Love Song(135)

The taxi stops in front of a large Tudor-style house with a spacious front lawn and three-car garage. I’m happy to see a car in the driveway. I hope that means somebody’s home; otherwise, I’m about to make camp on the porch like a stalker.

This was…a really bad idea, I realize.

I’ve done some ridiculous things for the sake of research, like flirt with a Kyle to convince him to dig through old, dusty boxes. But a day trip to a different state to visit a house whose residents might not even be connected to the story?

That’s extreme, even for me.

And yet the lengths I’ve gone to, as extreme as they may be, remind me of Wyatt saying how much he loves my nerdy pursuits. How my hobby isn’t dumb but passionate.

Still, I do feel sort of dumb as I stand awkwardly on the porch and ring the doorbell. My pulse speeds up when I hear footsteps beyond the door. Then it swings open, and a woman answers. An elderly woman. I’m not great with guessing ages, but she looks like she could be in her late sixties. Also bodes well. Darlie died fifty years ago, and her sister was nineteen at the time, so that would make Dolly sixty-nine now.

“Can I help you?” she asks with a polite smile.

“Um…maybe? Are you by any chance Dolly Gallagher? Loughlin, I mean. Dolly Gallagher Loughlin.”

Her smile falters, joined by a quick flicker of suspicion. But she doesn’t slam the door. If anything, she sounds curious as she says, “I am indeed. And you are?”

“Blake.” I offer an embarrassed smile. “Blake Logan. I’m a student at Briar University in Massachusetts. I was hoping I could ask you a few questions. About your sister,” I clarify.

Now her eyes narrow.

God, this is so awkward. “You know what? I’m so sorry,” I tell her, my cheeks hotter than Hades. “I just realized how crazy this is and how incredibly intrusive. I shouldn’t have shown up at your door like this, but I couldn’t find a phone number or email. This would have been so much better over email.”

I guess my nervous babbling eases her concerns that I might be here to kill her, because she laughs softly and opens the door wider. “Why don’t you come in, sweetheart? Do you want a glass of water?”

“Yes, please.” I glance toward the curb and give the taxi driver a thumbs-up. He’s been waiting for my signal to head off.

Inside, I remove my shoes at her request and follow her down a wide corridor toward a large kitchen with sky-blue cabinets and a cedar table by a window that overlooks a beautifully manicured backyard. This house isn’t as fancy as the Loughlins’ cliffside Tahoe property, but it’s still pretty damn nice.

“That’s a gorgeous yard,” I tell her.

“Thank you! Ray and I do all the landscaping ourselves.”

“Ray? You mean Raymond? So he’s still alive?”

“Alive and kicking,” Dolly confirms. She walks to the kettle on the stove. “I was just fixing myself a cup of tea when you rang. Would you like one or do you prefer water?”

“Tea is great, thanks.”

She returns to the table with two steaming mugs. “It’s peppermint. I hope that’s all right.”

“Perfect,” I say, gratefully reaching for the tea. “I really am sorry for just showing up here. Sometimes I find a topic I’m interested in, and before I know it, I’m obsessed. My family owns a house in Lake Tahoe, right across the lake from the Loughlin property.”

“Lord, I haven’t been back there in decades,” she muses. “Though I hear my sister is still creating quite the stir.”

I’m startled by the humor gleaming in her brown eyes. “So you know about the Darlie legend?”

“You mean that my sister tragically drowned herself because of her broken heart? And that rather than turn evil, she now strives to mend people’s hearts and shower them with love? Or whatever it is benevolent ghosts do.” Dolly releases a peal of laughter.

“You’re saying none of that is true?”

“Honey. I assure you that most ghost stories aren’t true.”

I feel a pang of disappointment, but at the same time, my curiosity hasn’t abated in the slightest. There’s clearly a story here.

“All right, what’s the real story then?” I ask the smiling woman. “I found your sister’s death certificate, which means she did die around the time this legend began.”

Dolly’s expression goes serious. “Yes. My sister passed on. And it was a difficult time for all of us, especially Ray. But it certainly wasn’t as dramatic as suicide by drowning. She died of a brain tumor.”

I gasp. “Wow. Really?”

“It came on so suddenly. Heck, we didn’t even have a history of brain cancer in our family. Darlie went in for a checkup for migraines and left with a diagnosis of three weeks to live. The tumor was so advanced, the doctors said even the most aggressive treatment wouldn’t help.” Her breath catches. “She was engaged. She was happy. She had her whole life ahead of her. Lord, we never even saw it coming.”

“Why wasn’t there a medical report?”

She wrinkles her forehead. “Well, I’m sure there was. Hospital records for her scans, certainly.”

I nod. After I found Darlie’s death certificate, the first thing I did was call all the hospitals in the area, but it turns out they don’t release private medical records to random college girls.