Sometime Yesterday Read Online Free

crossed himself and threw salt over his shoulder when I told him where I lived. What’s up with that?”
    She heard Mary’s heavy sigh before she answered. “Okay, I should have told you, but you only called me after you’d already written the check, remember?” There was a slight pause. “Rumor has it the house is haunted.”
    Natalie felt both nauseous and vindicated. She knew there was something strange going on. “Whole story. Spill it, girl.”
    “You don’t really believe in ghosts, do you?”
    Natalie rolled her eyes at the hopeful tone in Mary’s voice. “Hel-lo, have you met my mother the witch?”
    “You know, not to change the subject or anything, but I’ve never understood that. How come you went to Catholic school?”
    Natalie chuckled. “We Irish like to cover all our bases.” She heard a loud crash on the other end of the line and the boys screaming in the background.
    “Gotta go, Nat. I’ll call you back.”
    The line went dead. Her lovely house had a haunted history. Crap. Now what?
    Natalie flipped her phone shut and pulled out of the store’s parking lot. She turned right at the stop sign and continued on to the grocery store.

Chapter Three
     
    Van Easton lowered her sunglasses so she could better appreciate the sight of the trim figure bent over the trunk of a sporty little car. Nice pockets. She caught a glimpse of red hair as the owner sped out of the grocery store parking lot. And the car ain’t bad either. She grinned and slid the case of water into the bed of her truck and headed back to work. She would be putting in some more late hours as the opening madness of the spring rush would be in less than a month.
    She was dog-tired but felt her chest fill with pride at the first sight of the business she co-owned and worked with her father. Set back from the highway, V & V Landscaping was her baby. Since she was added to the letterhead, so to speak, the company had grown from the nursery to include landscaping and custom designs, her specialty.
    She flipped the radio off and could hear her tires crunching along the long gravel driveway until she pulled into the side parking lot. She absently waved to a customer who was leaving.
    More by habit than anything else, she stopped to straighten a few of the flat carts that were crooked and flashed on a memory of her father handing her a shiny quarter to make sure they were all lined up like little soldiers in formation. The main building was a white two-story farmhouse her parents had converted years ago. She paused at the bottom of the low, wide ramp. Her father had been busy. Large cement planters flanked the railing and burst with riots of colorful violas and purple faced pansies. Red geraniums hung from the overhang of the large porch. She noticed a pretty new fairy wind chime with cobalt wings dancing in the breeze and ringing merrily.
    Dad’s rocker was empty, as were the other rocking chairs on the porch that usually held one or two of his retired buddies. She glanced at her watch, noticing it was much later than she originally thought. She entered the front door and was struck with a sense of home. For a moment, she could almost see her mother on the other side of the old wood counter, polishing it with loving hands, smiling at her.
    The illusion shattered when Jenny, the cashier, greeted her.
    “Working tonight, boss?”
    “I’m sorry, what did you say?”
    “Um, Van? It’s closing time. Are you okay?”
    She nodded and managed to find her voice. “Go ahead and finish, Jen. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
    Van intended to go to her office but instead turned right at the stairs to the second floor, where she had grown up and her father still lived. She ran her hand lovingly along the smooth banister and saw herself, a young girl, sliding down it.
    What was with her tonight? She rolled her shoulders and tried to free herself of the melancholy, yet it followed her up the stairs.
    The living room still held traces of her mother, dead