Chasing Rainbow Read online

  “I couldn’t wait for you to get here,” Nellie said finally, leading them farther into the apartment. “It happened again!”

  “What happened?” Rainbow asked. She looked around, half expecting to see something, but all she saw were the cool beiges and blues of Nellie’s decor.

  “It was the ghost,” the older woman said. “I’m sure of it. Remember I told you I had to put the vase of silk flowers away because the flowers kept ending up on the floor?”

  Rainbow nodded.

  “Well, when I came home from Tampa this afternoon, the vase and flowers were right back on my bedside table—and I had left them in the hall closet in a box!”

  “Wow!” said Gene, looking suitably impressed.

  Rainbow began to wish she hadn’t agreed to take this case. This went far beyond anything she had dealt with before. In the past, she’d sense presences, cold spots, and even moods from spirits, but other than one event at a seance led by her mother, she’d never had to deal with moving objects. If these ghosts were actually moving things around to this degree, she was in over her head.

  All of a sudden she remembered what Mary Todd had said about Jake Carpenter’s suspicions. “You’re sure no one was in here while you were away?”

  Nellie was surprised and a little offended. “No one else has a key!”

  “Not even the maintenance staff?”

  “Of course not! No more than anyone else would have a key to your house, Rainbow. I own this unit. No one comes in here unless I open the door to them.”

  Rainbow nodded. “I had to ask, Mrs. Blair. You can understand that.”

  “I suppose.” She shook her head. “Jake Carpenter asked me the same questions a little while ago when I told him what had happened. I didn’t expect to hear them from you. He seems to think this is a hoax.”

  “Well, I can’t say I’ve ever seen a haunting like this before,” Rainbow admitted. “I’ve heard of them, though, which is why I’m not as sure as he is that this is a hoax.”

  Mollified, Nellie relaxed. “I think it’s a message. A friend gave me those flowers just before she died. It seems very important that they continue to be disturbed.”

  “You might be right. May I go into your bedroom?”

  “Be my guest. Would you like anything to drink, Mr. Holder?”

  Rainbow half listened to her uncle working his charm on Nellie Blair while she walked into the bedroom. Nellie had one of the larger, nicer units, with both a living room balcony and a bedroom balcony, and a spectacular view of the sunset over the Gulf. Vermilion ribbons of cloud stretched across the evening sky, while the sun’s fiery globe hovered just above the dark teal of the water. That view alone was almost enough to make Rainbow think about trading her cottage for one of these units.

  And there was the mauve vase filled with dusty rose silk flowers. She knew it the instant she saw it. At some level, her mind detected some sort of psychic impression in the air around it. She wasn’t a psychometrist—someone who received all kinds of information by touching objects—but she reached out for the vase anyway, seeking a stronger impression.

  Just before her fingers touched it, the vase slid away.

  Rainbow, hardly daring to believe what she had just seen, stared at the vase and saw how the silk dowers were nodding gently, disturbed by the recent movement. Excitement began to bubble up in her.

  Once again she reached out, and once again the vase danced away, staying just out of reach. All of a sudden she laughed and said, “This is so cool!”

  An instant later, she was joined by her uncle and Nellie. “What?” they asked eagerly. “What?”

  “When I reached out for the vase, it moved away,” she told them, still smiling. “Twice. It’s just so cool.”

  Once again she reached out, but this time the vase didn’t twitch.

  “Wouldn’t you know it?” she said in disappointment. “But really, it moved twice.”

  “I believe you,” Gene said.

  “So do I,” Nellie agreed. “After all, the darn thing’s been dumping itself on my floor for days now. And it managed to walk from the closet back to the table. Why wouldn’t it move when you reached for it?”

  As her hand closed around the vase, Rainbow felt something. Laughter. Gentle amusement. Sorrow. Untimely death. Wistfulness.

  “Lucy,” she said aloud.

  “Oh my God!” Nellie clapped a hand over her mouth, and was suddenly blinking back tears. “Do you know her?” Rainbow asked. Nellie nodded, speechless.

  “It’s not the same as what I felt in Mrs. Herschfeld’s apartment, though,” Rainbow said, holding the vase in both hands now. “It’s a different presence.”

  “We have two ghosts?” Nellie looked shocked.

  “That’s the feeling I get. Neither one is angry, but both are a little sad. Sad, yet amused.” She looked down at the vase in her hand. “These ghosts are enjoying this haunting, I think.”

  Nellie nodded eagerly, her eyes pleading for more.

  “I sense untimely violent death—”

  “Oh, it was awful,” Nellie said, finding her voice. “So sad!”

  “Great loss,” Rainbow continued, lost in the sensations. “Purpose. There is a purpose… no, there may be more than one purpose to the hauntings. Yes, more than one.” She started to put the vase down, but just then she was hit by one more strong impression. “Lucy wants you to know she’s happy now.”

  Mrs. Blair was no longer able to hold back tears. Reaching out, she took the vase and cradled it like a baby. “I won’t put the vase away again, Lucy,” she said. “I promise. It’ll stay right here beside my bed.”

  She raised her eyes to Rainbow. “It’s okay if Lucy wants to haunt my apartment. She was my dearest friend …”

  “What happened?” Gene inquired, “if you don’t mind my asking.”

  “Not at all. She and Joe Carpenter—that’s Jake’s uncle—went out on his boat one day last fall and something went wrong. The Coast Guard thinks the engine caught fire or blew up or something. There was just a little debris left.”

  Nellie polished the glass vase with the tail of her shirt and put it back on the night table. “If she wants to dump the flowers every day, that’s all right by me.”

  “I think,” Rainbow said gently, “that she just wanted you to know she was here.”

  Nellie nodded, fighting back more tears. “I can’t thank you enough for telling me that, Rainbow. It means so much.”

  “So,” Gene asked a few minutes later as they headed back to the elevator, “haunting solved?”

  “Not by a long shot. There’s something more going on. I can feel it.”

  “Mmm. Are we done for now?”

  “I just need to make one quick stop on six. It’ll only take a couple of minutes.”

  “I’m not complaining, you know.” He gave her a smile. “I’ve been enjoying myself.”

  Rainbow looked up at him, feeling a surge of love. It would be nice, she thought, if the entire world were populated by people like her Uncle Gene—instead of people like Jake Carpenter.

  She supposed she was being a fool to do this, but she had said she would, and whether he liked it or not, she kept her promises.

  When they reached his door, she knocked, then pulled the bag of rice out of her purse.

  “What’s that?” Gene asked. “A lethal weapon?”

  “Why would I be carrying a weapon?”

  “Something tells me this is Jake Carpenter’s apartment.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “The determined look on your face.”

  Just then, the door opened and Jake looked out at them. “You!” he said. Clearly he wasn’t pleased.

  “Now look,” Gene said, “it wouldn’t kill you to be polite to my niece.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Uncle Gene,” Rainbow said.

  “Yes it does!”

  “Who the hell are you?” Jake asked.

  “I’m Gene Holder, Rainbow’s uncle. And wh
ether or not you believe Rainy has psychic abilities is irrelevant. She has done nothing to harm you. The very least you can do is treat her with the same common civility you’d show a stranger on the street.”

  “She’s not a stranger on the street,” Jake retorted. “She’s a stranger knocking on my door, who just woke me up from the first decent sleep I’ve been able to get since I left Indonesia.”

  Rainbow stepped between the two men, hoping to deflect further argument. She was never comfortable with this kind of confrontation. “Look, I’m sorry. I just wanted to give you the rice I promised this morning.” She thrust it at him, and he took it.

  Jake looked down at the bag in his hand. “I wish you hadn’t done that.”

  “Of course you do,” she said sweetly. “You want to believe I’m a witch who doesn’t have a decent bone in her body. Sorry to disappoint you.”

  “Rainy…” Gene said, somewhere between laughter and dismay.

  “I never said you were a witch,” Jake pointed out.

  “No, you said I was a swindler. A huckster. I’d rather be a witch. Good night.”

  “Just wait a minute. Look… I’m sorry I’ve been such a boor. But I really don’t believe in all that psychic crap.”

  “Fine. Did I ask you to?”

  Jake looked from her to Gene, as if he thought another man might have some advice to help him out here. Gene shrugged, looking amused.

  It was, however, Rainbow who spoke next, and the words that came out of her mouth surprised even her. “Joe says you should lighten up.”

  The effect was instantaneous. Jake’s face paled, and then he slammed the door in her face.

  Confused, Rainbow looked at her uncle. “What did I say?”

  “You said Joe said he should lighten up.”

  “Oh. Joe?”

  Gene shook his head. “Rainy, Rainy, you’re still slipping up at times. You’re not supposed to blurt your impressions without preparation, remember? Joe. Remember what Nellie said? Joe Carpenter was Jake’s uncle.”

  Rainbow was appalled. To think she had let something like that slip past her guard, and to that man of all people!

  Just then, Jake’s door flew open again, and he put the package of rice back in her hands. “Keep your damn rice!”

  “No,” Rainbow shot back, throwing it into the apartment, “you keep it.”

  She turned and started marching away, head high. She didn’t care whether Gene followed her.

  “And leave my uncle out of this sham!” Jake called after her.

  This time Rainbow had the last word. “That’ll be hard to do if he wants to get involved!” To her great satisfaction, the elevator door opened the instant she pressed the button. She stepped inside, escaping that nasty man.

  Gene was still standing by the door. When Jake looked at him, he said very quietly, “She is psychic, you know. And it’s not at all fun.”

  “It’s all a hoax.”

  Gene shook his head. “Nobody keeps playing a hoax when it leaves her alone and crying into her pillow at night.” He turned away and headed for the elevator.

  “Say,” Jake called a moment later. “Aren’t you Gene Holder?”

  “I thought that’s what I told you.”

  “I mean, aren’t you the Gene Holder? Didn’t I see you in the movie Cutty’s Last Hours?”

  Gene paused to nod. “Yes, you did.”

  “I like your work.”

  “Thank you.” He hesitated. “Would you like to play a round of golf tomorrow?”

  “I’m rusty.”

  “Good, that means I’ll stand a chance of beating you. Say eight o’clock? I’ll meet you out front.”

  But Jake was still suspicious. “Why?”

  “I’d like to hear more about your theory of what’s going on around here.”

  “How did you hear about that?”

  “Mary Todd told Rainy. It’s a small town, Jake. You might keep that in mind. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  This time when Jake’s door closed, it did so quietly.

  Five

  You ASKED HIM TO PLAY GOLF?” RAINBOW LOOKED at her uncle as if he’d lost his mind.

  “I certainly did.” They were sitting in her kitchen, sharing an early breakfast of bagels and melon.

  “But Uncle Gene, he hates me!”

  “He misunderstands you. I might be able to do something about that.”

  Rainbow shook her head and wondered why she felt so betrayed. There was no reason on earth to think her uncle should be limited in his friendships by her dislike of people. She certainly wasn’t childish enough to feel that way.

  “Besides,” Gene continued, “you really shook him with your reference to his uncle.”

  “I didn’t mean to do that.”

  “I know. But perhaps I can … deal with it.”

  “I don’t see any reason to deal with it. The man is convinced I’m a fake, and nothing is going to change his mind.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure of that, my dear.”

  Rainbow repressed an urge to snort, and instead sipped her orange juice while she collected her thoughts. “You remember Walter,” she said finally.

  “Convincing him I was really psychic only made him decide I was creepy. Just leave it alone, Uncle Gene. Jake Carpenter doesn’t matter.”

  “Perhaps.”

  Gene let the subject go, but Rainbow wasn’t at all sure she’d heard the end of it. Gene couldn’t seem to understand that her circle of friends was very small and very select precisely because she was psychic. In the first place, she couldn’t be easily misled about what people thought of her. In the second, those who believed in her powers too often found her “creepy,” and those who didn’t believe scorned her for being a fake. She didn’t know a whole lot of people who were willing to leave her abilities out of the friendship equation.

  Although since coming to Paradise Beach ten years ago, she’d found more acceptance than she’d enjoyed elsewhere, largely because the town was small enough that most people were able to realize that she wasn’t cheating her clients. Or at least to accept that her clients felt she wasn’t cheating them. Even the chief of police had dated her a couple of times a few years ago.

  But like so many of her romantic relationships, it had died on the vine before really blossoming. Men just couldn’t stomach the idea of being in a relationship with a woman who consulted tarot cards and relied on her intuition as completely as her brains. It made them seriously uncomfortable.

  Gene departed twenty minutes later, leaving Rainbow to gaze sadly out the window and wonder why she couldn’t just have been like other people.

  “Rainy?” Gene’s voice called her from the front of the house.

  It was nearly one o’clock, and Rainbow had had a surprisingly busy morning, with one scheduled reading and three unexpected walkins. Her stomach was just beginning to rumble its demand for lunch, and she was trying to decide what to make for the two of them. Smiling, she hurried out from her reading room to greet her uncle.

  And stopped dead when she saw Jake Carpenter standing beside him in the living room.

  “I invited Jake for lunch,” her uncle said. “If you don’t want to fix something, I thought we could all go out together.”

  Rainy looked at her uncle as if he had just sprouted horns. He knew what she thought about Jake, yet he had still invited him to her house. She considered giving him a good shake for his audacity, but decided he’d just turn it into a hug. After all, he was bigger and stronger. “Jake doesn’t want to have lunch with me, Uncle Gene.”

  “That’s not what he said.”

  She glared at him, then looked at Jake who appeared to be feeling both uncomfortable and awkward. “We got off to a bad start,” the impossible man said. “I thought maybe we could mend our fences.”

  “Mend our fences?” Her voice was full of disbelief.

  “Rainy …” Gene started to say, trying to forestall her.

  But she was not about to be forestalled
. Whether she wanted to admit it to herself or not, this man had hurt her, and she’d spent the better part of two days stewing about it and mentally rehearsing all the things she would like to say to him. She was going to have her say. Now.

  “No, Uncle Gene,” she said firmly. “This man has told me what he thinks of me and has closed his door in my face twice. And now you expect me to go out to lunch with him?”

  “It’s the civilized thing to do!” Gene said. “Adults try to work out their differences.”

  “This is a difference that cannot be worked out. This man thinks I’m a fraud, a huckster, a swindler of elderly people! His mind is so irrevocably closed that a ray of intellectual illumination couldn’t possibly penetrate it!”

  Gene started to smile. “You have a way with words, my dear.”

  But Jake shifted uneasily and said, “I may have jumped to conclusions.”

  “Jumped! That’s an understatement. You took off like a rocket! And you didn’t even give me a chance to answer your charges!”

  Jake appeared to brace himself. “You’re right, I didn’t. And your uncle convinced me that I was wrong about you. I may not believe that what you do is possible, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t sincere.”

  “Well, thank you very much,” she said acidly. “Your approval means more than I can say.”

  Jake looked at Gene, who shrugged as if to say, “You made the problem, not me.”

  “Look,” Jake said after a moment. “I already apologized once for being a boor. My only excuse is that I was exhausted and suffering from jet lag. I’m not usually so brutish.”

  Rainbow looked at her uncle, wondering why he had put her in this difficult position. After their second encounter last night, she really wasn’t inclined to accept Jake’s apology, although, she admitted unhappily, Jake had been trying to apologize last night when she had blurted that thing about Joe. And his reaction to that, given the beliefs he was beginning with, was perfectly understandable.

  “Apology accepted,” she finally said, reluctantly.

  “Good.” Gene beamed at them both. “So now we can go out and get some lunch?” She nodded.