Gatekeeper by Debra Glass Read Free Book Online Page B

saw his ghost or something.”
    Jillian debated her reply but the man continued.
    “That’s cool,” he said. “I’ve seen a few myself over at the Carnton Plantation.”
    “Really?”
    He nodded. Something in his light blue eyes told her he was sincere. But before she could comment, he turned and pulled a book down from the shelf. “If you’ve been to Shy’s Hill, I may have a picture of your guy.”
    He flipped through the pages. “Here. Look at this.” He laid the book on the counter, spun it around and pushed it toward her.
    Jillian gasped. Staring up at her from the yellowed page of the book was her ghost in grainy black and white. The same dark, wavy hair. The same moustache and spade beard. But gone was the rough-hewn look of a soldier. Instead, he was posed and very polished. Even without smiling he looked cocky, smug. The memory of his fingers trailing down her neck gave her a shiver. And the sight of him—real, alive—in a photograph made her go weak in the knees.
    “That him?”
    Unable to speak, she nodded. He was as handsome in the photograph as he had been as a ghost, almost timeless in his attractiveness but with all the romantic appeal of a nineteenth-century-novel hero. Something warm and sinuous unfurled inside her. Uncomfortable with the feelings the sight of him evoked, Jillian shifted her weight from one leg to the other.
    “That’s old Thomas Benton Smith.”
    Her gaze briefly left the page and she looked into Matt’s eyes before returning her stare to the photograph. Her ghost was hardly old but the name was familiar. Where had she heard it before? “Thomas Benton Smith.” Just uttering it caused a warm blush to creep up the front of her neck.
    “Folks who knew him called him Benton,” Matt said. “Hence, Benton Smith Road. You had to have driven on it if you went to Shy’s Hill.”
    That’s right. She remembered now. She touched the photo. “Benton Smith.” The heat of the blush intensified.
    “He was killed there.”
    A shudder swept through Jillian. She recalled the bloodstain on his shoulder “How?”
    “The Confederates got surrounded and Smith assessed the situation as hopeless. He surrendered but not before an assload of Union soldiers died trying to take the hill. After that, they were marched down the hill and one of his men made a smart-alecky comment to a Federal colonel that the whole hill was blue with Yankee dead. Smith had already handed over his sword to the colonel and when he got in between his man and the colonel, the colonel killed him with his own sword.”
    She swallowed. A sense of pity welled inside her. “Did he stab him in the shoulder?”
    “No. The head.” Then Matt’s eyes narrowed. “But how do you know about the shoulder?”
    She touched her own shoulder where Benton’s jacket had been discolored. “There was a dark stain on his coat.”
    “That makes sense.” Matt’s eyes widened with interest. “He took that wound at the Battle of Stone’s River—where his brother was killed.”
    Jillian’s heart tightened. She knew all too well what it felt like to lose a loved one.
    “So, you saw Benton Smith’s ghost, ’eh?” Matt chuckled. “I can tell you why he appeared to someone like you.”
    Jillian was beyond curious. “Why?”
    Matt squinted at the photo again. “Benton Smith had a reputation as quite the ladies’ man.”
    She smirked. He’d told her he had given up on ladies. She ignored a nagging twinge of resentment. So she was right in her assessment that he’d broken many a Southern belle’s heart.
    “Oh yeah,” Matt continued. “There were several women after him but the story goes that he got himself engaged to a Williamson County woman by the name of Hattie. But after his brother died, he mysteriously broke off the engagement. She got all pissed and married a private under Smith.” He scratched his salt-and-pepper beard. “Nobody knows for sure why he dumped her. Rumor has it she married the man just to spite