One

The afternoon sun shone bright over the village of Dunmullach in the southwest of Ireland. The fragrance of wildflowers—clover, honeysuckle, valerian—wafted on a gentle breeze over the cliffs of Carrick Point. Gethsemane Brown rested her elbows on a windowsill and gazed out the open window at the pastoral scene that surrounded Carraigfaire Cottage. The day reminded her of Edward MacDowell’s “Summer Idyll.”

Eamon McCarthy’s mood, on the other hand, reminded her of Holst’s “Mars: The Bringer of War.”

“What the hell are they doing in my lighthouse?” Angry blue sparks punctuated the furious ghost’s shouts. A deep blue aura surrounded him. “What’s with the holy show?”

“Billy rented it to them for their wedding,” Gethsemane said.

“Why the bloody hell didn’t you stop him?” An anger-fueled blast of Eamon’s leather-and-soap scent filled the cottage’s interior.

Gethsemane leaned out the window and inhaled the fresh, green, salty smells of the cliffside. She counted to five and reminded herself that her spectral roommate’s anger was really meant for his nephew, Billy McCarthy, who’d owned the cottage and lighthouse since Eamon’s murder many years ago. “How the hell, bloody or otherwise, am I supposed to stop my landlord from renting out his own property?”

Another burst of sparks accompanied a string of swear words as blue as Eamon’s aura.

“For the record,” Gethsemane jerked a thumb in the direction of the century-old lighthouse that sat atop Carrick Point’s promontory and dominated the landscape, “I don’t want them here anymore than you do. Especially the groom.”

“He’s the fella you told me about? From the pub? The one Grennan’s mot dissolved into screaming hysterics over?”

“‘Screaming hysterics’ overstates things. Verna got upset, sure, but I wouldn’t call her hysterical. And she didn’t scream.” Seeing Ty Lismore walk into the Mad Rabbit with two of his groomsmen two weeks ago had sent Verna Cunningham, the Latin teacher at St. Brennan’s Boys’ School and Frankie Grennan’s new girlfriend, running from the table in tears.

“What’s between Miss Cunningham and the groom-to-be? A bad romance?”

“Chauvinist. You would assume—”

Eamon cut her off. “What else would send her running at the mere sight of him?”

“Um…” Nothing she could think of quickly enough to qualify as a comeback. “Give me a minute.”

“Not a damn thing and you know it. Except maybe she’s a fugitive murderer and he’s the garda hot on her trail.”

“You’ve been spending too much time with me, if that’s the alternative you came up with.” She and Eamon had solved several murders together since she landed in Dunmullach almost a year ago, starting with his and his wife, Orla’s. “Yes, he probably broke her heart. But that’s a guess because, other than telling us his name, Verna won’t talk about him. At all. She’s more closed mouth about Lismore than Frankie is about Yseult.” Frankie, math teacher at St. Brennan’s and Gethsemane’s close friend, loathed speaking about his ex-wife, Yseult, a fugitive thief and con artist. Even mention of her name sent him into a funk he wouldn’t emerge from for days.

“This Lismore fella sounds like a true wanker.” A blue orb materialized and hovered in front of Eamon. It sizzled and popped with destructive energy. “I could do Miss Cunningham a favor and—”

Gethsemane cut him off. “Put it away.”

“Why?”

“Because you can’t blast every gobshite and wanker who darkens your day. For one thing, hitting people in the head with balls of energy is rude. For another, how would I explain it to Inspector Sutton?” She shuddered. She’d endured several run-ins with the head of the Dunmullach Garda homicide unit, encounters that usually involved her doing her best to convince the inspector that neither she nor her friends had killed anyone. He wasn’t a fan.

“What if I just spook them? Move the furniture, levitate a few objects?”

“I thought you didn’t do parlor tricks. They’re beneath you. Isn’t that what you told me when we first met and I asked you to prove you were a ghost?”

Eamon grinned and shrugged. An amused green tinged the edges of his still-blue aura. “Desperate times. The thought of that gang of bollocks making a bags of my lighthouse by festooning it with gewgaws and furbelows is making me spin in my grave. Literally.”

“Rest easy. They’re not festooning anything. Billy said the wedding’s not until October. They’re here now to do some planning and take some pre-wedding photos.”

“Can we at least go see what they’re up to? I promise to behave.”

“If you don’t want me to see your fingers crossed behind your back,” she pointed to his semi-transparent hand visible through his semi-transparent torso, “you should dial up your density.”

“D’you know how much energy it takes to manifest one of these orbs? I can’t do it and fully materialize at the same time.”

Gethsemane ducked as the blue projectile buzzed past her head. “All the more reason to put it away.”

The orb vanished and Eamon filled in until he appeared solid. “Lighthouse?”

She nodded. “I admit to morbid curiosity about the woman who captured the heart of the man who, I assume, trampled on Verna’s. Billy seemed impressed. Her name’s Sunny Markham; she’s American, a social media influencer, and an heiress.”

“Social media influencer? That’s an actual job description?”

Gethsemane snort-laughed. “She’s young, rich, and beautiful. People want to be her but can’t, so they settle for wearing what she wears, eating what she eats, traveling where she travels, you get the idea.”

“How do they know all that?”

“She posts a carefully curated selection of photos on social media of herself living a fabulous life.”

“Are you sure I can’t use an orb?”

“I’m sure. Let’s go. Maybe I can suss out some intel for Frankie so he’ll know what he’s up against.”

“Race you.” Eamon dematerialized.