Treasured Legacies (A Mary O'Reilly Paranormal Mystery) (22 page)

After work, Mary picked up enough pizza to feed the entire
Mormon Tabernacle Choir and wondered if it was going to be enough for the
Brennan boys, not to mention the rest of them. When she walked into the house
she was greeted with a contingency of starving children and a nearly
exasperated husband.

“They’re like locusts,” he said, as he helped her put out
the paper plates and napkins. “I kept throwing food at them and it was scary to
see how quickly it disappeared.”

He looked at the empty bowl that had been brimming with
potato chips only a few minutes ago. “By the way, we need to go grocery
shopping tomorrow,” he said, shaking his head.

Laughing, she opened the cabinet and pulled out another bag
of chips. “They are growing boys,” she said. “That’s just how they eat.”

“Scary,” he said.

After the food had been devoured, they all sat in the living
room to watch a movie.
 
The debate about
which movie to watch lasted nearly fifteen
minutes,
until Mary suggested that they watch something none of them had ever seen
before.

“What?” Andy said. “We’ve pretty much seen everything.”

“How about Dracula?”
Mary asked.

“We’ve seen it,” David Brennan said.

“The 1931 version of Dracula?”
Mary
asked.

“Was that one with the real Dracula?” Andy asked.

Grinning, Mary nodded. “Well, it is the one with the
original Dracula,” she agreed. “And it was filmed using only black and white.”

“That’s cool,” David agreed.

“I don’t know,” Bradley said. “That was before ratings.
 
They might see something their parents
wouldn’t want them to see.”

“We can see it.”
 

“They won’t mind.”

“Please!”

Mary bit the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling.
“Okay, we’ll let you see it,” she agreed. “But you have to agree not to tell
your parents.”

Bradley inserted the movie into the DVD player and then
scooped up some of the paper plates. Mary followed with another armful.

“You are brilliant,” she said, giving him a quick kiss on
the cheek.

“Thanks,” he said. “You’re not bad yourself.”

Arming themselves with several large bowls of popcorn that they
distributed around the room, they cuddled together in the loveseat and enjoyed
the movie themselves. A quick seventy-five minutes later, they were onto the
second part of their double-feature with the 1931 version of Frankenstein. And
when Katie and Clifford arrived at ten-thirty, they were all still arguing
whether
Bela
Lugosi or Boris Karloff was scarier.

An hour later, the house was quiet and Mary was snuggling
into her pillow, fighting sleep until Bradley joined her in bed. She let her
eyes drift closed as she listened to him move around in the bathroom. She awoke
a few moments later, listening to the water running in the sink and tried once
again to stay awake.

“Honey,” she yawned. “You have to hurry, I’m sinking fast.”

She started to drift off again and then she felt the weight
of someone sitting on the bed next to her. “Finally,” she muttered, turning to
him.

The scream flew from her mouth before she could stop it and
Bradley dashed into the room, a toothbrush still in his mouth. “What?” he
demanded.

Not able to form words yet, she slowly reached out her hand
in his direction.
 
He ran to her side,
grasped her hand and saw what she was looking at.

Sitting on the edge of the bed, no more than two feet away
from Mary, were the fleshless decomposing remains of a corpse. The head slowly
cocked to one side and hollow eye sockets met her eyes. “Sorry to bother you so
late,” he said, in a very genteel tone. “But I rather think I might be dead and
I was wondering if you could help me.”

The
End

About
the author:
 
Terri Reid lives near Freeport, the home of
the Mary O’Reilly Mystery Series, and loves a good ghost story.
 
She lives in a hundred year-old farmhouse
complete with its own ghost. She loves hearing from her readers at
[email protected]

Other Books by Terri Reid:

Mary O’Reilly Paranormal Mystery Series:

Loose Ends (Book One)

Good Tidings (Book Two)

Never Forgotten
(Book Three)

Final Call
(Book Four)

Darkness
Exposed
 
(
Book Five)

Natural
Reaction (Book Six)

Secret Hollows
(Book Seven)

Broken Promises
(Book Eight)

Twisted Paths
(Book Nine)

Veiled Passages
(Book Ten)

Bumpy Roads
(Book Eleven)

PRCD Case Files:

The Ghosts
Of
New Orleans -A Paranormal Research and Containment
Division Case File

Eochaidh:

Legend of the
Horseman (Book One)