The Haunted Valentine (A Lin Coffin Mystery Book 7)

by J A Whiting

  “I don’t know how you do it. I couldn’t handle doing landscaping no matter how trim it would make me.” Viv shook her head. “I can’t work in the heat. Give me the air-conditioned bookstore any day. I have no idea how Leonard works so hard, at his age, in the heat and humidity. It would kill me.”

  “Leonard’s only in his early sixties. He’s in better shape than both of us.” Lin chuckled. “And it’s a good thing he didn’t hear that comment of yours. He isn’t old.”

  Viv waved away Lin’s reprimand. “You know what I mean.”

  Lin’s phone beeped with a text. “Speak of the devil. It’s Leonard. He’s asking if I can pick him up in the morning.” She sent a return text and set the phone down. “You know, it’s kind of weird. Leonard has never once invited me into his house.”

  “Why is that weird?” Viv asked.

  “Well, isn’t it?” Lin made eye contact with her cousin. “Leonard’s been here in my house a million times, he’s eaten with us, he even slept on the sofa one night to protect me when we were involved in that other case. He’s been to your house a bunch of times, too, but he’s never once invited me into his house.”

  “Maybe the place is a mess. Maybe he doesn’t want you to see what a messy person he is.”

  “When I first met him, I would have thought that was the reason, but not now.” Lin moved her fork over her plate to pick up the last of the pie crumbs. “I should drive you past his house one day. It’s a small, antique Cape, perfectly tended. There’s a white picket fence around the front yard. It’s filled with flowers and flowering bushes, and I mean filled. It’s like something out of a magazine. It’s gorgeous. And you should see how neat and tidy the outside of the house is. We should use his place as a testimonial to his landscaping abilities. It’s that perfect.” Lin sipped her iced tea. “I’m sure the inside is done just as nicely.”

  Viv got an idea. “Ask him about the history of his house, then maybe he’ll ask you in to see it.”

  “I did that. He answered my questions and that was it.”

  Viv gave a chuckle. “Maybe he’s got a dead body hidden in there.”

  Nicky and Queenie sat side by side looking out to the deck through the kitchen’s screen door. The dog turned his head and barked at Viv.

  Viv’s comment caused a shiver to run over Lin’s skin and a serious expression to form on her face.

  Viv noticed Lin’s reaction. “I’m kidding, for Pete’s sake.” She looked over at Nicky and said to the dog, “You know Leonard. He doesn’t have a dead body in his house.” Viv narrowed her eyes and used a sinister-sounding voice to kid them. “Or does he?”

  Lin let out a groan. “I guess I’ll just have to keep wondering why Leonard won’t let me inside his house.”

  Viv stood up to load the dishwasher with the dirty plates and glasses. “It was nice to have the afternoon off with you, but I’d better go check on the bookstore and make sure everything’s okay.”

  Lin let the dog and cat outside and then went to cover the pie with plastic wrap. Movement at the living room window caught her eye and she craned her neck to see a man heading for her front landing. He walked briskly and was wearing a long-sleeved shirt and brown slacks. “There’s someone coming to the door.”

  “Is there? I’ll go see.” Viv walked through the living room and opened the door. She stepped out and then came right back in. “There’s no one here. Maybe the person walked past the house.”

  Lin shook her head. “No. He was on my walkway. He was definitely coming to this house.”

  “Well, there’s no one out there.” Viv came back to the kitchen and then stopped suddenly and stared at her cousin. “Are you cold?” Lin always felt cold whenever a ghost was around.

  “No, I’m not cold. I saw the man through the window.” Lin gestured.

  “Maybe he realized he had the wrong address,” Viv suggested.

  “And what? Evaporated? He couldn’t have gotten very far. He must have been on the street when you looked out.”

  Viv leveled her eyes at Lin. “I looked up and down the road. There wasn’t anyone nearby. Unless he stepped into the trees to hide.”

  Lin had a dumbfounded look on her face. “He looked like he was in his early twenties, he was medium height, thin. He had a beard. It was dark brown like his hair. He was dressed in slacks and a matching vest and a white shirt….” She stopped talking and her mouth hung open a little as she blinked. “Did I imagine him?”

  Was he out there or not?

  3

  The early morning sun peeked through the trees as Lin parked her truck at the end of Leonard’s driveway, let the dog out of the vehicle, and headed to the door to ring the bell. Before she could press the button, the tall, strong man came around from the back of the house carrying his lunch box in one hand and his tool case in the other. He set the tool box down to pat the dog as it danced around his legs. Nicky practically grinned as Leonard scratched behind the dog’s ears.

  “Mornin’, Coffin,” he said to Lin with a nod. “I’m all ready to go.”

  Wanting to see how Leonard responded to her request, Lin asked, “Can I use your bathroom?”

  “The house is a mess. I don’t let anyone in when it looks like that.” Leonard opened the truck’s passenger side door. “Go around back and pee in the woods.”

  Lin gave the man a frown. “Thanks, but no thanks. I’ll wait until we get to the work site.” Ideas about why Leonard wouldn’t let her inside his home swirled around in her mind, but none of them seemed to be plausible. She didn’t believe the reason he gave her that the house was too messy … the place couldn’t be that big of a mess. Climbing into the driver’s side, Lin eyed her business partner wondering what the real reason was for keeping her out of his home.

  When they arrived at the site of the new project, Lin’s boyfriend, Jeff, had already arrived and was removing some tools from the bed of this truck. He heard Lin pulling into the crushed shell driveway and gave her and Leonard a wide smile and a wave.

  “I just got here.” Jeff greeted them.

  Lin gave the handsome carpenter a hug and a kiss and Nicky rubbed his head against Jeff’s leg until the man gave the little dog some pats. In his mid-thirties, tall and fit with dark brown hair and brown eyes, Jeff had been an Air Force pilot for eight years before returning to the island of his birth to work as a self-employed carpenter.

  The three people and the dog headed to the backyard, a half-acre of weedy grass with shade trees standing along the rear of the property line. A long row of blooming blue hydrangeas grew to the left and right sides of the place. A similar antique Cape-style house stood on the lot to the right and a rambling old Colonial was on the left.

  “It’s a nice yard,” Jeff remarked. “It has lots of possibilities. My buddy is looking forward to the transformation.” Looking over to the beautiful flowering bushes, he asked, “Does Neil want to keep the hydrangeas?”

  “He does,” Lin told him with a nod.

  “Good. They’re too beautiful to get rid of and they’re sort of a Nantucket tradition.”

  “If Neil asked for us to pull them out,” Lin said with a grin, “Leonard and I would have tried to talk him out of it. We would have encouraged him to keep them.”

  “Most of the time, we can be pretty persuasive.” With Nicky trotting after him, Leonard headed over to the pile of tools they’d dropped off previously and took hold of one of the wheelbarrows.

  Lin described the landscaping plans to Jeff. “We’re putting in flower beds along these sides, a stone patio is going right off the kitchen door with a path to that part of the yard over there where we’ll build a stone base for the gazebo Neil has ordered. There will be an arbor on the other side,” Lin gestured, “that will lead to a secret garden with a water feature and several benches.”

  “Sounds great.” Jeff gave a nod of approval. He and Lin went into Neil’s house so that Jeff could show his girlfriend the work he was doing. After the tour, Lin went back outside, mar
ked out where one of the beds would go and got to work removing the lawn with a shovel. After an hour of working and swigging from a water bottle, Leonard came over to where Lin had cut the new bed.

  “Taking a break to supervise me?” Lin kidded the man as she wiped beads of sweat from her forehead.

  “Sometimes you need supervising,” Leonard joked. “Listen, Coffin, I just got a text from Mrs. Lucien. She’s having a fit over some of the flowers we put in her yard. She’s hosting some kind of an afternoon tea thing for her friends in a few hours and she wants us to replace the flowers.”

  Lin rolled her eyes. Mrs. Lucien was a perfectionist who demanded everything look tip-top, even when it already did. “What’s wrong with the flowers? I put them in two days ago.”

  “She changed her mind about the colors of the flowers,” Leonard went on to explain. “She thought the pink and white would look great with her tablecloths or whatever, but now she’s changed her mind. She’s in a panic. She wants them changed to add some blue in between.” Leonard shrugged. “The customer is always right.”

  “Want me to go?” Lin leaned on the handle of the shovel.

  “Nah, I’ll do it. My winning personality will calm her down.” Leonard downed the last of the water in his bottle. “I’ll go by the greenhouse and pick out some things to make her happy.” Lin and Leonard had begun renting some space from a big nursery on the island in order to have a wide supply and different assortment of flowers and bushes available when they needed them. “I’ll need to borrow your truck.”

  Lin fished the keys out of her back pocket and handed them to her partner.

  “I’ll be back as soon as I finish up with Mrs. Lucien.” Leonard headed for the truck.

  Lifting her arms over her head and moving from side to side to stretch her back, Lin looked across the yard to see her dog resting on the grass in the shade of some trees. Deciding she needed a break, she took her water and a bowl from her cooler bag and went to join Nicky under the tree where the air felt ten degrees cooler in the shade.

  She poured some water into the bowl for the dog and resting back against the tree trunk, Lin took a long swallow from the bottle thinking about Viv’s comment that there was no way she’d ever work outside in the heat. Sometimes, Lin thought her cousin had a good point.

  A rustling sound behind her caused Lin to swivel around on her butt. A man was working in the next yard pulling out some weeds from a flower bed that ran along the property line shared with Neil’s place.

  Lin called out a greeting and the man looked over at her.

  “Hello. I didn’t see you there.” The man was in his late-twenties, slim, with dark brown hair and a short beard. He stood up and brushed at the knees of his chinos.

  Lin walked over and introduced herself. “My partner and I are landscaping Neil’s yard.” Looking over to the antique gray-shingled Cape, she said, “Your house is lovely.”

  “Oh, it isn’t my house. I’m the caretaker. I manage a few houses on this road and several others in town.” The young man glanced at the Cape house. “I’d love to own a house like this someday.” He turned and smiled at Lin. “I’m saving my money.”

  “How long have you lived on the island?” she asked.

  “My whole life.” The man got a faraway look on his face. “It was a wonderful place to grow up.”

  “I was born here, too, but moved away when I was little,” Lin said. “My grandfather raised me.”

  “Your parents died.” The man said it in a factual way, not as a question.

  “Yes, in an automobile accident.”

  “I’m very sorry. I’ve suffered loss, too.”

  Lin waited to hear some details, but the man glanced over to the house for a few moments without adding more information to his comment and she decided not to ask about his loss, thinking if he wanted to tell her, he would have. Such a strong sense of sadness floated around the man that the heaviness of it pressed against Lin’s chest.

  In contrast to Lin’s impression, the young man turned back to Lin with a smile. “I got married recently.”

  Lin returned the smile. “Congratulations.”

  The man noticed Lin’s necklace. “That’s a beautiful necklace you’re wearing.”

  Instinctively, Lin’s hand moved to touch her horseshoe necklace and before she could say anything, the man remarked, “It’s an heirloom, isn’t it?”

  “It is. It belonged to a long-ago ancestor of mine.”

  The man stared tenderly at Lin’s piece of jewelry. “I’d bet you are very much like her.”

  Surprised at the comment, Lin’s eyebrow raised and then she said, “I think I am.” The delicate horseshoe necklace had once belonged to Emily Witchard Coffin, who was one of the early settlers of the island, wife of Sebastien Coffin, and a relative of Lin’s. Many of the Witchard women had “special” skills and Emily was no exception. It was believed that the woman could see ghosts, just like Lin was able to do.

  “What was your relative’s name?” the man asked.

  Lin told him.

  His soft, kind eyes rested on the necklace again. “Yes,” he said, so softly that Lin barely heard the word. Not knowing why, a shiver danced over her skin.

  Lin gave herself a shake. “Do you live nearby?”

  “Not far. You live in town, isn’t that right?”

  “Just at the edge of town. How did you know?”

  “I might have seen your truck around.” The man glanced over his shoulder back to the Cape. “I should get back to work. I’m pleased to make your acquaintance, Lin Coffin.”

  Lin was about to extend her hand to shake with him, but the man reached down for his weeding tool and turned around to walk back to the house so she and Nicky went back to Neil’s yard. As she looked over the hydrangea bushes into the other house’s yard, Lin couldn’t see the man anywhere around the house he was tending.

  Bending to pick up her shovel, a light cool breeze brushed over her skin and she realized the man hadn’t told her his name.

  Nicky woofed and Lin jumped. “You startled me, Nick,” she told the dog with a chuckle. “What are you woofing about? You want me to get back to work? Did Leonard tell you to keep an eye on me?” She patted the dog’s head and picked up her shovel. “Come on, let’s get back to making that new flower bed.”

  Lin took one more look into the neighbor’s yard and the thought that the man hadn’t told her his name picked at her again. Why didn’t he?

  Lin’s eyes widened. He said my full name. I don’t remember telling him my last name.

  4

  As soon as Viv was free, she came over to the table Lin was sitting at in the bookstore. Queenie and Nicky rested in an upholstered chair near one of the long book shelves.

  “This is the first minute I’ve had all day. It’s been go, go, go since I opened the doors this morning. Someone called out sick and customers have been coming in droves.”

  Lin smiled as she broke off a piece of her corn muffin. “It’s a good problem to have.”

  “Yes, but I’m not a marathon runner.” Viv leaned back against her chair and yawned. Her face looked exhausted. “I need to build my stamina if we’re going to have more days like this in the store. And tonight, John and I and the band are playing in a pub down by the docks. I’m going to fall asleep right in the middle of a song.”

  Lin chuckled. “I’ll come just to see that happen.”

  “How was your first day on the new project?”

  Lin’s face clouded even though she responded positively. “We’re off to a good start.”

  Viv narrowed her eyes. “But…?”

  Lin let out a breath and told her cousin about the man who worked as a caretaker at the house next to Neil’s. “It kind of unnerved me. The guy seemed to know things about me.”

  “Because he knew your last name?” Viv moved her hand dismissively. “You and Leonard are known around the island because of your business and your reputation for doing excellent work. Even people who hav
e never met you might know who you are. You’re out there doing landscaping work, your name is Lin … people put two and two together and assume you’re Carolin Coffin.” Viv went on. “This man was a caretaker. He must have heard of you and Leonard. He figured out who you were.”

  “I don’t know.” Lin rested her hand in her chin. “There was more to it than that.”

  “What do you mean?” Viv questioned.

  “He admired my necklace.” Lin reached up and touched the horseshoe.

  Vic cocked her head. “So? It’s a beautiful necklace.”

  “He asked if it was an heirloom.”

  “Maybe the guy likes jewelry. Maybe he could tell it was an antique piece.”

  Lin blew out a breath and leaned forward. “He seemed to know that my parents died in an accident. He said I was probably a lot like the ancestor who had owned the necklace.”

  “Your last name is Coffin. If the man had lived here all of his life, he would know about the Coffin family.” Viv shrugged a shoulder. “I think you’re being too suspicious. What do you think he is? A stalker?”

  Lin stared at her cousin pondering her words.

  “Oh for heaven’s sake, he couldn’t be a stalker,” Viv said, “he was working. You were working. He didn’t follow you there.”

  “I don’t think he’s a stalker.” Lin’s face was serious.

  “What do you think?”

  “I don’t know. The interaction felt weird. I don’t know how to describe it.”

  Viv’s eyes held her cousin’s. “Did he make you feel cold?”

  “No, he didn’t make me feel cold. He talked to me ... with words. He’s not a ghost.” Even though Lin could see ghosts and sometimes sensed things from them, she’d never met a spirit who talked to her. Not once. “He talks … so he isn’t a ghost.”

  “Okay, good.” Viv’s expression was full of relief. “He’s just some guy who’s lived on the island forever, has heard of you and Leonard, and figured out you’re Lin Coffin. That’s all. No need to worry.”