by Angie Fox
My gangster friend raised a brow. “So are we going to get out of the car?”
“Of course,” I said. After all, we were professionals. I even had business cards. I popped open the car door and wondered if the rest of the family remained on the property.
“You should be scared,” Frankie said as he materialized outside of the car. “This place is messed up.”
Tall oak trees cast long shadows over the driveway.
“Don’t worry. I’ll be…cautious.” Rock Fall mansion was a special case. I knew that.
I grabbed the gangster’s urn and slipped it inside my bag.
Frankie stretched his legs. “You ready for this?”
I plastered on a smile. “Let’s get ’em.”
Chapter 3
I knocked on the red-painted door and startled when it flew open and Lee Treadwell stuck his head out. “Come inside. Quickly,” he said, ushering me in the door, his gaze trained over my shoulder, out to the driveway beyond.
Lee hadn’t changed in the year since he’d retired from delivering mail. He wore his silver hair in a buzz cut and walked with rigid intent. He could have stood to gain twenty or so pounds. His post office uniform had always hung on him and now his blue chambray shirt and plain brown pants did the same.
“I came as soon as I could,” I said as he closed the door.
“Thank you for that. Have a seat,” he said, pointing me to a cozy plaid couch in the living room. Lee sat across from me in what appeared to be a favorite recliner. A TV Guide lay open on the table next to it, along with a pair of reading glasses. He’d circled his shows in blue ink, which I supposed some people did. Beyond the living room, I saw a well-kept kitchen and a set of stairs that most likely led to upstairs bedrooms.
“How’s your mother?” he asked, in the standard Sugarland conversation opener. He leaned forward on his elbows. “I used to deliver mail to your house back in the ’90s and she always had a tall glass of sweet tea for me if I wanted one.”
That sounded like Mom. “She and my stepdad are in love with each other and their RV. This week, she’s in New Orleans for the Oyster Festival.”
“Good for her,” he said, clearly pleased.
“She’s living her life as she’s always wanted,” I said. Even if it meant she’d left her home. I was happy for her, although I didn’t always understand her choices.
Parents. What could you do?
Lee ran a hand along the back of his neck. “I’ll bet you think it was strange to hear from me,” he said. “When I read we had a ghost hunter in town, well, I still didn’t think I’d ever ask you over here.” He dropped his hand. “Truth is, I should have called you sooner.”
Oh my. I leaned forward, matching his stance. “What’s the problem?”
He let out a small sigh. “The main house has always been haunted. Don’t try to be polite and act surprised, the whole town knows it.”
“I wasn’t about to,” I told him.
He nodded. “Just because I don’t share my business all over town doesn’t mean I’m not keenly aware. It gets worse every year as we approach the anniversary of JT’s death, or Jack, as he was known outside the family. He’s the one who brought the curse home.”
So Frankie hadn’t been exaggerating. “Tell me about it.”
He folded his hands in front of him. “I don’t really know what goes on in that house. No one does.”
“But you’ve lived here for years.” He had to have experienced something.
“Twenty-four years, to be exact.” He rubbed the pads of his thumbs together. “I moved to town after my dad died. Dad didn’t want anything to do with this place, but I’m the last Treadwell. It’s my family legacy,” he said with as much weariness as pride. “Honestly, I don’t know what to do with that house.” His mouth twisted in a rueful smile. “I’ve taken enough flack for being a mailman with one of the swankiest addresses in town—or at least it had been in the day.” He glanced out back, toward the mansion. “I’ve always seen things in the windows, but now, something else is happening.” He stood. “Come on. I’ll show you what I mean.”
He walked me into the small kitchen and held the back door open. Tiny goose bumps erupted along my arms as the chill of the approaching night settled over me.
“You’re not going to believe this,” he promised.
“Try me,” I said, glad to give him someone he could confide in.
We stepped onto the brick walk out back. Planter boxes lined the way, filled with colorful blooms. I touched my fingertips to a dusting of Goldilocks daisies thrusting out in shoots from a young crop of purple fountain grass.
“What have you seen out here?” I asked, on heightened alert should Jack’s ghost appear in the vegetable garden just ahead, or from the small grape arbor to our left.
“This is my space,” Lee said, his steps guarded as he led me out into the night. “The family spirits stick to their side.”
I could almost hear Frankie rolling his eyes. Most ghosts went wherever they pleased, evidenced by my gangster buddy gliding straight through a row of tomato stakes. I kept close to Lee, on a dirt path between the slim pea sprouts and leafy butter lettuce.
“This is lovely,” I told him, careful to avoid the delicate plants. I could tell he’d put a lot of care into his garden.
“I appreciate you saying so,” he said, glancing back at me. “Since I’ve retired, I’ve been working to reclaim some of the land, as much as I can handle. The disturbances happen just beyond the cultivated parts of the property.”
I stared out at the abandoned mansion on the other side of the hilltop.
A high-pitched wail echoed across the expanse, like a wounded animal. It shouldn’t have startled me, but it did.
It even gave Frankie pause. He listened carefully as the cry faded. “That’s more lonely soul than angry soul,” he said, as if trying to reassure himself.
“Lovely.” I took a step back when a loud crackling echoed from the mansion.
Frankie glanced at me. “I have no clue what that is.” He shoved his hands into his pockets in an attempt to hide his discomfort. Not much rattled the old gangster, and it scared me that this place gave him pause.
Stone popped and timber creaked, as if the house struggled against its foundation. “It’s been doing that more and more,” Lee muttered.
“We’ll figure it out,” I said, fighting to keep the fear out of my voice. I mean, at least the ghosts were active and perhaps attempting to communicate. “Maybe they’re disturbed by the changes you’re starting to make.”
“Then it’s only going to get worse,” Lee said. He ventured forward once more, with me at his side. “I have to fix this place up. I always said I would once I had the time—” his voice caught “—and let’s face it, I’m not getting any younger. It’s bad enough the line ends with me. If I die with a cursed legacy on my hands, nobody’s going to want to remember this estate, much less take care of it.”
I disagreed. Someone would probably buy the house, gut it, and turn it into a bed and breakfast. But he was right. His family heritage, as it stood, would be no more.
“You’ve made a good start,” I said, admiring the garden he’d recovered so far. Yet there was so much more to do. I couldn’t imagine how he’d handle it all.
Lee paused at the edge of the garden, with the gangster just a few steps ahead of him. “What does your ghost say?”
Frankie turned. “Tell this joker I ain’t your anything.”
“He’s eager to help,” I said, ignoring the way Frankie groaned.
We stepped out of the small, cultivated garden and came to a halt in front of a low wall of overgrown rosebushes. Brown, dry branches choked green leafy stems in a twisted struggle of life and death. A thorn caught my pink sundress and I took care in removing it. Due to my recent financial issues, I only owned three sundresses and wasn’t about to tear one.
“This way,” Lee said, leading us to a break cut into the thicket. I had to turn sideways
and suck in my breath to avoid the sharp, scraggly branches.
Frankie didn’t bother. He glided straight through a few feet away.
Show-off.
We emerged on the other side and found a formerly glorious ornamental garden decimated by time and neglect. The red brick path bent like a wave had erupted underneath. Grass sprouted between crumbled mortar, and brown bushes with sparse green leaves spilled from their beds, tickling my ankles and making it even harder to walk.
Up ahead, dead fruit trees staggered under the weight of predatory vines, while statues of cherubs frolicked in long-dry fountains, the black paint chipping from their pitted stone bodies.
“I’ll bet it was beautiful once,” I murmured.
“I’ll show you pictures sometime,” Lee said, leading me down a particularly dark path covered with an arched trellis that leaned at an alarming angle. The struggling plants blocked the waning sunlight and I reached into my purse for the flashlight I kept on my keychain. My light danced off the clustered vines. I smelled the wetness of yesterday’s rain and the stink of rotting vegetation. “Tonight, I heard a woman crying in the garden,” Lee said, his voice faint. The dank tunnel seemed to absorb the sound. “When I went to check, there was no one out here. But I did find this,” he said as we stepped outside.
The path dead-ended in a small courtyard with a bubbling fountain. A stone nymph stood naked in a large round pool, her generous figure twisted in a coy pose as she held aloft a jug of water.
If not for the shattered path surrounding it, the fountain appeared almost normal. “Pretty,” I said. At least it was still functional.
“It’s broken,” Lee said crisply, “or at least it was.” He’d stopped several feet away. “This fountain stood empty for years. I cleaned it out today and filled two trash bags with leaves and gunk. I took out the broken water pump. I came back with the rest of my tools and found it like this.”
We watched as water flowed down the statue into the pool below.
Only it didn’t flow from her pitcher, as one would expect. Instead, it trickled from her eyes, as if she were weeping.
“Frankie?” I prodded, glad that my voice worked.
The ghost hovered a small distance away. “That ain’t natural.”
I had to agree.
“Look inside,” Lee prodded, not making any move to lead us closer.
I exchanged a glance with Frankie. “All right.” This was my job.
Loose bricks shifted under my feet as I advanced on the fountain. With barely a shaking breath, I peered over the edge and into the watery pool.
Lord have mercy. Dozens of doll heads, broken from their bodies, stared up at me through the gently moving water in the basin. Their eyes opened wide, their cracked mouths smiled. My blood went cold. I took a quick step back and ran into Lee.
“Those weren’t here yesterday,” he said, too stiff to move.
Frankie reached down to touch one and his hand passed straight through. “Looks like it’s on the mortal plane.”
“Truly?” I asked, wondering how on earth they could have gotten there, not sure if I wanted to touch them. Goose bumps prickled up my arms. “It could be a prank,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest, trying to work up a plausible explanation. It was my job to look at this from every angle. “Someone could be trying to scare us.” If so, it was working.
The brick pathway shifted as Lee stepped away from the fountain. “There’s still no water pump.”
“Right.” No way this should be running.
“No power, either,” Lee added, not helping at all.
“This would be a good time to tune me in,” I said to my ghost friend. Frankie had to actively lend me his otherworldly energy in order for me to see any spirits in the area, not that I particularly wanted to meet the kind who left decapitated doll heads.
“I think it’s her,” Lee said, pointing past another acre of ruined garden, toward the house beyond. A lone figure stood in a second-floor window, watching us.
I shivered as I saw the outline of a young child wearing a gauzy white dress and pigtails. She was real. And strong. Frankie hadn’t begun to lend me his powers yet and I could still see the spirit, clear as day.
With no warning, she disappeared. One second she was there, the next…poof.
“Who was that?” I gasped.
Lee stood close to me. “I believe its Jack’s daughter, Charlotte. The day after Jack was found dead in his office, his only daughter fell from the cliff and died.”
“Poor thing,” I murmured.
“Told you this place was cursed,” Frankie said.
I had to admit that standing here, seeing this place, made me think it could be possible.
“Do you think these are her dolls?” I asked, returning my attention to the pool.
The heads were gone.
I jumped back from the fountain. “How?” This place was messed up.
Frankie hadn’t been able to touch the heads. I hadn’t tried.
“That’s it,” Frankie said, zipping toward Lee’s house. “I’m done.”
“Frankie,” I protested.
“Look, babe, I draw the line at creepy dolls,” he said, his voice trailing after him. And then he was gone.
I couldn’t believe he’d just left me there with a client, and quite possibly a cursed ghost.
I pasted on a smile and forced myself to stick by Lee’s side despite the hollow pit in my stomach and the strong urge to beat feet out of there. Yes, this estate had problems, but I’d been in a lot of uncomfortable places, and if I wanted to consider myself any kind of paranormal investigator, I couldn’t run at the first sign of supernatural activity.
So I took a deep breath, found my steely Southern-girl backbone, and asked him point blank, “Tell me, what are your goals for this job?”
“Talk with her,” he urged. “Work with her. Find out what she wants.”
I had to admit, I wasn’t eager to go knock on her door.
“She might be trying to make friends,” I suggested. I sincerely hoped that was the case. “The doll heads were creepy, the fountain too, but she’s not being destructive.” Although with the state of the house and the gardens, it could be hard to tell.
Lee stood his ground near the creepy fountain. “I also want you with me when I take a look inside the main house. Nobody’s been in there since they found the governess in 1946. My family used to be well off. When the governess was still alive, my father sent for a lot of the valuables from the house. He sold them off to collectors over the years. But I don’t know if he liquidated all of it. I keep thinking that there may be something that I can sell or loan or use to make things easier.” The sunset glowed red in the west. “I can get my lantern and we can get started right away if you’d like.”
No way. I wasn’t about to set foot in a pitch-black cursed mansion—not at night if I could help it, and there was no point in going without Frankie. He was the one who gave me the ability to communicate with spirits.
Speaking of which, I needed to find my ghost. No doubt I’d locate him in the front seat of my car, ready to go. “I’d love to help you. We’ll start first thing tomorrow.” After I convinced Frankie. Besides, there was no sense tempting fate. “I doubt there’s electricity in the house, so it will be a lot easier to work during the day.”
We didn’t want to get into trouble because we didn’t see it coming.
“I’ll leave it to your expertise,” Lee said. I clicked on my light as he led me down the broken path toward the house. “You do a lot of this ghost hunting?”
“You’re my first official client,” I admitted. He’d learn the truth easy enough if he asked around town.
We walked quickly, glancing over our shoulders. Now that we’d started our retreat, it took all I had not to break into a full run.
Lee stuck by my side, for which I was extremely grateful. “When you come back tomorrow, I’d appreciate it if you’d tell the ghosts I’m trying to help,” he suggested.
“I’ll do my best,” I promised. A chill swept through the tunnel and, as we broke out into the fading sunlight, an uneasy feeling settled over me. I sensed we were being watched.
I ventured a glance back at the darkened house. It stood silent, brooding. I could just make out a flat, iron-gated widow’s walk at the very top of the roof.
“This is going to sound crazy,” Lee said as we reached the break in the rosebushes, “but the air feels ten degrees cooler whenever I leave the cultivated portion of the property.” He waited impatiently for me to pass through first. “It’ll help when we get back to my side.”
“Ghosts can have a chilling effect,” I explained, hoping to reassure him. If anything, he seemed more accepting than I would be about living in a place like this.
I let out a sigh of relief as we stood once again in Lee’s beautiful garden. The air felt warmer and the space lighter. Darkness had nearly fallen, and I could see my ghost glowing among the waist-high tomato vines. Thank goodness.
“I’m glad you’re taking the job,” Lee said, more confident now that we were back in his home territory.
In an instant, Frankie materialized next to me. “I didn’t agree to that.”
“Frankie—” I’d been hoping to talk to him alone after Lee and I had gone over the specifics.
“I don’t have much,” Lee said, as if it were more difficult to talk about finances than it was to face what lurked on his estate. “But I can pay you if we find something valuable that I can sell.”
“If,” Frankie pressed. “If?” The gangster stepped between Lee and me. “We’re running a legitimate business here, which is bad enough. At the very least, we expect to be paid in gold.”
“Cut it out,” I told him. It was my business. He hadn’t even wanted to be a part of it when we were driving up here.
Lee shifted, as if he felt the chill of the gangster. “Does Frankie have an idea?”
The ghost turned to him. “Oh, I got plenty.”
“He’s looking for more specifics as far as payment,” I said, embarrassed that I had to bring it up this way.
Even through the haze of my ghostly buddy, I could see Lee flush. It had been hard enough for him to admit he didn’t have much. I knew how that felt. Frankie shot out a cold spot that chilled me to my core. Lee’s breath frosted the air in front of him. “I’ll pay you half of whatever I find.”
