Becca stared at me as if I were a whack job while the three girls—four, really, but she couldn’t see Lucia—raced off into the courtyard, where the bright morning sun had already begun to burn off the thick fog I’d been driving through. It significantly dimmed Lucia’s aura . . . though she continued to throw me solemn looks, not quite trusting me with her precious Becca . . . yet.
As soon as they reached the wide stone fountain—which this early in the morning had yet to attract any adult visitors—the three living girls peeled off their shoes and socks and jumped in (exactly as I’d told them not to). Even Lucia looked tempted to follow suit. It was hard to believe she was the same spirit who, the night before last, had tried to drown me.
“Who are they?” Becca asked, her gaze following the triplets.
“They’re my stepnieces,” I said. “I brought them so we could talk. Last time we got interrupted, and it wasn’t by any earthquake. Those three are here to keep it from happening again.”
Becca looked more bewildered than ever. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I do know about you, though. My stepmother told me—”
“Yes, I’m sure Kelly had plenty to say about me.” I steered her by the arm through one of the stone archways. “Well, I’ve got a lot to say to you. But not about her.”
Becca immediately put on the brakes, refusing to budge from beneath the chilly shade of the breezeway. “We aren’t allowed to go out here,” she balked, staring at the warm, sunny courtyard like it was the pit of a lava-filled volcano, and she was the hapless missionary I was about to sacrifice to the native gods.
“You are if you’re escorted by a staff member. And lucky you, I just happen to be a staff member.”
I pulled her off the smooth flagstone and onto the pebbled pathway that meandered through the courtyard’s many garden plots. She came blinking into the sunlight as cautiously as a mole person.
It might have been November, but in Carmel, that’s one of the most beautiful months of the year—which was why Jesse and I wanted to be married in November, only a year from now. An explosion of brightly colored flowers—milkweed, bougainvillea, azaleas, wisteria, and rhododendrons—lined the paths and even the rooftops of the breezeways and buildings surrounding the courtyard. The milkweed had attracted monarch butterflies, which flew in lazy circles around the yard like low-flying, drunk hang gliders.
Though the stucco walls were three feet thick, and the birds flitting across the clear blue sky overhead were calling noisily to one another, it was still possible to hear the organ music being played at morning mass over in the basilica.
“Sit,” I commanded Becca when we came to an ancient stone bench in a mossy alcove, not far from the fountain the girls were marauding. The bench, coincidentally, was beneath the feet of the Father Serra statue I’d so wrongfully been accused of decapitating.
Maybe this was why Becca looked more nervous than ever as she sat down. “I didn’t mean it about my stepmother. All she said was—”
“I don’t care what Kelly said about me.” I sat down beside her. “I want to know what really happened to Father Dominic. But first, I want to know what really happened to your friend Lucia Martinez.”
Becca stared at me as round-eyed as if I’d slapped her. “L-Lucia Martinez? Wh-who’s that?”
“Come on, Becca, don’t bullshit me.” I’d had about as much as I could take from this girl. “You know exactly who Lucia is. You like the game Ghost Mediator? Well, your old friend Lucia’s ghost has been following you around for years. You want to know how I know that? Because I’m a real-life mediator, and it’s my job to send her to the next level.”
Becca stared at me expressionlessly for several seconds from behind the lenses of her glasses.
Then she burst into tears.
veintiuno
Great. Just great. You would think after all these years I’d have figured out how to deliver this kind of news without causing young girls to burst into tears.
But no.
It was a good thing Jesse wasn’t around. He was infinitely more tender and patient than I was, and would probably have given this particular mediation one out of five stars based on my swearing alone.
I pulled a minipack of tissues from my messenger bag and passed it to Becca. A mediator needs to be prepared for any emergency.
“Becca,” I said, glad for the soothing sounds of the worshippers singing hymns over in the basilica, since they would hopefully keep my voice—and Becca’s sobs—from carrying over to the girls. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be quite so . . . blunt. I know this is probably very new to you. But Lucia’s ghost really has been following you around for years, probably since the day she died.”
Becca took a tissue and dabbed at her streaming eyes with trembling fingers. Her breath came in short, hiccupy sobs.
“How . . . how can that even be possible?” she asked. “Lucia? Here?” She glanced furtively around the courtyard, as if expecting a ghoul to leap out from behind a nearby rhododendron. “I don’t believe you. This is some kind of trick.”