“I’d never hurt her. She has to know that of me.” Connie told him of course he wouldn’t. “So you think that if she only believes in me and what I can do, she can see what I do? All of you guys?”
“I don’t know. I really don’t. The fact that you can see us at all is a wonderment to me. Did you know there are more of you guys than I first thought? I mean, like families of you.” He said he’d figured that was true. “But did you know most of them are taking drugs, living in homes for the mentally unstable as well? People think they’re insane and they usually end their own lives rather than have anyone there to help them. That is the saddest thing I’ve ever heard, don’t you think?”
“Yes I do. And had it not been for Ray and him finding me, I might have been there as well. But how? How do you help them? I’m sure you have a plan. You’d have never brought it up if you didn’t.” She laughed and so did he. “I tell you what. You let me finish this thing up with the Bruces and I’ll help you with your plans. I don’t have much in the way of funding, but it’s all yours if we can make this work.”
As he moved back to the house, his step a little lighter, Aster came to stand beside her. The girl had had her life cut so short, but she’d been doing so much good since she’d been killed at seventeen. And Connie was sure that had she not been there with her all these years, she might have been a little worse off than even Mitch had been.
“Does he have any idea how much he’s worth, you think?” Connie asked her how much. “Billions. Not just money either, but houses, cars, stocks. Vinnie has done well for herself, and in living a long time, she’s also amassed a great many collectables. I think...what do you think of her opening a nice antique store? I think with her knowledge and our connections, she can make a go at it. If nothing else, she might have firsthand knowledge of all the pieces that come her way. She might have even owned them.”
“What a thing to say. But you might be right. And you’ve been snooping again, haven’t you?” Aster only grinned. “When she can see us, and I’ve no doubt she will soon, we’ll have a long talk with her. She’s going to have to do something other than being a lawyer. I wonder if she became one because of her being a real bloodsucker, or she just liked to rub it in people’s faces.”
“Knowing Vinnie, I’d say she did it to rub in their faces. She’s a nice person. Too bad about her family.” Connie agreed. She’d been using some of her more...well, less than stellar connections to keep an eye on Horatio, as well as the rest of the family. He was up to no good, she just knew it. The man was simply bad news. Connie looked at Aster when she laughed.
“Well, I’m off. I want to go and talk to Kari’s baby again. She’s going to be such fun when she gets here. Just a few more months and I’ll be an aunt.”
As Connie was left in her solitude, she thought about the people in the house and the ones that were close by. Connie loved them all, the living and the dead, and she’d do just about anything to help them. With that in mind, she reached out to a couple of her friends and put the search out for some of the young men that had been in the Bruce household. Even the dead had connections that could help.
~~~
Millicent watched the man standing in front of her in wonder. He was mean and rude, but it was his treatment of the child with him that had her wanting to tear his throat out. Something that she’d done countless times to those that would dare piss her off. But with this newfound life, this half-life, she could only watch as he fumbled through life without knowing that he was so close to death right now. And how she’d make him pay for doing that to such an innocent child, something that had never occurred to her to be bothered about until now. She didn’t bother turning when she felt her brother come up behind her.
“They’re meaner now than I ever thought possible when I was alive.” Horrie agreed with her and laughed. “If I could only, for a moment, do something to rid the world of one more asshole, I’d do it. Why does he have to yell at his child like that? Why does he think that screaming at her will make her understand what he wants from her any better?”
Horrie touched the man, no more, and he fell into the street in front of an oncoming car. They both watched as his body was thrown high into the sky, then tumbled back down only to be hit several more times by the other oncoming cars. She turned to him with a frown on her face when the screaming started, and thought perhaps she’d like to shove him into the street now too. Not that it would hurt him much. Millie now wished she’d done it to him when they were both alive. As if he read her mind, he shook his head.