My Ghost Husband Won't Let Me Go

The First time my dead husband came back, he ruined my engagement. The second time, He tried to stop me from breathing. Neither of those things should have been possible. Especially since I buried Derek Blackwood six months ago. Yet there I stood in the center of a ballroom filled with two hundred guests, staring at a text message sent from a phone number that no longer existed. UNKNOWN NUMBER Don't put on the ring. My heart skipped. Then another message appeared. I'm warning you, Desidre The blood drained from my face. I knew that wording. Knew the bluntness. The arrogance. The certainty that the world should listen when he spoke. Derek. No. Impossible. I tightened my grip on the phone. "Everything okay?" James smiled beside me. Tall. Handsome. Safe. Everything a woman should want in a husband. His hand rested against the velvet ring box in his pocket. The entire ballroom seemed to hold its breath. Waiting. Watching. The famous Dr. James Carter was finally proposing. I should have been happy. Instead, dread crawled down my spine. Because Derek hated being ignored. Even when he was alive. And if this was some kind of sick prank... My phone vibrated again. Last chance, wife. The word punched the air from my lungs. Wife. Not ex-wife. Not widow. Wife. Only one man had ever called me that. A man whose ashes had been scattered into Boston Harbor. A man whose death certificate was sitting in my apartment. A man who should have stayed dead. "Desidre?" James's voice sounded distant. Concerned. I forced a smile. "I'm fine." Lie. The ballroom lights flickered. Once. Twice. Three times. Guests murmured. The string quartet faltered. Then James dropped to one knee. Applause erupted instantly. Cameras lifted. Phones recorded. Everyone wanted the moment. The proposal. The fairy-tale ending. "Desidre Rossi," James said softly. His brown eyes shone. "These last six months have been the hardest of your life. I know that." Guilt stabbed through me. Because he was right. James had helped me survive Derek's death. The panic attacks. The nightmares. The loneliness. He had been patient. Kind. Steady. Everything Derek had never been. "I love you," James continued. "And I want to spend the rest of my life proving it." The ring box opened. Gasps echoed around the room. The diamond was enormous. Beautiful. Perfect. A future. A normal future. One I desperately wanted. James smiled. "Will you marry me?" The crowd held its breath. My answer sat on the tip of my tongue. Then every light in the ballroom exploded. Darkness swallowed the room. Women screamed. Glass shattered. The quartet stopped playing. For one terrible second, silence ruled everything. Then came the cold. Not winter cold. Not air-conditioning cold. Dead cold. The kind that belongs in morgues. The kind that belongs six feet underground. The kind I remembered from the moment I touched Derek's body in the hospital. A gasp escaped me. White frost spread across the floor beneath my heels. Guests stumbled backward. Someone cursed. Someone else started praying. The emergency lights should have activated. They didn't. Instead, a single spotlight flickered on. At the far end of the ballroom. Directly beside the wedding cake. My pulse hammered. "No..." The word barely escaped. A figure stood inside the light. Tall. Broad-shouldered. Dressed entirely in black. The crowd slowly parted around him. Like prey sensing a predator. My hands started shaking. Because I knew that silhouette. Even before I saw his face. I knew it. The stranger took one step forward. Then another. The spotlight followed him. The room temperature dropped with every movement. And finally— I saw his eyes. Grey. Cold. Familiar. Impossible. A collective gasp swept through the ballroom. Someone dropped a champagne glass. It shattered. Nobody noticed. Nobody could look away. Derek Blackwood smiled. The same smile that had once made newspapers call him America's most dangerous billionaire. The same smile that had made me marry him after knowing him for only four months. The same smile I'd watched disappear forever in a hospital bed. Except apparently... Forever hadn't lasted very long. My knees nearly gave out. "That's impossible," someone whispered. "He's dead." Derek ignored everyone. His gaze locked onto mine. Possessive. Intense. Terrifying. Exactly as I remembered. Then his eyes shifted. To James. Still kneeling. Still holding the engagement ring. The smile vanished. The temperature plummeted. Frost raced across the marble floor. Guests screamed. Several backed away. James stood instantly. Protectively positioning himself in front of me. "Who the hell are you?" The question echoed through the silence. Derek's expression darkened. Slowly. Dangerously. Then he looked at James the way a king might look at an insect. "My wife," he said quietly. The entire ballroom froze. His gaze returned to me. "You really thought death would make me let you go?" The engagement ring shattered. Still inside James's hand. The diamond exploded into glittering dust. And my phone buzzed one final time. A new message. From Derek. I looked down. My blood turned to ice. Three words filled the screen. I'm coming home.