A/N: I just wanted to take a moment to thank everyone for their continued support. I've loved reading all your comments and sharing your excitement about what's going on in the story.

FYI - possible trigger warning for a physical altercation that takes place within this chapter.

Thanks again for reading! I look forward to hearing what you think!

~Jamie

Chapter 15

I drove home in silence. Nothing on the radio could really compare to what I had just experienced and listening to it would only muddle my thoughts even more. I wanted my head as free of distractions as possible so that I could reflect upon the events of that evening.

My heart sped up even just thinking about the moment Erik appeared.

I was almost certain I'd seen tears cloud his eyes, and the thought of knowing how much my gesture meant to him was enough to make that warm feeling course through me all over again. But it was the penetrating gaze that immediately followed it that I couldn't stop thinking about.

How was it possible to convey that many emotions in one look? In the span of a few moments, he had communicated so much: astonishment, gratitude, appreciation, and a hunger for more. It made me shiver just thinking about it.

I was still lost in my thoughts when I walked through the front door. Erik was waiting for me in the hallway.

"Hi," I said weakly, for lack of anything better to say. I hadn't anticipated this being so awkward.

"What you did…. Words cannot express…." He laced his extraordinarily long fingers together and placed them over his chest, looking down at the floor as he continued, "Thank you."

I smiled so hard my cheeks hurt.

"You're welcome, Erik. After our last conversation it was pretty evident how much you missed music. I just wanted to give a little bit of it back to you."

He raised his eyes slowly and once again pegged me with that smoldering stare.

Something fluttered in my chest.

We stared at each other, neither of us sure what to say or do next. Finally, he gave a slight bow and said, "Goodnight, mademoiselle."

It wasn't until after he had disappeared and I was left standing alone in the front room that I whispered back, "Goodnight, Erik."

XXX

I could count on one hand how many times someone had done anything for me purely for my benefit. The Daroga saving my life in Persia was one of them. As such, I was awed and humbled and shaken by her gesture all at the same time.

I had experienced the feeling of elated satisfaction when Christine finally broke free of the chains of despair that had shackled her to the ground and her voice soared under my guidance, but that feeling was nothing compared to how I felt now.

Is this what true happiness felt like?

XXX

As the days went on, Erik and I fell into a steady, comfortable rhythm. Most of the time he joined me in the kitchen at night as I worked, continuing to offer me guidance in some areas and interjecting hilariously dry comments in others.

Occasionally I would try to find reasons to bring up Christine and his past, but he would always carefully steer the conversation back to safer topics and I would give up for a time, too afraid that doing so would ruin the precarious peace that had formed between us.

"What do you think about this floor?" I randomly asked Erik one night after work.

True to my nature, I couldn't stay idle for long and had decided to take the plunge re-stain the cabinets.

He glanced from me to the floor and then back up again. "I beg your pardon?"

"The floor. Personally, I think there's too much tile in here now and feel like hardwood would be a more accurate representation of how the house used to look back in the old days. But I want your opinion."

"You won't like it," he said with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.

Raising my eyebrows, I set the screwdriver I'd been using to take the hinges off the cabinet doors down on the counter. "Oh?" I said, folding my arms over my chest. "How come?"

"This house has been altered so many times that there is barely anything left that I would even remotely call original. The bannister on the staircase and the crown moulding on the walls, perhaps, but that's about it."

I frowned. "Okay, obviously the addition of electricity and upgrading all the appliances has changed things over the years, but you're saying there's been substantial alterations to the structure itself?"

Erik nodded.

"Like what?"

"This kitchen is a prime example. Houses like this one didn't have wall-mounted cupboards and countertops back in their day. Most still had sideboards and hutches. In the more well-to-do homes, they may have had porcelain sinks mounted to the wall, but the majority still used freestanding sinks and washbasins."

"Oh. Well…shit," I laughed, gazing around the kitchen. "So much for that, I guess."

"For what it's worth," he added, "I think you've done a marvelous job, and hardwood would look gorgeous in here."

I grinned. "That's exactly what I was thinking."

XXX

That following Friday, Maddie sent me a text just as I was getting ready for bed.

M: I know it's late and short notice, but you could girls meet me for coffee tomorrow?

C: Sure. Where?

R: Let's try that new coffee house on Main!

M: Okay. 10 AM?

C: Works for me.

M: Great! See you both then.

Maddie and Rochelle were waiting for me inside the Perk You Up coffee shop the next morning. Although the rain had stopped and the sky was a cloudless blue, the air was bitterly cold.

"Morning," I greeted. I slid into the booth next to Rochelle, wrapping both my hands around my pumpkin spice latte to warm them up after being outside.

"I met someone!" Maddie blurted as soon as I sat down. She was grinning from ear to ear, her eyes sparkling like diamonds in the sun, full of all the excitement that came with starting a new relationship. "His name's Edward—Eddie for short—and I can't wait for you to meet him!"

"That's wonderful!" Rochelle exclaimed. "How did you two meet?"

"At the gym. We're in the same kickboxing class."

That made perfect sense. The gym was like Maddie's second home.

"We started talking about workout routines and swapped recipes for healthy dinners and smoothies and before I knew it, we were checking out vegan restaurants downtown once or twice a week."

"That sounds amazing," I sighed dreamily. Well, maybe not the vegan restaurant part, but the dating part in general.

Maddie took a sip of her chai tea and then extended both her hands, one to each of us. "I'm sorry if I've been a terrible friend and haven't kept in touch lately."

"You haven't been," I hurriedly assured her, patting her hand. "I think it's awesome you found someone, and I am looking forward to meeting him."

"We should all go out to dinner one night!" Rochelle suggested. "Does he have any cute friends?"

"That does sound like fun!" Maddie replied. "I'll ask him and maybe we can set something up for next weekend."

XXX

I was quiet and contemplative for the rest of the day. Not even the prospect of working on my project was enough to pull me out of my funk. I did so anyway, though, just to keep my mind focused on something else.

What was wrong with me? I should be ecstatic for Maddie. It had been ages since she'd had a boyfriend. She had been my rock throughout my entire marriage and subsequent divorce from Ben. I needed to return the favor and be supportive for her, not jealous that she had found someone new and I hadn't.

If anyone was being a terrible friend, it was me.

That realization only pushed me even deeper into my melancholy.

XXX

The rest of the weekend flew by and before I knew it, it was Sunday evening. I had made considerable headway on my cabinets. All of the doors had been removed and were now stacked on the kitchen table, each one waiting for its turn on the sawhorses so I could strip off the old stain and sand it down to the bare wood. I was really putting that old power sander of Dad's to good use and was already about a third of the way done.

As the high-pitched whirr of the sander wound down, I thought I heard another sound. I paused, letting the sander hover in the air above the door as I strained to listen. The soft tinkling of my ringtone filtered back to me. Huh. I must have left my phone in the front room.

I set the sander down on top of the cabinet door and hurried out of the kitchen to find it before the ringing stopped. Sure enough, my phone was lying face down on the couch. Picking it up, I dusted it off and turned it over.

I frowned. Ben had called. Several times.

My heart skipped a beat. We hadn't spoken since the night he came over to help me put the plywood in the window. Why was he calling now?

It doesn't matter, the hopeful part of my heart all but screamed. He's calling you. He's no longer angry. See what he wants!

Biting my lip, I selected his number from the missed call list and listened as it rang.

"Hello?"

I closed my eyes, savoring the sound of his deep voice as it resonated through the speaker.

"Hi," I replied, somewhat breathlessly. "Sorry I missed all your calls. I was sanding and didn't hear my phone over all the noise."

"Working on another project?"

He was being fairly amiable and talkative tonight, I thought. Usually he wasn't interested in what I was doing. Naturally, I pounced on the opportunity to have a normal conversation with him.

"Yeah. You know me; I can't seem to sit still for too long. I've decided to stain the cabinets in the kitchen a darker color. I think they'll look better with the new countertop than the oak ones do."

Ben let out a soft chuckle. "Yep, that sounds like you."

I gripped the phone a little tighter and smiled, my cheeks reddening as I basked in the attention he was giving me.

"You should come over one night and check out all the work I've done in there."

"Yeah. About that." He cleared his throat. "Listen, Chris. I need to tell you something."

The blood pounded in my ears. Something was wrong. He usually only used that tone when he was really serious. Did something happen between him and Carly?

"What is it?"

"I wanted you to hear it from me, first."

My grip tightened on the phone again, but this time it wasn't accompanied by the giddy anticipation that I had felt the first time.

"Carly and I went away for the weekend…."

The smile slid off my face.

"We umm…well, we went to Vegas."

No. I shook my head silently. Please don't finish that sentence.

"And we…we got married."

It was like he had just kicked me right in the gut. I couldn't breathe.

"You did what?"

Why was he telling me this? Did he get some sort of sick pleasure out of rubbing it in that he was happy with his new life? Did he call me just to gloat?

"We got married. And there's one more thing. It makes Carly really uncomfortable when I talk to you, so I need you to stop calling me all the time, okay, Chris. Hello? Are you still there?"

I let the phone fall back to the couch. I think I hung up, but I wasn't sure. I didn't care enough to check. All I wanted to do was get as far away from it as possible. I tore around the couch and was out the door before I even knew what I was doing. Hot tears stung my eyes and clouded my vision as I ran down the front steps and into the dark street.

Married! He'd married her. How could he do that? Why would he do that! What did she have to offer that I hadn't already given him?

The still night air was fractured by sounds of my pathetic crying. I ran until my chest burned, but it was impossible to tell whether it was due to the physical exertion or from the intensity of my sobs.

It was over. He was gone and now I was never going to win him back.

"Ben!" I wailed, clutching my stomach as I doubled over. "Why? Oh god, why wasn't I good enough for you?"

I don't know how long I stayed like that, but eventually I collected enough of my wits about me to realize that I was standing outside in the cold without a coat and that I had no clue where I was. Swiping the tears off my cheeks I reluctantly retraced my steps back to the house. I was freezing by the time I got there, shivering so hard that I could barely wrap my hand around the door knob. I gave it a savage twist and damn near broke my wrist when it refused to budge. I tried a second and third time, wiggling it back and forth, but that didn't change the fact that it was locked tight.

"Fuck!" I shouted, slamming my shoulder against the wooden door in a feeble attempt to wedge it open.

I slid down the length of the door. Now what was I going to do? I didn't have my keys, and my phone was still inside on the couch because I had to be dramatic and run off without it! I couldn't even call an emergency locksmith for help. And yelling for Erik wouldn't do any good. It's not like he would be able to open the door for me.

It was really tempting to sit on my ass on the front porch and cry about everything some more but that wasn't going to open my door and it wasn't getting any warmer.

Unfortunately, I was in the habit of keeping all my doors locked when I was home, so I knew there wasn't a chance the back door would be open. The same went for all the windows. In fact, all the ones on the ground level had a dowel of wood in the sills as an added deterrent.

Wood….

I scrambled to my feet and jogged around to the side of the house where the boarded-up window in the dining room was located. With enough force, I should be able to kick it in. I hated the thought of what it might do to the window frame on the inside, but considering the alternative was to stand out here and freeze, I was left with little choice.

I wasted a few moments wheeling the garbage can from the back of the house over to the window so I could climb on top of it. Once I had settled myself on the lid, I placed both my feet flat against the plywood, and with a resigned sigh, kicked with all my might.

XXX

The sudden crack of splintering wood echoed through the otherwise silent house and immediately caught my attention, for it sounded nothing at all like the usual sounds of construction that I had been listening to all day.

Christine was nowhere to be seen but given the lateness of the hour that wasn't all that unusual. It was a Sunday night, and she usually liked to retire early in order to prepare for the upcoming work week.

My senses now on full alert, I slowly crept down the darkened hallway, following the sound of pounding until it brought me into the dining room. I turned to corner just in time to witness the board that was covering the window split into two separate pieces and crash to the ground. My hand instinctively sought the hidden pocket inside my cloak where I kept the Punjab lasso and as soon as my fingers closed around the sinewy piece of catgut, I sprang into action.

XXX

It had taken considerably more effort than I thought it would to break the board enough that I could get in, mostly because the frigid air had sapped all my strength. As soon as I heard the plywood hit the ground, I clambered off the garbage can and cautiously climbed through the open window and into the pitch-black dining room beyond.

Before my feet had even touched the ground, two large hands emerged from the shadows and seized me by my shoulders. Startled, I tried to cry out, but my protests were quickly silenced as I was yanked the rest of the way through the window. The stranger expertly deflected my weak attempts to defend myself and in one quick motion he spun me around and slipped a small wire cord around my throat. Pulling it taut, he forced me backward until my back was flush with the hard outline of his chest.

My fight-or-flight instinct immediately kicked into high gear, leaving me no time to think about how someone had gotten into the house when all the doors were locked. Clawing at the wire with both my hands, I tried to tug it away from my neck, and dug my heels into the floor to slow him down as he dragged me away from the window. But my feet couldn't find purchase on the slippery hardwood, and all my shoes did was squeak against the surface as he hauled me backwards. Although I thrashed wildly against him, all my efforts to free myself were in vain. The more I moved, the more he was able to restrain me.

I squeezed my eyes shut, tears of panic coursing down my cheeks. The wire pinched against my wind pipe, making it hard to catch my breath. It was becoming hard to think clearly and my limbs felt heavy and uncooperative. Soon, the edges of my vision began to blur.

Sensing that my will to fight back was rapidly dwindling, my assailant adjusted his grip, twisting his wrists so that he could increase the pressure of his stranglehold, his entire body tensing as he moved in for the kill.

"You have made a grave mistake," he taunted in the most frightening voice I had ever heard. "One that you will now pay dearly for—with your life."

My eyes snapped open. It was almost unrecognizable in its terrifying deadliness, but I knew that voice!

I knew then that it was probably my last chance. I took a deep breath, the action causing the cord to cut into my skin, and sputtered, "Erik!"

His hands instantly sprang open and the wire fell to the ground at my feet. I stumbled forward, eagerly gulping down several large breaths of air. My head was spinning, both from the lack of oxygen and from sheer relief, and I most certainly would have collapsed if Erik hadn't caught me by the shoulders and whirled me around to face him.

"Christine!" he cried in alarm. "Oh, Christine, please forgive me! I didn't know it was you! Did I hurt you?"

Without waiting for me to answer, he dragged me out of the dining room and into the hallway, where the light from the kitchen was bright enough that he could see me. Cupping my cheeks with both his hands, he gingerly tilted my head back so he could get a better look at my neck. His fingertips were light and gentle as they slid past my jaw and down the column of my throat to probe at the tender, swollen flesh. He uttered another small cry, remorse flickering briefly across his eyes before they suddenly slanted in rage.

"You foolish girl!" he shouted, once again clutching my upper arms so that I would be forced to meet his fiery gaze. "What the hell were you thinking?! I could have killed you!"

Something inside me snapped. My emotions were already running at an all-time high thanks to the massive amounts of adrenaline pumping through my system, and Erik yelling at me was the last thing I needed.

"Don't be stupid!" I fired back, wrenching myself from his grasp. "You can't kill me! You're a ghost. You can't even touch me!"

I froze.

But he had touched me…the proof of it was still burning around my neck. I brought my hand to the base of my throat, remembering not only the way the cord bit into my skin, but also how soft and real his fingers felt when he'd lifted my chin to assess the damage he'd done to my throat.

Reality came crashing down on me like a ton of bricks. A few more seconds and I would have been dead, strangled at the hands of a ghost whose physical interactions had, up until that moment, been spotty at best.

Erik took a step towards me, his hand outstretched in concern.

I backed away, slowly shaking my head from side to side. "It isn't…."

My stomach somersaulted at the same time the hallway tipped on its side. I wobbled; my body suddenly too heavy for my knees to support the weight. They buckled and everything around me went black.