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“So how’d you get into the bean business?” he asked as he kept his eyes fixed on the distant horizon.

“Putting myself through graduate school,” I answered by rote. His was a question I’d answered often, especially when my professors and fellow students asked why I was distracting myself with this temporary job when I could simply finish my degree and find a much better gig. “How about you?”

“Just following orders.” He flashed me an impish grin.

“What? Whose orders?”

He let out a fatigued sigh.“It’s a condition of my trust fund. I have to keep a steady job to collect. So just to stick it to my old man, I keep the lowliest job possible, doing the exact opposite of what he’d intended for me.”

“So you’re a trust fund baby? That explains a few things,” I said, thinking back to his shiny sports coupe.

“Darling, I’m a trust fund man, and don’t you forget it.” He smiled charmingly, and I couldn’t help but laugh. This was something we had in common, at least. The people in our lives expected more of us—or rather different things. I knew I’d finish my degree eventually, but I still hadno idea what I actually wanted for my life. In truth, I’d chosen Sociology as my field of study because it seemed to be one of the broadest majors available. I’d then signed on to grad school because that’s what you were supposed to do when your bachelor’s degree didn’t offer a clear career path.

I still preferred that life be full of surprises, and settling into a 9-to-5 felt like the exact opposite of that.

“Don’t you get bored, though?” I asked Drake now. “With only working part-time and having no aspirations outside of continuing to collect?” He didn’t need to know that my own aspirations were as of yet undefined.

“Bored? No way. And who says I don’t have aspirations. Like I said, I like to know a little bit about a lot of things. A modern renaissance man.”

“Like gardening,” I supplied with a slight grin. “And makeup.”

He nodded.“And ghosts.”

Oh, good. He’d given me the lead in I needed. I jumped for it. “Actually, I was wondering about that.”

He hung his head and laughed.“Of course, you were. You don’t think I knew that in the parking lot?”

I stopped walking and stared after him.“But you—“

He also stopped a few paces ahead and then turned to study me.“I turned the situation to my advantage. I’ve been wanting to take you out for a long time. I figured this way you’d want it, too.”

“Sneaky.” Now my smile was so big it was busting at the seams.

He winked at me.“Or genius.”

“I’ll stick with sneaky,” I answered with a laugh, then began walking again and looped my arm through his once more. “So are you going to tell me about the ghosts?”

“Ghost,” he corrected. His smile had been replaced by a clenched jaw and furrowed brow. “I’ve only ever seen the one.”

“Tell me about it,” I practically begged as I gave his forearm a little squeeze.

His expression lightened again.“Well, I guess I got what I wanted out of tonight—that is, some extra time with you. I suppose it’s only fair to give you what you wanted. One ghost story coming right up.”

He cleared his throat to begin…

8

“Okay, so it was a dark and stormy night…”

I groaned and flung my head back dramatically.“Seriously?”

“If you want the story, then you’ve gotta let me set the scene,” Drake said, his dark hair falling into his eyes as he smiled at me from just one side of his mouth.

I rolled my eyes and motioned for him to go ahead.

“Like I was saying, it was a dark and stormy night.” He widened his eyes and glared at me, daring me to protest.

When I kept mum, he smiled with the other half of his mouth, too.

“I’d just turned twenty-one, which meant I’d finally come into my trust fund, and now I was in the process of driving all over the country in search of a new place to settle down. The only requirement? That it be as far away from my parents as possible. I was on my way to Miami when a giant storm whipped up, so I pulled over to the side of the road to wait it out. While I sat there, this lady in white appeared out of nowhere.” His eyes became vacant as he journeyed deeper into the memory, and I had no doubt he was seeing the scene unfold anew in his mind’s eye.

Drake took a deep, stuttering breath before continuing.“She wore this old-fashioned gown and no shoes. I could barely see her through the thick sheet of rain, but it was enough to tell that she was semi-transparent.”

I gasped.“Wow, you really did see a ghost.”

“Why would I lie about it?” he asked with one dark eyebrow raised in question.

The intensity of his gaze made me let go of his arm and take a small step to the side.“You’re right. I’m sorry. Go ahead.”