Read Ghostwriting for Free Online Page B

‘What a question!’
    Amy immediately wanted to retract it. ‘Sorry.’
    â€˜I’m not suddenly going to spin out on you, if that’s what you mean.’
    â€˜It isn’t,’ she assured him. ‘I just want to make sure that you’re okay with Olivia’s death.’
    â€˜Of course I’m okay with it. She’s allowed to die, isn’t she?’
    Amy was puzzled. ‘But won’t you miss her?’
    Liam shrugged, casting his sights around the cluttered office. ‘She’s still hanging around.’
    A chill came over Amy as he said this, and she noted how dimly lit the room was and how quiet.
    â€˜She could never rest in peace with this final chapter unresolved.’ Liam noticed Amy was looking spooked. ‘Sorry, am I scaring you?’
    â€˜A little,’ she confessed.
    Liam clapped his hands together to dispel the eerie mood he’d created, and his beaming smile returned. ‘I haven’t put you off staying, have I? It seems silly for you to have to come back in the morning when you’re already here.’
    Amy shied away from the idea. ‘I haven’t any clothes and —’
    â€˜You can borrow mine,’ he insisted.
    â€˜Are all your things so …’ she screwed up her nose, ‘bright?’
    Liam nodded, figuring that Amy wore black all the time and that it wasn’t just a mourning thing. ‘You know what they say about people who feel the need to always wear black?’
    Amy shook her head. ‘What do they say?’
    â€˜They either have absolutely no idea where they’re at, or they have total command of their life … Which are you?’
    After a thought Amy laughed. ‘I think I need to get some new clothes.’ Then, resigning herself to accepting his kind offer, she said, ‘Thank you, I will stay.’
    Stage Three: Anger
    After a late dinner and a couple of hours in Liam’s company, Amy was too full of food, drink and merriment to be bothered about Olivia’s ghost. She collapsed into bed around midnight and was asleep before her head hit the pillow.
    The following morning Liam went into the city to attend classes, and Amy set to her quest. A cup of tea in hand, she climbed the stairs to Olivia’s office, located in the mansion’s large attic room.
    Four equilateral triangles rose to form a pyramid structure in the ceiling. Due to this, the walls were of minimal height and so were the windows. Double French doors at one end allowed some natural light to penetrate the room. Through these, a little balcony overlooked the surrounding houses to the harbour and city beyond.
    Amy opened the doors to air the room, and switched on the overhead light. She was of a mind tostart at one end of the office and systematically sift her way through every little slip of paper until she found the pages she sought.
    But as the hours passed, Amy’s optimism dwindled and the anxious feeling she’d had since Olivia’s death seethed in her stomach, twisting it into knots. By the time she’d sorted her way through to the desk, Amy was completely exasperated.
    â€˜Goddamn it.’ The tears started to well. ‘Those pages have to be here.’ Frustrated, Amy reached the bottom of the paper pile on the desk and discarded the whole lot on to the floor. On the beautiful mahogany desk, now cleared of its clutter, Amy spied an irregularity in the lovely polished finish. Focusing more closely on the black marks, she realised it was marker scribble, much like that on the top of the box containing the manuscript. Amy began to tremble as she made out the jagged letters ‘ISH’.
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    Liam was struggling through the door, juggling his dance bag, keys and a couple of bags of groceries, when Amy came charging down the main staircase and began rummaging blindly through her handbag for her car keys.
    â€˜What’s happened?’ Liam dropped everything to block her