Inn at Last Chance

by Hope Ramsay

  Between them, Sabina and Jenny managed to fill up the back of the van Sabina used for her business.

  At night, they stayed at other inns and B and Bs, which allowed Jenny to check out the competition and talk shop with other innkeepers. She learned a lot, and she was looking forward to the day, only two weeks away, when she would be officially open for business.

  While she was away, she checked back with Sheriff Rhodes on a regular basis, but he didn’t seem to be making much headway in solving the mystery of the trashed kitchen. And the farther away she got from that night in time and distance, the less worried she became. The prank, which is how she’d come to view it, had been organized by some of Dennis Hayden’s hacks. It had been intended to stir up the church ladies, and it had succeeded.

  According to emails from the Library Committee, Lillian Bray’s protest of the event had sparked a great deal of statewide publicity, which translated into brisk ticket sales. The event was sold out. But the organizers worried that attendees might have to cross a picket line of mobilized Christians in order to come.

  Poor Gabe. He’d come to Last Chance looking for solitude and quiet, and the library had handed him something else altogether. Which, although it was ironic, still seemed like a bad bargain. It couldn’t be easy to become the eye of a storm like that.

  She also exchanged a few texts with Gabe, who assured her that he was fully capable of making sure that the locksmith did a good job of installing dead bolts on all the exterior doors at The Jonquil House. He also informed her that the much-delayed furniture for the Daisy Room had arrived and been installed.

  Their communiqués had been terse, which didn’t surprise her either. Now that she’d been away for a while, she was starting to wonder if the idea of seducing him had been a by-product of the fear she’d experienced the night her kitchen had been vandalized. Maybe this time away was a good thing after all.

  She had a new wardrobe, a new pair of glasses, a new hairdo, and a new attitude. She was going to be strong and independent. If, upon her return, she still had feelings for Gabe, then she would make a play for him, provided, of course, that he and Barbara Ianelli weren’t shacked up together in the Iris Room.

  On Friday afternoon, she picked up her Fiesta where she’d left it at the Cut ’n Curl, loaded it with shopping bags and boxes of china, and headed out of town toward Bluff Road and home.

  Home. She hadn’t felt this way about any place since the old farmhouse burned. The Jonquil House might be haunted and have a troubled past, but to her heart it had become home. She wasn’t going to let anyone—living or dead—drive her away.

  Her spirits were high when she turned up the driveway. It was an unseasonably warm day in February, and the landscape offered the hope of an early spring. Tiny buds on the wild dogwoods had swelled, promising blossoms. And everywhere in the woods on either side of the house, jonquils peeked above the leaf litter and pine needles, giving the forest floor a haze of green. It was Valentine’s Day—a long time until the first day of spring. But here in South Carolina, the jonquils would bloom in early March, a couple of weeks away.

  She was grinning like a fool when she marched up the porch steps, keys in hand. But one look at the two locks on her front door reminded her that, while she owned The Jonquil House, she didn’t have a set of keys to the place.

  She pressed the doorbell. Bear started barking, and her heart took flight.

  The door opened a moment later, and Bear rushed out and jumped up on her, lavishing kisses on her face. “Did you miss me, Bear-y boy?” she said on a laugh that sprang from deep inside. It had been a long, long time since she’d been welcomed home with such love.

  “Down!” Gabe said, and the dog obeyed. But Jenny could tell that Bear still wanted to get up and do a Snoopy dance.

  Jenny looked up at the man in the doorway, and she lost the ability to breathe. He wore his old blue jeans and tattered Harvard sweatshirt, his face rough with stubble, his eyes sparked with something that made Jenny’s heart run away with her.

  She struggled to appear calm and not to fall right into him and cover his grim face with kisses. If she behaved that way, she ran the risk of him saying something like, “Down girl.” And that would be humiliating. Of course, she didn’t have to obey him. She was, after all, a chicken-hurling hussy. She could do what she wanted.

  His stare stopped her, though. No doubt he was surprised by the shorter, lighter hair, the new glasses, the sweater set, and the stretchy jeans that hugged her butt. But, oddly, his gaze seemed locked on her eyes and nothing else.

  “There you are,” he said in a low voice. “You’re back.” His brows lowered into a scowl. “You told me it was just for a weekend, and you left for a whole week.” He sounded peeved. If she didn’t know him better, she might have been intimidated by his words. She might have mistaken them for a complaint about her abilities as an innkeeper. But she didn’t read them that way.

  He had missed her.

  His words brought a smile to her lips despite her efforts to play it cool.

  His gaze slid down to take in her new clothes. “Maybe this isn’t Jenny Carpenter,” he said. “Maybe this is some changeling she sent back to me.”

  “I let Sabina pick out a new wardrobe fit for an innkeeper. And I went antiquing and bought a bunch of things that you’ll probably hate. I have a couple of boxes in the car.”

  That brought a smile to his lips. His gaze moved to her Fiesta, with its still-open hatch. “Let me help you bring in your treasures.”

  He brushed past her, and her skin prickled from head to toe. His limp was entirely gone.

  “You’ve been to the doctor,” she said inanely.

  “I have,” he answered.

  A moment later, they stood in the kitchen, where she noted that the bloodstain on the grout had been scrubbed clean. He put a box of dishes on the counter.

  “Thank you, for your kindness,” she said in a voice that was barely a whisper. “I’m strangely glad to get back again… to you.”

  Time hung suspended as their gazes met and held. She wanted to wrap him in her arms but she didn’t know how to start. Maybe he would make the first move and carry her off to his bedroom. And maybe she was an idiot.

  “Is Ms. Ianelli still here?” she asked. It was lame. She didn’t care about his editor. She didn’t care if he loved her or lusted after her or whatever. She was liberated.

  Not.

  His mouth twitched. “I sent her back to New York. We argued about the book. She’s not happy with it, and it may be that I’ve lost my publisher for good. I’m not worried, though.”

  And yet the skin around his eyes looked bruised and his brow was wrinkled and he appeared in every respect to look like a man who was worried. Or maybe “haunted” was a better word for it.

  “Are you still blocked?”

  He shook his head. “No. Can I tell you something?”

  “Of course.”

  “The ghost is helping me write this book. And I think it’s better than my others. But Barbara says it’s not. I think I may be losing my mind.”

  She lifted her hand to his cheek. It was warm. “No. But I think maybe living with a ghost has been hard on you. And now I feel guilty because I left you.”

  For an instant Gabe leaned into her touch. Then he stepped away from her. “I hate to say this, Jenny, but I think it might have been better if you hadn’t come back. I don’t think it’s safe for you to be living here.”

  Was he talking about the kitchen vandal or the literary ghost? It didn’t matter. She pasted a smile on her face. “I’m not afraid,” she said. “And it looks as if you need a good, warm meal. Please, let me cook for you. We can have a nice homecoming meal on the new china and the repaired table.”

  “You should go, Jenny.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” It was now or never. If the man wouldn’t let her seduce him with her cooking, then she was going to have to use her body. Since she was not exactly sexually liberated or experienced,
this was going to be a real challenge.

  But she was ready.

  And it sure did look like Gabe needed a distraction.

  So she did exactly what Barbara Ianelli had done a week ago. She wrapped her arms around his neck, rose up on tiptoes, and kissed his mouth.

  For an instant, she thought Gabe would succumb to her kiss. His arms briefly came around her middle, and their tongues touched for a fraction of a second. An insatiable hunger burned up her middle, but in the next minute he retreated.

  He set her back on her heels and took three steps in the opposite direction.

  “No.” His voice was rusty.

  “But—”

  “No. Jenny, no. You’re a beautiful, warm, lovely woman. But no.”

  He turned, stalked to his room, and slammed the door behind him. The sad little “Do Not Disturb” sticky note let go of his door and fluttered to the ground like a falling leaf.

  She’d ignored that note many times before, but she wasn’t going to ignore it this time. He’d made his preferences clear and, really, it was better this way. At least he hadn’t led her on. They’d had one crazy moment, but that was all it was ever going to be.

  She stood there breathing hard and telling herself that she was better without this experience. But her throat closed up, and tears threatened anyway.

  She refused to cry. There was no reason to cry. She’d spent many a Valentine’s Day alone. This one would be no different.

  Gabe didn’t sleep much that night, knowing that Jenny was upstairs in the Rose Room. At least Bear was with her. The dog had defected, which came as no surprise. If he were Bear and had the choice of sleeping down here with him in Luke’s frigid bedroom or upstairs with Jenny, he’d do the same thing.

  That thought raised a bark of laughter, because he did have that choice. If he went upstairs and knocked on her door, she’d willingly let him in. Her new clothes and her kiss had told him as much.

  God knew he wanted to go there. But he wasn’t going to be that selfish.

  Tomorrow was the library fund-raiser, and once he’d fulfilled his obligation he was going to leave town and never come back. He understood why Zeph had warned him about staying. It was hard to be haunted.

  He sat in the folding chair staring at his computer screen. His novel was almost finished. He just needed to write the ending. If he stayed here, the ghost would make him write something that would wrench his soul. If he left, he could avoid that and maybe salvage his relationship with his publisher.

  He knew how hauntings worked in ghost stories. You got out before it was too late.

  And he was perilously close to being trapped.

  He was falling in love, which was more frightening and dangerous than being haunted. The first, last, and only time he’d fallen in love, he’d ignored every misgiving. He’d thrown himself into it with his whole being. And he’d paid a gigantic price.

  Love was blind.

  Not that he thought Jenny lacked for anything. She actually seemed perfect in every way. But how could he be sure?

  And if she was, indeed, the sweet, wonderful, kind woman that she appeared to be, then loving her would be the most selfish thing Gabe could do. He couldn’t subject Jenny to his life. It would be unfair. It would be dangerous.

  He hadn’t even told her the truth about his diabetes—or the truth about anything else that was important, for that matter.

  No, it was better to run away. Running was a good option sometimes. So he’d hit the road and go to Columbia or someplace where they didn’t know his name, where they didn’t expect anything from him. Someplace where he could hide out and finish this story the way he wanted to, without the damn ghost constantly kibitzing, and without his libido being tweaked by his pretty innkeeper.

  The ghost could go back to haunting Zeph. Or maybe Jenny could figure out a way to send the ghost packing, or turn him into a tourist attraction. He wasn’t a scary ghost, in any case. He was just an emotionally exhausting one.

  And Jenny could be the free, independent innkeeper she wanted to be.

  So, he’d go. The ghost would deal. Jenny would deal. And everything in the sleepy town of Last Chance would return to normal.

  CHAPTER

  19

  Gabe’s determination to leave Allenberg County was reinforced the minute he turned his Lexus onto Palmetto Avenue and caught sight of the mayhem the library fund-raiser had created.

  Last Chance didn’t look anything like a sleepy southern town. There had to be half a dozen county deputies directing foot and vehicular traffic in front of The Kismet. On one side of the street, people were queuing up by the theater’s doors. These people, by and large, were not locals, unless Allenberg County had a colony of Goths living nearby. The people in line were wearing black, with lots of tats and body piercings. A few of them had dressed up like his characters and victims. All in all, they looked like they’d come out for a Halloween party.

  No doubt the Library Committee had underestimated the reach of Facebook and Twitter. And so had he. If he had known what would happen, he never would have agreed to this presentation. He’d expected a small local event. Not this. He’d come here to the middle of nowhere to avoid this.

  And now, unfortunately, his throngs of followers would realize that the locale in Black Water was based on Last Chance. And that probably meant Last Chance would be dealing with these crazies for some time to come.

  Obviously this wasn’t going to endear him to the locals, some of whom had gathered on the other side of the street in front of the Knit & Stitch and the Wash-O-Rama. This group consisted of mostly blue-haired ladies who were marching back and forth carrying signs that pretty much called his Christian values into question. Which, actually, was fair game because Gabe didn’t have any values that were strictly Christian. He’d given up going to church when he’d moved out of his grandfather’s house. He’d had his fill of Granddad’s hypocrisy.

  Sheriff Rhodes was in the middle of the street, directing his deputies who were directing traffic. And good thing, too, because the sheriff was able to spot Gabe’s car before he ended up in the middle of this fracas. Sheriff Rhodes waved him forward to an area in front of the theater that had been roped off.

  Gabe lowered his window to speak with Stone. “I’m really sorry about this.”

  Stone shrugged. “Not your fault. I’ve saved you a parking spot. And I’ll escort you into the building.”

  “You know the fans may look weird, but they are mostly harmless.”

  Stone gave him a solemn look. “Are they? We’ve had about a dozen complaints from Garnet Willoughby down at the Peach Blossom Motor Court. Apparently every room is sold out, and your fans are a rowdy bunch. Of course Lillian Bray is beside herself. It’s bad enough that she spies on people who go to the Peach Blossom for sex, but having it overrun by a bunch of Goths has put her into a self-righteous hissy fit.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Yeah, well, I don’t blame you. To be honest, Gabe, I pity you. And don’t worry. I’ve got my eye on every single one of those people staying at the motel. I don’t let people get hurt in my town, especially people who’ve lived here all their lives, like Jenny Carpenter.”

  Gabe decided that Stone Rhodes might be a perfect model for one of his traditional heroes. It was funny how a small-town cop took Gabe’s security way more seriously than the cops in the big cities. “Thank you.”

  “It’s my job.”

  Gabe pulled his car to the curb. When he stepped out of it, the ladies across the street started chanting something nasty about him worshiping the devil. The people in line clapped and cheered.

  Stone took him by the arm, hurried him inside, and left him in the lobby without so much as a word. Gabe stood there for a moment bowled over by memories. He and Luke had come to this theater every summer. They had bought candy at that counter. His mouth almost watered at the thought of the Milk Duds he’d consumed as a boy.

  It had been decades since he’d allowed himsel
f the luxury of eating a whole box of Milk Duds.

  Just then a wave of frigid air enveloped him and chilled him from the inside out. He knew this feeling well. The ghost was right behind him.

  Damn. Weren’t ghosts supposed to be attached to the places they haunted? How was he going to ditch the ghost if the ghost planned to follow him? The thought made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

  Nita Wills, the town librarian, came through the double doors that led to the auditorium. “Oh, thank goodness you made it all right. We were worried. Jenny has been trying to get you on the phone for half an hour. She was going to run back to the house, drive you here, and smuggle you in by the side door.”

  He reached into the pocket of his dress slacks and pulled out his smartphone. It was set on mute. He didn’t remember muting it, but this wouldn’t be the first time something odd had happened with his phone. The ghost loved to play with his electronics, and Gabe had the feeling that Luke was a little jealous he hadn’t lived long enough to truly enjoy the information age.

  He slipped the phone back in his pocket and looked up at the librarian. “Sorry. I guess it was on mute. Sheriff Rhodes walked me in.”

  “I’m glad you’re okay. And I’m sorry this has turned into a circus.”

  “I should have warned you that it might. People seem to either love me or hate me.”

  “Come on back. We’ve got a place for you at the reserved table, and there are some folks who would like to say hey.” She took him by the arm and guided him through the doors into the theater.

  The Kismet wasn’t exactly the same theater as the one he remembered. The traditional auditorium chairs had been removed. The sloping floor had been terraced, and dining tables had been set up on each level. The tables were set with white cloths and standard restaurant silverware. On each table was a floral display of daffodils. Apparently the organizers were hoping he would celebrate the restoration of The Jonquil House, which, of course, had been the setting for Black Water as much as the town and the swamp had been.