Free Her Loving Husband's Curse by Meredith Allard Page A

Hathorne is dead and bones, six feet under, while you’re walking home where you’ll see your dear and loving husband soon. Hathorne can’t hurt you now. Besides, when your husband is a vampire and you’re a ghost, is there anything left to frighten you?
    Sarah didn’t wait to be rational. She hurried back to Derby past Pickering Wharf. It was quiet along the dock except for the people eating at the restaurants, some outside under the umbrellas watching the serenity of the night-tide bay. She thought about stopping by the Witches Lair to see if Olivia was there, but it was late and the shops were dark. She wondered if she should get another psychic reading after all. She couldn’t live like this, swinging from the tips of dangling nerves, unable to settle until they brought their child home. James was right. It would take time. And Jennifer was right too. Olivia had helped her before. True, Sarah had been frightened out of her wits at the psychic reading, but then, when Sarah was wrought with angst over those chain-filled nightmares that jolted her awake, Olivia had pointed her in the direction of Martha, who had pointed her in the direction of Elizabeth, which was who she had been all along. Maybe she would go for another reading after all.
    Maybe.
    Back home she was just was as agitated as she was before she left. Looking for something to do, she wandered through the newly remodeled stainless steel kitchen with the modern marble island in the center, though everything was clean and there was nothing to keep her occupied. She saw the wood ladder so she climbed up to the open, loft-style attic. She sighed when she saw everything strewn about, old feather mattresses, silverware, cooking utensils, blue and white Delftware dishes, mugs, rolled up seventeenth century maps. She picked up a pile of moth-eaten linens so threadbare they disintegrated in her hands, but beneath them was a seventeenth century chest with the lock unlatched. She pushed open the top, looked inside, and gasped aloud.
    “Hello.”
    Sarah was startled to see James at the top of the ladder. She was so distracted she didn’t hear him come in. Normally, she heard him open the front door, the old-time wood frame creaking like an old man standing from a low chair.
    “Hello yourself,” she said.
    “What are you doing?”
    “Keeping busy. It’s a mess up here, did you know that?”
    “Everyone’s attic is a mess.”
    He stepped onto the attic floor and held out his arms. Sarah pushed herself into him, squeezing him, closing her eyes, losing herself in him. When she stepped back he was intent, looking over her shoulder at the brown material she pulled out of the trunk.
    “I didn’t know you kept my clothes,” she said.
    “I kept everything. This whole house was a tribute to you. I left, sometimes for decades, but I always came back. I thought I should sell everything and move on, but I could never bring myself to let go.”
    Sarah held the dress out, inspecting the stitching, running her hand over the fabric. “It’s a little worn,” she said, “but it isn’t too bad. Maybe I could bring it to someone to restore it.”
    James took the dress into his hands and held it close to his face, dwelling on the details, intent the way he was when he was reading or taking notes, or the way he looked at her.
    “Whenever I missed you, I took this out and held it in my arms as if I were holding you again.” His mellow voice cracked. “I’d cradle it, bury my nose in the folds of fabric, aching for any sense of you. It didn’t bring back your dark curls or your full lips, but it was something I could hold.”
    He shook his head as though pressing the sadness away. “I haven’t pulled it out for nearly a year now. I don’t need it any more.” He nodded at the brown Pilgrim-style dress. “You haven’t seen this before tonight?”
    “I haven’t been up here since I moved in.”
    James nudged her, a playful smile on his lips. “You should put it on.