Read Online Garden of the Moon by Elizabeth Sinclair - Free Book Online Page A

then vanished. Once more, they were alone in the garden.
    “Sara? What is it?” Julie glanced over her shoulder then back to Sara. “You’re white as a sheet.” She stood and laid her hand on Sara’s brow. “Are you feeling all right?”
    The concern in her friend’s voice roused Sara from the stupor brought on by the apparition of Jonathan appearing so suddenly in the garden. She forced a smile to her cold lips.
    “I’m…fine.” The words rang with insincerity.
    “You don’t look fine. You look like you’re going to faint at any moment.” Julie moved to her side and then guided Sara back to the garden bench. “Sit down.”
    Not until Julie said it did Sara become aware of the rapid throbbing in her chest and the watery weakness invading her legs.
    “You rest there, and I’ll go get Raina.”
    Sara grabbed Julie’s hand. “No. I don’t need Raina and, what I have to tell you will just frighten her.”
    This time, it was Julie’s face that was drained of color. She sank onto the bench beside Sara. “Very well. I’m listening.”
    Even though Julie was aware that Sara saw dead people, she still had trouble finding the right words to tell her friend about what had happened at Harrogate in the past two days.
    “When we came down the drive to Harrogate, I thought my life was perfect. I was finally free of my mother, and I was coming home to the one place I’d always felt secure and at peace,” she said, pushing the words out before she could change her mind. “But when we stopped in front of the house, things began to happen that I couldn’t explain. At first I thought it was fatigue from the journey or the shadows of the trees playing tricks on me, but I soon learned that it wasn’t.” Words continued to tumble from her in quick succession.
    Once she started, she talked non-stop for the next hour, leaving almost nothing out, while Julie listened. By the time she’d finished, Julie knew everything: the man in the swamp and the upstairs window; the locket; her grandmother’s nocturnal visit; the visit to Clarice’s; the dead crow; the portraits; the diary; her uncanny resemblance to the dead Madeline Grayson; and the overwhelming sadness she’d felt when Clarice told her of Jonathan’s murder.
    The one thing Sara did omit was the unprecedented physical reaction she had to Jonathan Bradford’s ghost. Until she understood it herself, she couldn’t very well explain why she longed for the touch of a dead man.
    “Are you sure you didn’t just dream about your grandmother visiting you? You’d just made a very long journey from New Orleans and worked most of the day opening the house. You were probably sleeping very deeply. It could have been that you thought you were awake, but you weren’t.” The lack of conviction in Julie’s voice told Sara her friend was grabbing at straws. “As for the sadness…” Julie went on, “well…it’s probably no more than the same fatigue or grief you’d naturally feel for someone who died so violently.”
    Sara shook her head. “If that were the case, then how do you explain that the locket I found was buried with Maddy and that the ghost of Jonathon Bradford appeared just now.” She inclined her head in the direction where the ghost had been.
    “Just now?” Julie glanced over her shoulder. “Is that what you saw? Is he still here?”
    “No. He’s gone, but he was right over there.” This time Sara pointed at the exact spot beside a flowering azalea bush where she’d just seen him.
    Relief evident in her expression, Julie sat back. For a few moments, she remained deep in thought. “You’re sure that the man in the swamp, and the window, and the portrait, and the one that just showed up here are all this Jonathan?”
    Sara nodded. “I saw his portrait. There is no doubt in my mind.”
    “Could he be the evil your grandmother warned you about?”
    Sara thought about it. The man’s eyes were the kindest she’d ever seen. His smile warmed her