2 The Ghosts Upstairs

by SUE FINEMAN

  On her way to the family room, she remembered Buford. “Billy, where’s the dog?”

  “Outside.”

  She ran to the door and called for Buford, but the helicopter was making so much noise, she couldn’t hear herself. Poor dog must be terrified.

  Billy called the television station. “This is Billy Kane. Get that damn helicopter away from my house. The dog is afraid of loud noises. He ran off and we can’t find him with that thing hovering over the house. If anything happens to Buford, I’m holding your station responsible.”

  The helicopter backed away, and Billy helped Kayla seach for Buford. The helicopter still hovered in the distance, and he knew there were cameras on them, but it couldn’t be helped.

  They found Buford hiding in the pool house, under the bench, shivering with fear. Billy carried him into the house. He looked over at Kayla. “Did you talk to reporters? Did you tell them about the house?”

  “You didn’t tell me it was a secret. That nice reporter from channel seven asked me who I was, and I told her about coming to River Valley for my inheritance and now nice you were to let me stay in the house.”

  Billy felt angry heat warm his face, and it was all he could do to keep from yelling at her. Didn’t the woman have any sense?

  “I didn’t know they’d come here with a helicopter and bother you. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have said anything at all.”

  He’d planned to get some things done outside tonight, but he couldn’t go outside with that damn helicopter in the area. If he did, they’d be right back over the house again. “Damn! I can’t work outside tonight.”

  “What needs to be done?”

  “I was going to put weed killer on the lawn.”

  “I’ll take care of it first thing in the morning.”

  “Kayla, I don’t expect you to do everything.”

  The oven timer went off as he walked off into the other room to cool off. His life changed when Eleanor died, and Kayla changed it even more. He should have told her he didn’t want anyone outside his family to know about the house.

  He found himself in the sunroom, a big glass-walled room near the kitchen. The ceiling was glass, too, or it was until that tree branch came through it. He thought he could have the broken glass replaced, but the window frames were bent or broken. Maybe he should just tear the whole thing off and build a new roof, make it an open porch. Or screen it in. The mosquitoes were bad here in the summer.

  Kayla walked up beside him and handed him a dish of warm cobbler. “I’m sorry, Billy.”

  “They’ll give up and go pick on someone else in a day or two.”

  “Sounds like you’ve dealt with reporters before.”

  “I did, when Dad and Hannah found a body in the basement of the house on Livingston Avenue. They hung around for days. At least we have a gate to keep them out here.”

  “Hannah told me about the body in the basement.” They sat in the family room with their dishes of cobbler. “You know, the little gate out front isn’t locked, or it wasn’t locked yesterday morning. That’s how I got in.”

  “I’ll take care of it after dark.” He took a bite of cherry cobbler. “Mmm, this is good.” The woman didn’t just clean, she could cook, too. Why did that surprise him?

  “It’s Granny’s recipe. The only thing she cooked that I couldn’t abide was okra. It didn’t matter how she cooked it, it always tasted slimy.”

  He’d never tasted okra. “Sounds awful.”

  “Granny said I wasn’t a proper Southern girl if I wouldn’t eat okra and grits. Now I like grits, but I told her I’d move up North before I ate okra again.”

  He chuckled. “And here you are. Up North.”

  “Here I am.”

  She gazed into his eyes and he wondered what she was thinking. He’d never met a redhead with brown eyes. She had a few light freckles sprinkled across her cute little nose. She’d been wearing her hair tied back, but it was long and loose today, curling around her shoulders. He wanted to touch it, run his fingers through it, and kiss her, but he barely knew her.

  He hoped to get to know her a lot better while she was here, if she’d let him. He knew it wouldn’t be a long-term relationship. She didn’t intend to stay in Ohio, and this was his home.

  He’d never considered living anywhere else.

  <>

  After Kayla went in to shower and get ready for bed, Billy unpacked and settled into the library. Then he tinkered with the safe. He tried variations of the gate code, 6-1-6-1, 6-16-1, 61-6-1, and 6-1-61, but nothing worked. He scrambled the numbers and tried more combinations, but it still wouldn’t open. Then he tried his birthday, 12-10, and as he put in the year, the lock clicked into place. “Yes!”

  Pulling the heavy door open, he looked inside and found three bank bags stuffed with hundred-dollar bills and three legal documents. Leaving the money in the safe, he pulled out the documents. He carried them into the study, put them on the desk, and turned on the light.

  The first document was the deed to this property. The second was the deed to another property in River Valley. From the address, it must be overlooking the river. Billy was surprised to see his name on the deed. He was tempted to go find the address right now, but it could wait until those reporters stopped following him around.

  The third document was a million-dollar life insurance policy on William Goodman, with William Goodman Kane as the beneficiary. Billy stared at the document. Was this still good? William Goodman had been dead for over twenty years.

  Did Eleanor have the combination to the safe? Did she know this was in here?

  “No,” he decided. If Eleanor knew, the money wouldn’t be here, and she wouldn’t have left the insurance policy or deeds for him to find.

  Piano music came from the back of the house. He knew Kayla could sing, but he didn’t realize she also knew how to play the piano.

  Billy put the papers in the safe, locked it, and pushed the books back in front of it. Then he picked up the phone and called his father.

  Charlie answered the phone. “He’s busy.”

  “This is important.”

  “Then tell me.”

  “Like hell. Get Dad.”

  Dad picked up the phone. “What’s up?”

  “I got the safe open. The combination is my birthday.”

  “Why didn’t I think of that? So, was there anything in it?”

  Billy told his dad what he’d found. “If that insurance policy is any good, I can fix up the house, pay the taxes, and live here until the real estate market improves. Nothing is selling right now.”

  “Yeah, I know. What about the ghosts?”

  “To hell with the ghosts.” His grandfather wanted him to have the house, and Billy wouldn’t let Maggie and Eleanor chase him away.

  Kayla finished dusting the piano and ran a dust mop over the floor in the room she thought of as the ballroom. She could picture kids dancing and having a party in this room, with a band standing up there by the piano. What she wouldn’t give to have a grand piano like that one. It sounded so much better than the old upright in the church where Granny taught her to play.

  While she was shaking the dust mop out back, Buford went outside. She hoped that helicopter stayed away. The sun was starting to set, and the sky was all colors of pinks and blues. Pretty, just like back home. She should call Norma and give her the phone number here, if she could find it. Or maybe she wouldn’t need the number. She had caller ID on her apartment phone, and that was where Norma was living since she’d left her boyfriend.

  After she finished dusting in the ballroom, she went looking for Billy. She found him in the study. “Billy, is it all right if I make a long-distance phone call?”

  “Sure.” As she turned to go back to the kitchen, he said, “Kayla, I’ll pay you two hundred a week.”

  She turned back. “Are you serious?”

  “You’re worth it.” His voice, deep and sexy, sent tingles down her arms, and her heart nearly jumped out of her ches
t.

  She leaned down and kissed him on the lips. “Thank you, Billy.”

  He stood and nuzzled into her neck to kiss her there. And then he kissed her lips, not a little peck like she’d given him, but a full-blown, I-want-your-body kind of kiss that left her panties damp and her heart pounding. She wanted the same thing he did, but if things didn’t go well between them, she could find herself looking for another job and another place to live before she got her inheritance.

  Stepping back, she said, “Goodnight,” and walked away. Her hands shook, her whole body trembled, and she knew she’d have a hard time keeping her distance after that kiss.

  Did she really want to keep her distance?

  Billy couldn’t stop grinning. He’d not only found the mother lode in the safe, Kayla kissed him. Her lips, soft and full, tasted so sweet, he wanted to taste the rest of her. If only she hadn’t backed away.

  He walked out front and locked the little gate. He should give Kayla a key to the house and the gate code. Eleanor’s key should be around here somewhere.

  After locking the house, he headed upstairs to look through Eleanor’s bedroom suite. All the suites had bedrooms and sitting rooms, walk-in closets, and private bathrooms. There were five suites on this floor, including the master. Why would a couple with one kid need a house this big?

  The bed looked funny without a mattress, and it felt strange to be in this room, the room his grandmother slept in while he and his family slept in a dingy apartment with walls so thin he heard the neighbors fighting. She lived in luxury while Dad struggled to take care of his family and pay Maggie’s hospital bill Eleanor had promised to pay. It wasn’t the money so much, though. It hurt to know she didn’t care that they had to move to a bad neighborhood, that he was being attacked at school, that his second-hand bicycle had been stolen, that Pop had to lug groceries up a flight of cement steps when his arthritis was bothering him. And that Dad buried himself in work so he wouldn’t have to think about their situation.

  If Billy hadn’t been born, Eleanor would still have blamed Dad for killing Maggie. If anyone was to blame, it was Maggie herself. She should have seen a doctor when she found the first lump. If she had, she might have lost her breast, but not her life.

  Shaking off his thoughts, Billy searched Eleanor’s sitting room and bedroom and closet. He found several purses in the cabinet in the closet, all empty. Several pairs of black shoes were lined up on the shelves, and every item of clothing in the closet was black. “Well, at least she didn’t have to worry about coordinating colors,” he muttered to himself.

  He found a purse in the bottom drawer of Eleanor’s armoire. Inside were her wallet and keys. The wallet held two hundred and eighty-three dollars. Kayla could have that. There were two credit cards, and her drivers license had expired over a year ago. He took the keys and put the rest back in the drawer.

  A cold breeze touched his skin, and he knew at least one of the ghosts was present. His skin crawled. “I was just looking for your keys, Eleanor. Someone has to start your car so the battery doesn’t run down, and Kayla needs a house key.”

  The cold moved away, but his skin still prickled with goose bumps. Why didn’t the woman go to hell and get it over with? Why didn’t they both go?

  Down the hallway, he heard the sound of a woman crying. It had to be Maggie. He should feel sorry for her, for the pain and suffering she endured before she died, and for the agony she still felt over having her body destroyed by cancer. But he couldn’t. She’d treated him like pond scum even before she got sick. All he ever wanted was a kind word and a gentle touch from the mother who was supposed to love him, but she never gave it to him.

  “Shut up, Maggie,” he yelled down the hall. “Just shut the hell up.”

  The crying stopped, leaving a silence so thick he could almost taste it. Then he realized what he’d done. He’d shouted the same words back at Maggie that she’d yelled at him when he was a little boy. She couldn’t stand to hear him cry then, and he couldn’t stand to listen to her cry now.

  <>

  The reporters were gone the next day, so after school, Billy drove to the address on the deed in the safe. He pulled into a short driveway and walked to the middle of a huge river-front parcel on a bluff overlooking the river. It was the only undeveloped piece of property along this road, and it belonged to him. “Beautiful piece of property. Thank you, William.”

  He pulled out his cell phone and called Thornton Clapp, the attorney. “Mr. Clapp, I found a deed in my grandfather’s safe for a piece of property on River Road. It’s in my name. I don’t have the parcel number with me, but I was wondering whether the property taxes have been paid on it.”

  “Yes, I’ve been paying them out of an account Mr. Goodman set up for that purpose. I’ve also been paying the taxes and insurance for the house on Mansion Drive. He felt sure Eleanor wouldn’t pay them.”

  “I also found an insurance policy. Is it still good?”

  “That depends on the terms of the policy. Would you like me to check on it?”

  “Yes, thank you. I’ll bring the policy by your office tomorrow. I haven’t found a copy of his death certificate.”

  “There should be one here in my office. As you know, my partner was William’s attorney at the time of William’s death. He has since retired.”

  “Yes, I’m aware of that.”

  “Billy, do you intend to contest Eleanor’s will?”

  “No, I don’t want anything from Eleanor Goodman.” The only thing he wanted was for her and Maggie to get out of his house and out of his life.

  He drove to Mansion Drive and found Kayla buffing the floor in the room with the piano. She didn’t just clean, she made this place shine. He backed out of the room and put his briefcase on the desk in the study. Walking into the kitchen, he smelled something cooking. He opened the oven and got a whiff of pot roast.

  The hum of the floor buffer stopped, and Kayla came into the kitchen. “Oh, I didn’t know you were home, Billy.” She opened the oven and checked the roast.

  “Smells good. Is there any of that cherry stuff left? I didn’t have time for lunch today.”

  She took a dish out of the refrigerator and put it in the microwave. Seconds later, she handed it to him with a fork. “Billy, the piano needs to be tuned. Does anyone in your family play?”

  “My sister takes lessons.”

  “Granny taught me. She used to play the organ in church every Sunday, and she taught piano and organ lessons there after school. We didn’t have a piano at home.”

  “I never learned the piano, but Hannah bought me a guitar when I was twelve.”

  She cocked her head. “Do you play country?”

  “I don’t play anything well. Andy plays a whole lot better than me. He plays in a band off and on. They’re not very good, but they have fun together.”

  “What about Charlie?”

  “Charlie plays sports, and he plays the girls.”

  Charlie, with his black hair and gray eyes, was a real charmer. Andy was the only one in the immediate family with brown hair. He was intelligent, thoughtful, and better looking than Charlie, but he didn’t date a lot. He said he was waiting for the right girl.

  “I thought I heard crying last night.”

  “I heard it too. I told her to shut up.”

  “Oh, Billy. She probably doesn’t know she’s dead.”

  “Then tell her. And while you’re at it, tell them both to move on. I don’t want them in my house.”

  He walked away, leaving Kayla with a heavy heart. When she cleaned upstairs tomorrow, she’d see if the ghosts would talk to her. Why had Maggie stayed on earth this long? Did it have something to do with Billy?

  She put the floor buffer back in the closet. The floor she’d polished looked a whole lot better. The only rooms left to clean on this floor were the living and dining rooms and that glass room with the broken ceiling. She didn’t know what Billy intended to do with that thing, but she was half afraid to go
inside that room with the ceiling glass broken.

  Andy showed up a few minutes later. He unrolled some papers and spread them on the kitchen counter. He’d sketched the front of the house with black iron window boxes and a carport-like cover like you see at nice hotels. The new red double entry doors were surrounded with etched glass panels. It looked like a different house.

  Kayla looked up at Billy. “I love the way this changes the look of the house. That old door alone is enough to scare folks away.”

  Billy put his hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Andy, you’re going to make one hell of an architect one of these days.”

  Andy’s whole face smiled.

  Kayla missed having brothers and sisters. With Granny gone and Mama out in California, she didn’t have anyone but Norma and a few other close friends. And Leonard. As if she’d ever really had him.

  She thought marriage would settle him, but he didn’t change at all. He took no responsibility for anyone, not even himself or his dog. She was the responsible one, and she didn’t want to play mother to a thirty-five-year-old man who played at being a singing star.

  It wasn’t until after she was married that she realized she didn’t love him. Granny had just passed, and she was so lonesome. It was a mistake she wasn’t likely to make again. Since she couldn’t have kids, she couldn’t think of a single reason to marry again.

  Once upon a time, she’d dreamed of a happy marriage and children of her own, but Blake ruined that dream. And Leonard rubbed it in her face.

  She was damaged goods. What man would want her?

  Chapter Five

  Kayla was up at dawn the next morning. While Billy slept, she put weed killer and fertilizer on the lawn and then turned on the sprinkler system to water it in while she went inside to fix breakfast.

  She had the French toast and bacon almost done by the time Billy made an appearance. Freshly showered and shaved, he looked more like a college student than a teacher. He was younger than her by five years, not that age mattered that much. Mama’s latest boyfriend was eight years younger, and Norma had dated a guy fifteen years older for several years.