She sighed and hoisted Avery’s suitcase from the car, pulled the handles on both bags, and closed the trunk.

Trina screamed.

“What?” Avery jumped back.

Trina blinked, her heart in her chest. “Don’t scare me like that.”

“I thought you heard me coming.”

She willed her pulse to slow down. “No. Geez.”

“Here, let me help.”

Trina let Avery drag her own overstuffed bag and quickly followed her inside.

Not that the interior of the house helped at all with the calming of her nerves.

“We need some music in here,” she told Avery.

“Maybe a certain country singer?” Avery teased.

That made Trina smile. “Not a bad idea. I don’t know if I’ve ever heard Wade’s music.”

“I doubt that’s possible.”

By the time Trina dropped her bag in her old room and placed Avery’s in the closest guest room, Avery had already found the stereo and Bluetoothed her phone to it.

Sure enough, Wade’s lighthearted southern drawl filled the house and made Trina smile.

“I know this song,” she said, surprised.

“Told you.” Avery held a pen and a notebook. “Let’s start a list so I can go to the grocery store. I think it’s going to take at least a week. This place is huge.”

“Yeah.”

“Are these originals?” Avery asked, looking at the art on the walls.

“I have no idea.”

“If they are, there will be paperwork somewhere. We should find an art dealer. Unless you want any of them.”

Trina looked at the wall as if seeing the art for the first time. “No, I don’t . . .”

Avery spun around. “I forgot how big this place was.”

“Me too.”

“Show me around again.”

Trina headed to the stairs to do just that.

Chapter Ten

They’d finished a bottle of wine, which seemed to be the theme of their friendship, and boiled some gourmet pasta, which they ate with a tossed green salad.

But when Avery couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer, Trina was faced with sleeping in her old room. Not that there were memories of Fedor there. But beyond the adjoining door was his personal space, which she hadn’t yet tackled.

With a laundry basket full of clean clothes, she pulled on a nightgown she hadn’t seen in a year and went through the motions of getting ready for bed. Once she kicked her feet up, her eyes traveled to the door between the rooms.

She tapped her fingers, looked away, and then jumped from the bed.

She hesitated for only a second before swinging the door open.

There wasn’t a bogeyman, or even a ghost, just an empty room with a perfectly made bed and clean floor. Like her bedroom, Fedor’s was left the way he had kept it. The nightstand held a book, but the title wasn’t one Trina had heard of. She padded barefoot to his dresser and lifted the cologne she recognized as his unique scent. Three of the wooden figures he himself had carved sat perfectly placed next to a lamp. He often carried a whittling knife and dabbled in the pastime when he wanted to relax. A picture of Fedor and his mother sat next to a picture of the two of them on their wedding day.

Trina lifted it up and remembered when she’d picked out the image to print. Very few of the pictures captured her in a relaxed state. Much as she had to be an actress for everyone watching, it wasn’t a job she was good at. But this picture was caught with Fedor whispering in her ear. She still remembered his words. “Just think, everyone in this room is going to have sex tonight except you and me.”

She had laughed and whispered back, “I knew your mom had something going with Steve.”

Steve had been Alice’s nurse. While there was no way Steve was doing anything with Alice, Trina had kept the joke going with Fedor and Alice whenever spirits were low. Even Steve played along from time to time.

The wedding picture in her hand had captured a genuine smile between the both of them. No one would have guessed after seeing the image that their entire wedding and marriage was a farce. They looked the part of a couple in love. Truth was, Trina loved and respected Fedor for everything he had done to make his mother happy in her last days. She meant everything to him, to the point of marrying Trina. Something Alice didn’t think she’d see her son do before she died. It hadn’t been a complete surprise that Fedor couldn’t cope with her imminent death after a stroke left her oblivious of everything around her.

Still, Trina cussed her dead husband for his choice.

She’d lost a friend and gained a life she hadn’t wanted with his suicide. Maybe he thought he was doing them all a favor. She’d never know. Fedor hadn’t left a note or ever indicated his desire to die.

“You know something, Fedor?” she said to the empty room. “You never struck me as a coward. Mama’s boy . . . but for the right reasons. But not a coward.”

The room screamed its silence.

“Nothing to say?” she asked again. “I thought so.”

Trina padded back into her room and closed the door behind her. With the ghost flushed simply by looking beyond the door, she welcomed the warmth of the bed and the quiet of the house.

Until her phone rang.

She didn’t recognize the number, and the name for it was written as Wade, You Owe Me A Dance, Thomas.

“Hello?”

“Hey, little lady.”

Trina’s heart kicked and her lips spread into a huge grin. “Wade?”

“Is someone else calling you little lady?”

“What are you doing?” She chuckled.

“I’m checking up on you. Thought maybe something had happened, since you haven’t called yet.”

She tucked her bare feet beneath the covers and pulled her knees into her chest. “I didn’t realize we had a phone date set up.”

“It was implied.”

“Well, bad on me, then.”

He laughed. “Did you survive the inquisition of your friends?”

“Barely. Did you survive the flight home?”

“With lots of whiskey.”

“Oh, you’re traumatized.”

“I survived by thinking of how calm you were on our flight out of hell and felt the need to man up.”

“Glad I helped.”

He paused. “Are you home yet?”

She looked around the room she once called home. “No. I’m in New York, actually.”

“Oh?”

“I’ve put off dealing with the house here long enough.”

“Sounds painful. How are you doing with that?”

She glanced at the closed door. “I’m okay. It’s not the easiest thing I’ve ever done, but it isn’t the hardest either.”

“Do you need any help?”

Trina processed his question. “Uhm, ah . . . ,” she stuttered. “Avery is here with me.”

“The blonde pit bull?”

Now Trina was laughing. “I’ll be sure and tell her you said that.”

“Come on, darlin’, I thought we were friends.”

“She won’t bite.”

“I doubt that.”

Yeah, Trina did, too. “She’s protective and apparently my disappearing act brought out her mom gene.”

“Does she have kids?”

“No . . . but my guess is when she does, her kids won’t think about crossing her.”

“That’s a good thing.”

She moved the phone to the other ear. “I have a confession to make.”

“I’m all ears.”

“I might have listened to your latest album today.”

Wade paused, and when he started talking, she could tell his ego had been stroked. “Might have, or did?”

“Did. I even recognized a few of the songs.”

Silence.

Trina bit her lip.

“And?”

She hummed a bit. “It was all right.”

“All right?” he asked, deadpan.

Trina tried not to laugh. “Yeah, one of the songs was even pretty good.”

“One?”

She giggled in silence.

“Well, uh . . . I’ll see what I can do about impressing you with my next album.”

She snorted and gave in to her laughter. “You are so easy.”

“You’re pulling my chain,” he said.

“So easy.”

“You’re the most unusual woman I’ve ever met.”

“I’m not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing.”

“Me either,” he confessed.

“I like your music, Wade.”

There was relief in his voice. “Well, thank you, little lady.”

“Don’t expect me to ask for your autograph the next time I see you.”

It was Wade’s turn to hum. “So I am going to see you again.”

“If,” she retracted. “If I see you again.”

“Oh, no, no, no. You said next time. I’m holding you to it.”

Her heart warmed. “You’re an insufferable flirt.”

“And you’re flirting back.”

“I’m teasing. Not flirting.”

Wade made a ticking noise on the phone. “Fine line drawn between those two things. If you’re flirting, your cheeks would be rosy and warm.”