The Architect of Song (Haunted Hearts Legacy Book 1) by A. G. Howard Page B

glide—as if we skimmed atop clouds. On the climb to Cemetery Hill, bare-branched trees cut through the frothy air like gnarled fingers spinning cotton on a loom.
    A damp film coated my face through my netted veil. I shivered. Hawk lifted an arm to draw me close and block the wind—an instinctual move. He couldn’t hide his frustration when he realized we still could not touch, regardless his success with the vine.
    My heart dropped heavier than a stone as I wondered how much more upset he’d be once we reached our destination. How could anyone withstand the sight of their own grave, knowing what lay beneath the dirt?

    Patches of fog wrapped the tombs and statues like gauze.
    I set the brake on the gig and secured Chester’s reins to a tree. Hawk walked at my side, looking out of place in the cold with his thin, opened shirt, dress breeches, and muddied boots. His attention darted from one headstone to the next, anxiously searching for his body’s home.
    I paused beside Mama’s grave. Hawk waited next to the angel statues in the distance, his silhouette an untouchable reflection of their physiques of marble and moss.
    Kneeling, I swept the veil from my face. “Sweet Mama, how I miss you.” My fingertip traced the engraving on her stone. “But I have a new friend. He’s going to help me keep our estate.” The rose I’d left the day before was gone. A few remaining, withered petals fluttered around my knees, as if to taunt me that my mother was gone, too, and that she would never be here again to offer her wisdom or approval. My eyes stung and I silently promised to bring her a fresh rose on my next visit.
    I stood. Mud puckered around my boots as I wove around the hedges, sniffling.
    Hawk joined me, focused solely on my face. “Forgive me for asking you to visit so soon.”
    “I would’ve come, with or without you,” I assured him.
    We arrived at his tomb. Another padlock replaced the one I’d broken the day before. His grave keeper had been by and left muddy prints, too small to be a man’s.
    It dawned on me that my ghostly companion might have a wife who missed him. And children that adored him. And I’d earlier wanted to kiss him … more than just to thank him for saving me. I wanted to taste his breath of chicory and mint. To savor the mouth that gave me such beautiful songs and sounds. Shame splashed through me, hot and scalding. Enya would say I was a trollop … that only men should have such carnal thoughts.
    “No.” Hawk squinted toward the tomb centered within the fence. “I would remember, had I given my heart to someone. This much I’m sure of.” His eyes—glittering to match the mist-dampened stone that marked his grave—came to rest on mine. “And having desire to be close to another person is natural. Intrinsic, not only to a man, but to any human. Such attraction goes beyond the physical, and reaches into the spiritual, as I know now. For although I’ve no need for food or sleep, those other appetites still beg appeasement.” His gaze ran the length of me and I basked in the huskiness of his voice, remembering the night before when he had tried to touch my necklace. When I had melted beneath a phantom caress.
    Hawk offered his hand. And though we could not touch, I removed my glove and hovered my palm over his.
    “We’re playing make-believe.” His free hand reached up as if to tuck a wayfaring lock of hair into my hat. I leaned forward, pretending he could. “I am inaccessible. I am safe. You are a perceptive young woman, more attuned to your senses than most, and curious about the intimacies between two people, after having witnessed the great love of your mother and father. We live in a society that stifles emotions. It is no wonder you would allow your thoughts free reign now that you are provided such an outlet. I’m honored, to have inspired such a restricted spirit’s attempt at flight.”
    I regarded every exotic angle and turn to his beautiful face, stopping at the