Well, it has been a week since our funerals and all has been quiet which is nice. We need a time to just relax for a while after that last case. Losing Ginnifer and Fridr was hard on everyone. Katresa and Alexine are still in the clinic and will likely be there for some time yet. Hope is out already, but she wasn’t wounded as badly as the others. Cristy is now out of the clinic and she is happy about that, however, Samantha says she can’t return to work just yet. That’s fine, there isn’t much to do right now anyway.

I was lying on the bed with Snow and Jewel on top of me. Snow likes to listen to my heart beating, she calls it the thumpy thumper, she misses her mommy Muffin a lot. Muffin adopted little Snow when we found her at that porn studio when she was just a little kitten. I miss Muffin a lot too and it’s wearing on me a little too much these days. Jewel is Snow’s new adopted mother, that’s the way Muffin wanted it to be if anything happened to her. Snow and Jewel get along great, it’s just a transition period for everyone.

I told Jennifer about the woman at the cemetery, she thinks I was just imagining it, but I know this woman was real. She even got in the car and came home with us, except she was gone by the time we stopped in front of the chateau. Sherry, who was driving, and Mac who also had stayed behind to watch over me after Jennifer asked him to, never saw this woman. All the cats were with me too, but they also said there was no woman, all but Snow and Sir Night that is. They saw her too, but they didn’t know who it was.

Jennifer just came in and laid down on the bed too. “I thought you 3 would be here,” she said, “now would be a good time.” I knew what she meant, so I agreed. She then called Celestine, who is the counselor and advisor for Jennifer and I. She came right away. “Nice,” she said, “is this a lie down session, or do I need to sit?” Jennifer told me to move over and Celestine laid down beside me and we started talking. For two hours. We were silent for a few minutes after that. “How do you have so much wisdom at 21,” asked Jennifer, “when you have no formal education or training in counseling?”

“I don’t know,” replied Celestine, “I just talk from the heart. Oh my, I’m supposed to be on lunch duty today.” “Stay where you are,” said Jennifer and she called Josephine, telling her we needed Celestine right now so she could pick anyone to replace her. Meanwhile, in the kitchen. “But I don’t know how to cook,” said Misty. “Good time to learn,” said Josephine, “when you get married you need to know how to cook.” “I would rather stay single,” replied Misty sighing.

There were two huge pots of soup cooking on the monster stoves we have and Josephine gave Misty some spice and a spoon and told her to put one spoonful into the soup and stir it. Well, Misty didn’t think that looked like very much for such a huge pot of soup, so she dumped the whole package of spice in and began to stir it. Now, back to us. It was sunny so Jennifer got up to close the drapes on our window and she looked outside first.

“Those girls just finished lunch and they are already outside having a race,” said Jennifer, “and Misty is way out in front! I didn’t know she could run so fast.” “That girl always amazes me with her many varied talents,” I responded, “she’s obviously keeping up with her exercising.” “True, I will give her an extra hour for her relaxation period,” said Jennifer, “now, tell Celestine about your ghost lady at the cemetery.” “Oooo, was she pretty?” asked Celestine excitedly. I looked at her.

“Um, well, yes, she was,” I said, “but Mac and Sherry didn’t see her, neither did the cats, except for Snow and Sir Night.” So, Celestine called Sir Night to join us, then she asked Snow to describe the woman, which she did. Then when Sir Night arrived he also described the woman just like Snow did, and they both matched my description of the woman as well. “Obviously she must be real,” said Celestine, “or perhaps another ghost. If she was a ghost, it would explain why no one else saw her.

However, if she was a ghost, she must have been someone you knew at one time, maybe one of the team members that died previously?” I then asked Melody to send me photos of all deceased team members, but none of them matched who I saw. Snow and Sir Night agreed, none were the woman that we saw. “This is more interesting all the time,” said Celestine. “I think we need to forget about it,” I said, “there are more important things to, um, to…” I was looking at Celestine, but, there was a flashback to the woman at the cemetery right then.

“Anything wrong Steve?” asked Celestine. “Uh, no, nothing at all,” I said, “but I’m going to skip lunch so I can relax some more.” “Oh no you don’t,” said Jennifer and she asked Amerie to bring some lunch up for the three of us. Amerie arrived quickly with our soup and bread, plus Storm who wanted to join us too. After lunch Jazzy called and asked if we were on a case right now. I told her we were not and had nothing coming up either. So, she asked if we could help her out. She owns many houses apparently and one is located in Bremen, Germany.

She says it’s a beautiful house about 300 years old which she uses quite regularly though she hasn’t been there for about 8 months now. “There is a young family that lives in part of the house and looks after the place for me,” said Jazzy, “and about 4 months ago they began to hear noises at night and in the morning they would come into my section of the house and furniture had been moved around. Sometimes only paintings were moved, other times it was just lamps or plants, strange things like that.

Then one night about a month ago they woke up and a ghost was standing at the foot of their bed and laughed at them. Then it floated around the room and went into the wall. Their two children, boys ages 8 and 10, said they saw it too in their bedroom. They called the police, but no one believed their story. So, yesterday I went to the house and the family was nowhere to be found, though all of their belongings were still there.

Then that afternoon a nice car drives up and a large man came to the door, he wanted to buy my house, but I told him it was not for sale. He asked to come in and we sat and talked for a while, then he made an offer that was only half what the house is worth. I told him that and said the house was not for sale. Then he told me to accept the offer, that it was the best I would get.

Then he told me very seriously not to be foolish in rejecting the offer. So, I told my man, Howard, to escort this man back to his car, which he did. On his way out he told me I had 10 days to think about it, then it would be his anyway.” I told Jazzy we would be there the next day…

To Be Continued. ©2026 Steve McLeod.