Abruptly, and as if it pained him to do so, he pulled his mouth away, panting as he rested his forehead against mine. “Ava…wake up.”

  A scream bubbled up in my throat, but I swallowed it down. “Holy shit. What was that?” I sat up, pulling my arms around my middle and squeezing to hold myself in as I tried to make sense of that dream. I’d lost my mind, or I was heading in that direction. Every night, it was the same dream and now… wow.

  Lamppost had a dominant side.

  My iPhone chirped with an incoming message, and I scooped it off the nightstand.

  Unknown: Ava baby. Why don’t you ditch Barbie, and let me drive you today?

  Me: Who is this?

  Unknown: Duh, your boyfriend.

  Ugh, freaking Abercrombie. How the hell did he get my number? The minute the thought manifested itself, I knew the answer. “Paige.”

  I tapped out another quick text, telling him he’d be my boyfriend as soon as hell put in an ice rink, then stalked off to take a hot bath before school. I’d almost survived my first week of college. I just had to get through one more day, and it would be the weekend.

  But that stupid nightmare had me on edge.

  I twisted on the taps and poured a cap full of lavender bubble bath under the stream. Before I knew it, bubbles filled the claw-foot tub, and fragrant steam filled the room. Every breath I took dragged me closer to tranquility. I pulled off my pajamas and stepped into the steaming tub, sinking down until my shoulders disappeared under the water. I’d come to the unfortunate conclusion that my mystery guy was probably just a figment of my imagination. But that didn’t stop me from clinging to him like Saran Wrap on last night’s leftovers.

  I knew I shouldn’t, but I wanted to see him around every corner. I felt drawn to him in a way I couldn’t begin to explain. I rested my head against the edge of the tub and closed my eyes, almost drifting off to sleep.

  A faint breeze blew across the water, making my skin pebble. For a second, I thought I heard soft footsteps against the marble floor, but when I opened my eyes, I was alone.

  Closing my eyes again, I hummed “Wild Horses” by the Rolling Stones. The memory of the keyed-up horse in my dream replayed in my head. Then I heard it again, the muffled sound of bare feet on marble, and my eyes snapped open. I stood up and grabbed my towel, wrapping it around me as I stepped out of the tub. “Who’s there? Mom? Josh? I’m naked in here, so quit screwing around.” I poked my head into the bedroom but didn’t see anyone. I reached up to wipe the steam off the bathroom mirror and noticed my name scrawled through the fog in elegant script.

  My skin prickled as if coated in hot sand from head to toe. I sucked in a breath, and the gritty particles caught in my throat, choking me. This wasn’t funny anymore.

  Sam paid for her venti iced caramel macchiato—with four heart-attack-inducing shots of espresso—and turned back to me. “Maybe you have a ghost.”

  I brought my half-caf vanilla latte to my lips to blow on it. “I don’t have a ghost.” More like an overactive imagination and a pain-in-the-ass little brother.

  “Come on, think about it. Your house is ancient. And old houses always seem to have one or two ghosts running around.” She took a sip of her drink and moaned out her approval before holding the cup out for me to taste. When I shook my head, she continued. “My Aunt Betty has a ghost. It’s always messing with the settings on her toaster, so her toast burns every time.”

  I held the door open and thought about what she said before following her out. “Ghosts don’t care about toast. And it’s probably just my little brother. He vowed to take revenge on me for snagging the best bedroom, and I wouldn’t put it past him to play a prank like that.”

  “There’s always that possibility. But I’m still going with the ghost theory. How else can you explain the invisible guy you were chasing in the quad Tuesday morning?” She paused, snapping her fingers and sucking in a quick breath. “Oh my God! That’s why you were running around the hardware store the day I met you. You were looking for him, weren’t you?”

  My cheeks flamed, and I ducked my head to hide the evidence. “Yes.”

  She let out a squeal, her body practically vibrating with excitement. “I knew it.”

  I coughed out a laugh. “You did not.”

  “Well, I knew it was something. He must be a hot ghost if you tried to hook up with him at the lighthouse.” She giggled as she got behind the wheel of her car.

  I climbed in, banging my head against my seat and wishing I’d kept my mouth shut. “I never should have told you about that. You’re going to think I’m some crazy girl hallucinating hot guys only to make out with assholes.”

  “Hey, I haven’t known you long, but I think I know you well enough to know you wouldn’t make out with Aaron Finch, no matter how many drinks you’d had. So obviously, it was the ghost you wanted.” She smiled as if that was the most obvious conclusion. “And now, someone’s writing in the steam on your mirror? Can your brother even reach that high?”

  I shrugged and sipped my coffee.

  She nodded. “Definitely a ghost.”

  Sam parked around the corner from the quad, but instead of dropping me off and leaving, she got out of the car. “No practice this morning?”

  “Nah, we don’t practice on Fridays. Lucky me.”

  “What are you two hookers doing here so early?” Paige came up behind Sam and gave me her best bitch brow over Sam’s shoulder.

  I matched her bitch brow with one of my own. “I have class.”

  Sam eyed her suspiciously. “I’m heading to the library, but what I’d like to know is what are you doing here this early? Shouldn’t you be sleeping? Your first class isn’t ’til ten.”

  “Oh…” Paige shrugged. “I volunteered to head up a group project in Philosophy.”

  Sam laughed. “Okay, who’s the guy?”

  Paige spread her ruby lips in a wide smile. “How’d you know?”

  “Please. As if you’d ever just volunteer for anything. I totally know your game. You used to have your daddy call the principal with an excuse anytime you didn’t want to participate in special projects—which was most of the time.”

  “Ha!” Paige hip-checked her. “I don’t even know his name yet, but he’s gorgeous, and as soon as I realized which one of the critical thinking groups he was assigned to, I volunteered to take the lead.”

  “Which group?” I asked.

  “Oh, um…” Paige shifted on her heels. “The uh, economic inequality study. At the food bank.”

  “You’re going to work at the food bank? For a guy?” Sam bit back a giggle.

  I didn’t know Paige as well as Sam did, but even I knew Paige wouldn’t last a day without her smartphone or her Manolos.

  “Go ahead. Laugh. But you didn’t see him. He’s totally worth it. And the way I see it, I’ll have a captive audience for at least the next six weeks. It’s up to me to make the first move. And believe me.” Paige wiggled her hips. “I’ll be making my move this afternoon.”

  Sam turned and backed her way across the parking lot toward the library. “You’re so gross.”

  “You love it.” Paige winked at her then, once Sam was out of earshot, turned her snarky smirk back to me. “Why are you still here?”

  I pushed away from the car and stepped into her personal space. She might have acted tough, but I wasn’t afraid of her. “Because I get off on making your life miserable.”

  She rolled her eyes before spinning around to head off in the opposite direction.

  “Ava!” Abercrombie’s obnoxious voice carried across the quad, making my stomach lurch. The half a banana I’d had for breakfast threatened to make a reappearance.

  Without acknowledging his presence, I jolted forward, dodging and weaving my way through the cars to avoid him.

  “Baby, wait.”

  He was gaining on me as I entered the building, and images of Abercrombie as a fire-breathing dragon flashed through my brain, making my natural fight-or-flight instinct take over. “Excuse me.” I pushed between a pair of girls, knocking their books to the floor, but kept going. I had my History of European Civilization classroom in my sights and started bargaining with the gods. Please let me get there first. If you help me beat him to the door, I promise I’ll cook dinner for the rest of the week. I’ll stop illegally downloading music, and I won’t give Josh shit when he sneaks into my room to steal my CDs. Hell, I’ll even give Josh my room if I never have to see Abercrombie again.

  I was almost to the door when he wrapped one of his giant paws around my arm. “God, girl. What’s the hurry?”

  I clenched my teeth and jerked away from him, panting. “Don’t you ever give up?”

  “Oh, he gives up, all right.” Hannah poked her head out of the room and gave Abercrombie an icy smile. “About two seconds after he pulls out, he’ll want nothing to do with you.”

  My mouth dropped open at the exchange, and I wondered if she was speaking from experience.

  “Oh, hey, Hannah. Yeah, well. I gotta get to class.” Abercrombie looked like he’d seen a ghost. “Call me later, Ava. Okay?”

  “Not on your life, Abercrombie.”

  As if he’d already forgotten Hannah’s comment, he flashed me his signature smirk. “Come on. You know I’m starting to break down those walls of yours.” He turned and dashed down the hall.

  “What a piece of work.” I watched him until he disappeared around a corner then looked at Hannah and burst out laughing. “Thanks.”

  She grinned back at me, bumping me with her shoulder. “Don’t mention it. And I mean that, Ava. Please don’t mention it. To anyone. If Sam—or, oh God, Paige—found out about…” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “Never mind. Just don’t say anything, okay?”

  “I won’t.” I looked into her cautious expression and smiled. “Honest. I won’t say a word.”

  “Thanks.” Her lips quirked. “Because I would have so kicked your ass if you did.”

  And with that, I decided Hannah was okay in my book. Blue hair and all.

  “Mom?” I threw my bag on the kitchen table and snatched an apple from the bowl on the counter. “Mom, are you home? Josh?” A shiver ran up my spine. Stupid Sam and her stupid ghost talk, especially since the only sound in the house came from the grandfather clock ticking in the living room. The freaking thing creeped me out. Mom had wound it the other day, and ever since then it was like reliving The Tell-Tale Heart twenty-four-seven. It was so loud I could hear it all the way on the third floor. Tick tock, tick tock.

  My stomach rumbled, and I pulled open the fridge. For half a minute, I contemplated making dinner. Then I remembered my bargain with the gods. If they didn’t have to keep up their end of the deal, neither did I. So instead, I grabbed my bag and my apple and headed upstairs to do my homework.

  Who knows, maybe I’ll get lucky, and the ghost is good at molecular biology.

  After cranking up the volume on my phone to blast the new One Direction album—my secret guilty pleasure—I flopped down on my stomach across the bed and pulled out my history assignment. Thanks to my recent nocturnal exploits, I’d recently developed a fascination for the Middle Ages. Frankly, Lamppost looked way better in his armor than the cavalry soldiers in the days of Charlemagne.

  I got the brilliant idea to look up medieval armor on the Internet and pushed my book aside to flip open my laptop. I paged through the images until I landed on a painting that actually resembled the boy in my dream.

  Maybe Sam was right. Maybe he was a ghost.

  I rolled over and pulled myself up to a sitting position, crossing my legs in the center of my bed. “Spirit, if you can hear me, make yourself known.” I waited for a minute but got no response. I tried again, this time closing my eyes and holding my arms out to my sides like they did in the movies. “I know you’re here. I’ve felt your presence. If you can hear me, please make yourself known.”

  “You are so weird.”

  My brother’s bored voice sounded from just inside the doorway, and I let out a bloodcurdling scream, jerking backward and rolling off the side of my bed to the floor. “Josh, I’m going to kill you!”

  Chapter Six

  Exhaustion plagued me from the moment I opened my eyes that morning. The weekend had practically flashed by. My recurring nightmare took Friday off, but it came back with a vengeance Saturday and Sunday. The dream always started at the lighthouse and ended in the stable. Saturday night, the horse turned into a dragon, and I had to stand by helplessly as he and my mystery guy battled to the death.

  Some nights, the action looped through two or three times before his voice would whisper for me to wake up, as my alarm was about to go off. The dragons and medieval warriors battling it out in my head had me so strung out, I was afraid to fall asleep. As we walked across the quad Monday morning, I barely had the energy to toss verbal barbs back and forth with Paige.

  “How are things going at the food bank?” Sam asked Paige as we reached the front doors.

  Her flawless face twisted into an ugly scowl. “He didn’t show up. I spent half the morning with smelly homeless people and a bunch of potheads.”

  “Aren’t you a pothead?” I tried to pull back the question as soon as it flew past my lips.

  She made a choking sound in her throat. “I may smoke the occasional joint, but I am not a pothead.”

  Hannah held up her hand. “I’m a pothead.”

  “We know,” Sam and I said at the same time then quickly followed it with “Jinx.”

  “You’re practically a poster child for why the youth of America shouldn’t do drugs.” Sam elbowed Hannah in the ribs, and they both giggled. “You’ve smoked so much pot your hair turned blue.”

  I spun around at the sound of sneakers slapping concrete.

  Abercrombie stopped short, obviously not expecting me to catch him. “Oh, hey. You scared me.”

  “I sincerely doubt that,” I muttered, pretending he wasn’t still following me around like a lost puppy.

  He let out a long sigh. “What will it take to get you to give me a chance?”

  “A terminal illness with only three days to live. No, wait. A day and a half.”

  “Come on, Ava. Don’t be such a bitch. I’m not that bad. I’m on the hockey team. I have a car.”

  Sam shoved him out of our path. “You also have crabs and probably several other sexually transmitted diseases I can’t even begin to pronounce.”

  “That’s just a rumor.” He flashed a cocky grin, all traces of sincerity wiped clean from his face. “I started it myself to get rid of this clingy chick my junior year.”

  “Well…” I held up my hand between us like a force field. “Let’s add that to the list of reasons I won’t be going out with you.”

  “You have a list?”

  “Oh, do I.” I was about to run through them one at a time when Abercrombie threw his arm over my shoulder. I froze as the pricking started at the back of my skull. It had to be a coincidence. There was no way my body would react to Aaron Finch that way.

  “Don’t you two make a cute couple?” Paige pulled out her phone and made fish lips at us. “Come on, Aaron, give her a big kiss. I’ll post it on Instagram.”

  I cut my eyes to Hannah, who was giving an Oscar-worthy performance over there. I would have never known she had a thing for the guy. I certainly had no idea what she saw in him. I ducked down, pushing his arm off me, and the prickling increased.

  “Where you going?” Abercrombie winked at me, the asshole.

  “To class?” I smirked at him. “Isn’t that where we’re all going?” As if I could feel my ghost’s presence, I whipped around and caught a flash of black going around the building. Damn it. The urge to go after him was almost unbearable. A week ago, I would have chased him down, but where had that gotten me? Nowhere. I had to keep reminding myself he wasn’t really there. The guy was a hallucination or a ghost or, as the evidence might imply, a paranoid delusion.

  “You okay, Ava?” Sam put her hand on my arm, and the contact calmed my racing heart.

  “Yeah, I’m fine.” I gave her a weak smile. “Just thought I saw something.”

  “The ghost?” she mouthed, and I nodded. “Did you need to go look for it?” The look of concern on her face touched me.

  “No, it’s fine. I’ll be fine.” I took a steadying breath and willed the tears to hold off, at least until I got home. Ava Flynn didn’t cry over boys, especially boys who didn’t even exist.

  She gave my arm a squeeze then turned to laugh at whatever Paige had said.

  Hannah caught up to me and gave me a sad smile. In some strange way, we were both in the same boat, pining after what we couldn’t have. “Did you do the history assignment?”

  “Uh, no. I started it, but my weekend just seemed to spiral out of control.” That was an understatement if I’d ever heard one. The memory of me sitting in the middle of my bed attempting to conjure up a ghost flashed unbidden into my head.

  She leaned into me, brushing my shoulder with hers. “You wanna copy mine?”

  “Nah, I’m good. What’s Professor Hurley gonna do? Put me in the dungeon for not completing an assignment?” We both laughed at that, and I had a sudden sense of belonging. Port Michael was actually beginning to feel like home.

  Hannah and I were still laughing about Professor Hurley’s possible medieval punishments when we wandered into the classroom ten minutes later, and I couldn’t help conjuring up my armored hottie. The whole class seemed to be whispering as I stepped through the door. The buzzing at the back of my neck flared, and my stomach clenched so hard I gasped.