The Haunting of Brynn Wilder: A Novel
Page 1
PRAISE FOR DAUGHTERS OF THE LAKE
“Simultaneously melancholy and sweet at its core.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Well-delineated characters and a suspenseful plot make this a winner.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Daughters of the Lake has everything you could want in a spellbinding read: unexpected family secrets, ghosts, tragic love stories, intertwined fates.”
—Refinery29
“Perfect for anyone who loves a good ghost story that bleeds into the present day.”
—Health
“Daughters of the Lake is gothic to its core, a story of ghostly revenge, of wronged parties setting history right.”
—Star Tribune
“Daughters of the Lake provides an immersive reading experience to those who love ghostly mysteries, time travel, and lovely descriptions.”
—New York Journal of Books
“Daughters of the Lake is an alchemical blend of romance, intrigue, ancestry, and the supernatural.”
—Bookreporter
“Eerie, atmospheric, and mesmerizing.”
—Novelgossip
“Haunting and heartbreaking . . . A masterful work of suspense . . .”
—Midwest Book Review
“In Wendy Webb’s entrancing Daughters of the Lake, dreams open a door between the dead and the living, a lake spirit calls to a family of gifted women, and a century-old murder is solved under the cover of fog. This northern gothic gem is everything that is delicious, spooky, and impossible to put down.”
—Emily Carpenter, author of Burying the Honeysuckle Girls, The Weight of Lies, and Every Single Secret
“The tentacles of the past reach out to threaten Kate Granger in this atmospheric tale, set on the shores of Lake Superior. Filled with all the intrigue of old houses and their long-buried secrets, this gothic tale will make you shiver.”
—Elizabeth Hall, bestselling author of Miramont’s Ghost
“Wendy Webb’s deftly woven tale hits all the right notes. A lost legacy of lake spirits, restless ghostly figures, and a past shrouded in fog and regret blend in delicious harmony in Daughters of the Lake. The queen of northern gothic does it again with this quintessential ghost story [that’s] every bit as compelling and evocative as her fans have come to expect.”
—Eliza Maxwell, bestselling author of The Unremembered Girl
OTHER BOOKS BY WENDY WEBB
Daughters of the Lake
The End of Temperance Dare
The Vanishing
The Fate of Mercy Alban
The Tale of Halcyon Crane
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2020 by Wendy Webb
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Lake Union Publishing, Seattle
www.apub.com
Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Lake Union Publishing are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.
ISBN-13: 9781542020121
ISBN-10: 1542020123
Cover design by Damon Freeman
For the Illustrated Man,
who brought laughter back into my life.
CONTENTS
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
THE HAUNTING OF BRYNN WILDER DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
PROLOGUE
Everyone is haunted by something. A road not taken. A hurt, carried deep inside. Harsh words that echo long after the sting of them is carried away on the wind.
Some of us are haunted more literally. We’ve seen and felt and heard what simply cannot be, but is. A low moan coming from the corner of a darkened room. A glimpse of an ethereal shape. A tangible encounter with . . . something. A passer-through.
My haunting is like that—strange, magical, unexplainable—but at the same time, it’s real enough to touch and feel and wrap my whole self around. Real enough to inhabit my dreams and sit like a stone on my heart as I carry it with me day after day.
Memories of other parts of my life over the years—love, loss, the mundane minutiae of living—might be hazy around the edges, dreamlike, as I look back on them now. But when I think of him, the one who haunts me still, the images are crystal clear. Even after all these years, I can taste him on my lips. Hear his voice, low and deep, in my ear. I love him with every cell in my body, even now.
As I sit alone with my thoughts in this empty house, in the dark, a fire crackling in the fireplace and snow falling outside, it all comes back to me. And I’ll let it come. God help me, I will let it come.
CHAPTER ONE
Driving north from my home in Minneapolis, I was trying not to look into the rearview mirror at what I was leaving behind. Focus on what you’re heading toward, I told myself. I was driving to Wharton, a tourist town on the shores of Lake Superior. It would be my home for the summer while I pushed the reset button on my life. Had I known what I was driving into, would I have turned around? I ask myself this question often.
But all I knew then was that my next three months would be about kayaking around a glorious chain of islands and letting the big water deliver the kind of peace that only it can give me. The native peoples in this area thought of this lake as a deity, and as far as I was concerned, they weren’t wrong about that. Lake Superior had a way of dropping my blood pressure as I listened to the waves lap, lap, lapping at the rocky shoreline. I needed that, after the three nightmarish years I had just been through. A shudder ran through me, but I pushed those thoughts out of my mind and took in what was coming into view as I rounded the corner and began to descend into town.
In Wharton, there was nothing other than the discreet Wi-Fi signs in most establishments to betray the fact that the town had, indeed, entered the modern age. Instead, you’d find block after block of Victorian homes with widow’s walks and balconies overlooking the most temperamental of the Great Lakes, whose mood could change from calm to deadly in an instant. No department stores or chain hotels, no fast
food, no buildings more than three stories tall, no bustling nightlife. Only mom-and-pop markets, locally owned restaurants, small banks, stores with local artisans’ work on display, apparel shops, and pharmacies. That was Wharton. It was like going back in time, but with all the modern conveniences. People flocked there, especially during the summer and fall, just to get a taste of what it felt like to time travel.
I was here at the urging of my friend Kate, whose family was from Wharton going back generations. Their home was now one of the town’s most magnificent inns, Harrison’s House, a stunning Victorian masterpiece on the hill overlooking the water.
I’d be spending time with her during my visit, but I would not be staying at the inn that she, her cousin Simon, and his husband, Jonathan, ran. Even with the discount they were prepared to give me, it was out of my financial reach to take up residence in that grand home for the summer. And I didn’t want to take away the revenue they could get during high tourist season, which was just about to begin. So, they found me a place at LuAnn’s, a century-old restaurant that had been a boardinghouse back in the day, with upstairs rooms rented by the week, the month, or the summer at prices that seemed to be taken from a simpler time.
This was what was rolling through my mind as I drove down the hill, watching the town, and the lake, laid out before me. Sailboats, their spinnakers unfurled, decorated the water, and ferries chugged in and out of the harbor on their way to the islands that dotted this area of the lake. One, Ile de Colette, was inhabited; the rest were wild. Boats were docked at the slip, and I saw people working on them, readying for the coming season. It was the week before Memorial Day, so tourists had not yet descended en masse, but a few people were strolling around the streets and wandering into the shops and restaurants, which were all open for business. I drove by Harrison’s House and told myself to call Kate when I got settled, then made my way to LuAnn’s, where I’d be living for the summer.
It was a three-story building with deep-red wooden siding and four-paned windows that looked as old as time. A neon sign proclaiming the establishment “Open” hung above the front door. I pulled into the parking lot.
A woman I assumed was LuAnn herself came outside to welcome me, leopard-print leggings, oversize glasses, bling around her neck and all. I put her at about seventy-five years old, maybe older?
“You must be Brynn,” she said, squinting at me as I got out of the car.
“I am. You’re LuAnn?”
She smiled a broad smile. “The one and only. Welcome, honey.” She threaded an arm around mine. “Let me show you around. We can deal with your bags later.”
We walked through the door, and I saw a restaurant that could have been plucked out of the 1950s. It was an odd disconnect. The building itself had a much older feel to it, as though the century-ago happenings inside of it still hung in the air, just out of reach. And yet I was standing in what looked like an old-fashioned diner.
Several round red-pleather barstools bellied up to a long linoleum-topped bar that was backed by what clearly had once been a soda fountain, now converted to dispense beer. A jukebox stood in one corner. Tables with a mishmash of chairs around them were scattered in two oak-paneled rooms. The tables themselves were a mix of styles, too—wooden, linoleum, tile topped, round, square, whatever.
Framed news clippings with historic headlines about D-Day, the moon walk, the Kennedy assassination, Watergate, Barack Obama’s election, and other life-altering events in this country lined the walls, reflecting a time line of American life over the course of a century. I looked closer at one of them, a photo of a handsome young man standing at the front door of LuAnn’s.
“Is that John F. Kennedy Junior?” I asked her.
“Adorable kid,” she said, shaking her head. “He came here with a group of friends to kayak around the islands. Damn shame what happened.”
I nodded in agreement. It was a damn shame.
“This place was built in the 1800s, originally as a boardinghouse.” She gestured around the room. “Been remodeled a few times since then, obviously. We’re open all day. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. You get one meal a day with your stay, and you get half off if you choose to eat your other meals here, too. Alcohol is extra, but you can just run a tab and pay for it at the end of the month with your rent.”
I nodded, looking around.
“Happy hour’s at three every day except weekends,” she said. “It’s a good way to get to know people in town, if that’s what you want. Everyone comes here.”
“Okay,” I said, taking it in.
She leaned over the front desk and fished an old-fashioned skeleton key off one of the hooks. “Let’s go upstairs,” she said. “I’ll show you your digs. You’ll like the room. It’s one of my favorites.”
I followed her through the dining room to a narrow door, which she opened, revealing a long and narrow staircase. We walked up the uneven stairs and entered a hallway with alcoves jutting out on either side. There weren’t many rooms, just a handful. Mine was at the end, on the corner, next to a door with a large window that opened out onto a shared deck.
As we made our way down the hall, I shivered, just a little.
LuAnn opened my door to reveal a spacious room with light-yellow walls and big double-hung windows on two sides, each with sheer white curtains billowing in the breeze. The age of this room radiated out into my bones. A century of souls inhabiting a place will leave an imprint that lingers long after they’re gone, and it lingered here. Not in a bad way. It felt well lived in.
A queen bed with a white down comforter and an antique wooden headboard sat on one wall. The dresser, complete with a curved mirror and a seat, looked to be from the same era. I caught a glimpse of myself in that mirror and wondered how many women, from how many time periods, had done the same. A rocking chair with a wide leather seat was perched near one of the windows, and a couple of comfy armchairs sat on either side of an end table that held an antique lamp with a rose-colored etched-glass shade.
A small fridge stood outside the bathroom next to a darling antique hutch, where a French press coffee maker was waiting for the morning along with two cups. A flat-screen TV hung on the wall, propelling the room into the present.
“Now, you’re not going to want to be eating all of your meals out,” LuAnn chattered on. “That gets spendy. There’s a grocery store just a block up the hill. What most residents do is stock up on things like yogurt, cheese, fruit. Feel free to grab dishes, silverware, glasses, whatever you need, from the kitchen, and just return them when you’re finished. You’ll see the tubs where we put the restaurant’s dirty dishes before they get loaded into the dishwasher. Gary or Aaron will take care of the washing up.”
“Good to know.”
I peeked into the bathroom. Just a toilet and a sink.
“Two showers and one bathtub are down here,” she said, leading me through the hallway and opening one door, then another to reveal two tiled single shower rooms. A third held a deep claw-foot tub.
“You’re sharing these with just one other summer lodger. There are six rooms total, and the suite—occupied all summer long by a couple—has a full bath, so they don’t use these showers or the tub. That leaves two rooms for renters, who come and go.”
I nodded.
“You’ll find people are pretty courteous,” LuAnn continued. “Nobody’s taking long showers. You get in, you get out. Shampoo, conditioner, and bodywash are in containers on the wall in each shower. Baths are another story. People like to soak, and so be it. I find the tub isn’t used too often, so if you like baths, bring a glass of wine and a good book, and don’t worry about a backlog.”
“Got it,” I said, knowing I’d do exactly that.
“We’ve got towels, too, but there’s no guarantee you’ll find one when you’ll need one, so Mickey’s down the block has everything you need—towels, comfy robes, flip-flops, puffs. If you want your own shampoo and bodywash and other bath accessories, you can find them there, too. Mo
st are locally made.”
We walked past another stairway going up to a third level of the house. “You can go up there if you like,” she said, waving an arm in an upward direction. “That’s our bunk room. Had been a ballroom back in the day. Sometimes the staff stays after closing time and has a few drinks. Sometimes more than a few. I’ve got five bunks up there for people to crash in, so they don’t drink and drive. Safety first, with no judgment from me.”
All of a sudden, something didn’t make sense. “Wait,” I said, doing the math. “You said I’m sharing the showers with one summer lodger and the other has an en suite bath. That’s three rooms. Two for renters, that’s five. I thought there were six?”
LuAnn’s face grew serious. “That’s right. I’ve got one of the rooms shut up for now.”
I was going to ask her why but didn’t get the chance. Someone called for her from the restaurant, and she excused herself to attend to whatever it was.
I figured this would be a good time to unpack, so I traipsed back out to the car, hauled my suitcases upstairs, and set about organizing my things.
With that handled . . . What next? I wondered. I sank into one of the armchairs and gazed out the window. It had been so long since I’d had nothing to do, nobody to care for, no errands to run, no calls to make, no one depending on me for anything, that I wasn’t sure what to do.
A vague sense of guilt pricked at my skin as I looked up and down the street. Was I forgetting something? Some important job that needed doing? My mind raced for a moment, but then I realized. No. It was truly over. I wished with all my soul it wasn’t, but it was.
I plucked a tissue from the box on the bedside table, dabbed at my eyes, and pushed myself out of the chair. I scooped up my purse, remembering to grab the old skeleton key that LuAnn had set on the dresser, and locked the door on my way out.
CHAPTER TWO
I didn’t get far. As I walked down the hallway, I noticed the door at the opposite end from my room was open. Inside, at a scrubbed wooden table facing the door, sat a handsome man who I assumed was in his late sixties. I caught his eye.