go and get himself killed before he got out of trouble with her.

  Unfinished business. She took a sip of wine. Hannah might not be able to guess what it was, but Thea could. Gabe couldn’t leave without telling her that he was sorry. He’d said that over and over again after she found him with Melissa, but no matter how hard she tried, a “sorry” wasn’t enough to help her forgive him.

  Still, he must feel the way she did. They were meant to be together. Gabe made a wrong choice when he hit his speed bump in life, and that forced a detour into their lives. But eventually, they’d be together again.

  Except he died.

  She was sitting at the table, trying to collect her muddled thoughts, when Josh wandered into the house.

  He stopped, surprised, when he saw his mother sitting at the table, doing nothing, in the middle of the afternoon. He studied her. “What’s wrong?”

  Oh, Lord, how would the news affect Josh? Thea fought for a gentle way to tell him, couldn’t think of one damn thing, so said, “I’m sorry I have to tell you this. It’s awful, but your father was hit by a semi this afternoon and died.”

  Josh blinked. “You sure?”

  Thea nodded. Her reaction had been pain mixed with anger. It wasn’t fair. She wanted to shake her fists at the heavens. Josh’s reply sounded a lot like denial. “Hannah saw him on her way home from school.”

  “Shit.” He sank onto a chair opposite hers.

  “He came here,” Thea said. Her throat tightened, and her voice sounded odd. “He tried to tell me something, but he hasn’t learned how to talk to us yet. Hannah says he has unfinished business.”

  “He can’t haunt Melissa, can he? He must hate her quite a bit.”

  Josh’s reaction surprised Thea. She’d braced herself in case he fell apart, got more melancholy. Instead, he seemed to be taking it better than she was. “Your dad isn’t like that. He’s not the get-even type. He would have gone to the light if something important wasn’t bothering him.”

  “He wants to see you again,” Josh said.

  Tears started to form, and Thea blinked them away. “It’s not fair.”

  Josh reached across the table and laid his hand over her small, square one. “You still love him.”

  “I’ll always love him. Blast him!”

  “How long was his bookmark?”

  Thea swallowed. “Almost as long as mine. I thought we had more time.”

  Josh frowned. “You usually know.”

  “You’re right. I usually do.” She pushed herself from her chair. She couldn’t just sit here. She had to do something. “I’m going to go look.”

  “Can I come with you?”

  She hesitated. Josh had never wanted to see the looms or weavings before. They made him nervous. “Will you be okay?”

  “It might help.”

  She motioned for him to follow her.

  They didn’t talk as their feet crunched on the gravel drive that led to the barn. The silence continued as Thea unlocked the doors and hurried up the steps to her loft studio. She went straight to the center of the room, looked skyward at the bookmarks--dozens and dozens of layers deep--hanging from ceiling beams. They came in all sizes and colors, varied of shape and thickness. Thousands of them. She called Gabe’s name.

  A beautiful, narrow bookmark woven of yellows, golds, and reds gently drifted down to her, floating
softly as a feather. The minute she saw it, she gasped.

  Josh stopped craning his neck to look at the surroundings that were unfamiliar to him and asked, “Are you all right?”

  “No.” She forced herself to be steady. Her fingers caressed the damaged bookmark, willing the threads to right themselves.

  “What is it?” Josh came to stoop over her, to see his father’s bookmark.

  Thea held it in shaking fingers. “Someone’s frayed it at the end.”

  Josh stared. “Frayed it? You mean pulled the strings?”

  “Gabe wasn’t meant to die now.”

  Josh’s soft, dark eyes clouded. “I don’t understand.”

  “Someone cut the knot at the end of his bookmark and pulled the strings apart.”

  Josh shook his head. “Maybe they just shook loose. Maybe the strings weren’t woven tight enough and they fell apart.” When the bookmark unraveled to the present time, Gabe died.

  “That doesn’t happen.” Whom was she trying to convince, him or her? How could a bookmark unravel? “Every string is cut at the end and tied in a knot. It’s final. Fate.”

  “Did you weave Dad’s bookmark?” Josh asked.

  “No, that was before my time. My mother would have.”

  “She was pretty good, wasn’t she? Not as good as you. You’re one of the best. Grandma told me. She said that you have empathy.”

  A memory stirred, and Thea waited until her thoughts came together. “Some weavers are more talented than others, but a person can’t have this job if they’re not adequate. My mom was good, but her mother struggled at it. My Grandma Doreen wasn’t supposed to be the weaver in the Patek lineage. Her sister, Olive, had been trained to hold the job. But . . “ She took Josh’s arm. Impossible. This couldn’t have happened to Gabe. “One day, in a fury, Olive’s husband took her bookmark and pulled the threads apart. Olive dropped dead at his feet. Grandma had to take Olive’s place, but it wasn’t her true destiny.”