Unintended Detour: A Christian Suspense Novel (The Unintended Series Book 3)

by D. L. Wood

  “I appreciate it. Thanks.”

  “How’s the gallery exhibit coming? I heard you’d taken that on. That’s nice of you given that this is your vacation and all—second anniversary, right?”

  Chloe squinted. “How’d you know that?”

  “Small resort. Word gets around, especially about the owner’s son.”

  “Ah. Well, the exhibit’s an interesting project. And I don’t mind helping out. I’m a photographer by trade, and I find all the vintage photographs fascinating. The fact that there’s a legend to go along with them just makes it more compelling. I’m planning on reaching out to one of the Stones’ descendants—Cora’s daughter—to see if she’s got any more photos or other items that would beef it up. Or any information.”

  “I would’ve thought someone would have asked her about that by now.”

  Chloe shrugged. “They did, but I’m hoping I can be a bit more persuasive. Plus everything I’ve read makes me think there might be more to the story. There’s a theory about Rader having an accomplice. I want to find out if Cora’s daughter ever heard anything about that.”

  “I’ve heard that one. I was under the impression no one found anything to back it up.”

  “Well, Tara—the curator before me—was still waiting on some additional research on Will Rader to come in that might shed light on his background and people he may have been involved with. So I’m hoping there’ll be something in that.”

  “I wish you the best of luck,” Vanessa said, angling back toward the horse. “Because if you get a lead that helps you find that treasure, my children will finally have to stop looking for it.”

  18

  RILEY

  “I think we have a problem.” Riley leaned against the doorway to Deidre’s office, his arms crossed over his chest.

  Deidre looked up from her computer, surprise flashing across her face an instant before trading it for a calm, businesslike expression. “Mr. Riley.” Unless he was mistaken, he detected a note of pleasure in her voice. “I’m sorry to hear that. What seems to be the matter?”

  “Weeeelll…” he started, dragging the word out “first of all, I had to go through two other people at the front desk to get to you,” he said, keeping his tone intentionally light.

  “We’ve trained our people to make their best attempts to solve issues on their own without going up the chain. I apologize that they weren’t able to help you already.”

  “It isn’t a problem they can solve,” he said, tapping a finger on his crossed arm.

  “Oh?” Deidre asked.

  “I have to be the third wheel at dinner tonight with Jack and Chloe, and I can’t stand being a third wheel.”

  “I see.” The short answer held both hesitation and amusement as one corner of her mouth rose.

  “I was hoping you might be able to help me out with that.” He paused for a second, then took a step into the room. “Come to dinner with me.”

  She stood, her dark hair swishing at her shoulders. “Um, Mr. Riley—”

  “Aaron,” he insisted.

  “Mr. Riley, thank you, but I don’t think I could. As manager—”

  “Acting manager, you mean,” he said, taking several more steps, bringing him close to her desk.

  She fell silent for a few seconds. “You’ve been speaking to the Bartholomews about me?”

  He pursed his lips as he felt a small smile slip out. “You…might have come up.”

  She narrowed her eyes as an electric silence filled the room. Or at least it felt that way to him. Is it just me? He appraised her stance and the way she was leaning toward him slightly, even though it was likely unintentional. Nah. It’s not just me.

  “Well, even as acting manager, I have duties this evening.”

  “You have to eat sometime, don’t you?”

  Her dark eyes narrowed. “Yes.”

  “And don’t tell me the manager isn’t allowed to eat with guests, because I know that isn’t true. At least not with important guests, and we already established I’m one of those.” He noticed a shift in her stance. Was he making her nervous?

  “No, it’s not that—”

  “Then good. It’s settled.” He wasn’t going to give her a chance to get out of it. “Seven o’clock tonight in The Dining Room. I’ve already made reservations for four.”

  She eyed him narrowly, her brow slightly furrowed. “All right. Dinner. At seven. But it’s a business dinner. Between the owner’s son, his wife, their friend, and the acting manager.”

  “If that’s how you want to look at it.”

  “That’s how it is.”

  “All right then. Just a business dinner. With the owner’s son’s most charming friend thrown in as a bonus. And you’ll still be saving me from being the odd man out.”

  “If that can’t be helped, it can’t be helped,” she said, her tone adopting a subtle mischievous quality.

  “I guess not.” Riley turned and walked out, feeling a grin stretching his cheeks to the breaking point.

  19

  CHLOE

  “I understand you’ve had your share of troubles in getting this place up and running,” Riley said between mouthfuls. It seemed to Chloe that he’d gone to extra lengths tonight—suit jacket, cologne, trimmed beard—the works. When Jack teased him about it, Riley retorted that Jack shouldn’t be jealous just because Riley was better looking.

  Deidre also looked especially put-together in a black dress and high heels, though she still wore her name tag. Her hair wasn’t straight now, but instead fell in springy curls to just below her shoulders. Chloe also detected a faint floral scent she hadn’t noticed before. When Deidre had arrived, Riley jumped up to pull out her chair, and Deidre quickly reminded him this was just a business dinner. Chloe had forced herself not to smile. For two people acting like this was nothing special, they were both certainly going to a lot of effort.

  Now that more than half the weekend’s guests had checked in, The Dining Room was nearly full. The menu was limited to four selections, and at Chloe’s suggestion they all picked a different one. Each was delectable—from the filet mignon to the lobster to the braised pork shank to the grilled eggplant vegetarian meal. They ate and laughed and told stories. Jack and Riley entertained them with some of the more adventurous tales from their time as Navy SEALS. Deidre detailed Lily’s legend since Riley hadn’t heard it before, then Chloe chimed in, trying to make her encounter with the wall noises sound as eerie as possible.

  “I can’t lie,” Deidre said, her fork holding the last bite of her raspberry chocolate cheesecake. “I’ve opened half a dozen resorts, and I’ve never encountered this many difficulties. But given the crazy happenings here over the years, I guess we shouldn’t have been surprised that things would go wrong.”

  “So there’s more than what happened to the Stones?” Riley asked, scooping the last of his homemade blackberry cobbler and vanilla bean ice cream onto his spoon.

  Deidre nodded. “Over the decades people have raked over the land, the house, even breaking in when it was boarded up, trying to find the treasure. In 1953, four teenage boys slipped inside to hunt through the house. One got the bright idea to check the stair railing. He lost his footing and fell through a weak spot to the grand foyer below. Died right there.”

  “That’s awful.” Riley sat back, his forehead wrinkled.

  Jack turned to Deidre, uncertainty clouding his expression. “And Bartholomew Hotels knew about this death and all the rest of it when they bought the property?”

  “This stretch of the Hudson is full of ghost stories and tragic legends,” said Deidre. “It probably only made it more appealing. The eerie history is part of the draw.”

  Chloe leaned forward. “You haven’t even heard all of it. I just learned this part today when I went through Tara’s notes. The last death—well, the last before Nate Lewis,” she added somberly, “was in 1984. There was some kind of college prank carried out here. Something like new pledges forced to break into the h
ouse and scour it for a fake treasure that the upperclassmen had hidden. One accidentally got pushed into a window on the third floor, and it couldn’t hold his weight. He landed on the front drive. He died on his way to the hospital.”

  “Four deaths?” Riley whistled. “It’s a wonder anyone would ever buy the place.”

  “You’d be surprised,” Deidre said. “There have been multiple owners. The last was a family who bought the house in the early nineties and lived here for almost five years. They were determined to fix it up and sell it at a profit, but the work ended up being more than they could handle. They lost it to the bank, who held it until Bartholomew Holdings bought it. It was terribly rundown at that point. The company’s invested a lot of time and money to bring it back to its former glory. We’ve been actively renovating for about fourteen months.”

  “You’ve done a great job,” Chloe said. “It feels like I’ve gone back in time. I’m sure a lot of that is thanks to you, Deidre.”

  “Nate and I managed it together.” A tight-lipped, sad smile appeared on her face. “His funeral is tomorrow afternoon. I’ll have to slip out to go, but we can’t afford to release anybody else from the staff. By then, we’ll be at capacity.”

  A pang of sympathy rang through Chloe. She hadn’t considered how hard it might be for Deidre to lose Nate after working together as long as they had.

  Maybe I should offer to go with—

  “I can go with you if you want,” Riley piped in.

  “Oh,” Deidre said, her bewildered expression making it clear she hadn’t expected that. “I can manage. Thanks, though.” The warmth in her eyes evidenced she meant it.

  The table grew quiet until Jack broke in, redirecting back to the legend. “And this treasure?” he asked. “After all the people who’ve traipsed through here, no one’s found anything?”

  Chloe shook her head. “Nothing. Not a single piece of jewelry or even a clue. And it hasn’t only been amateurs. Professionals have tried too.”

  “They did a television show here once,” Deidre added. “Some cable thing about estates with legends and whatnot. They brought in all their equipment, x-ray and metal detectors, and still found nothing. Even the surrounding woods and river have been searched—divers with cameras and some kind of sonar or something.”

  “Maybe somebody found it and never said anything,” Riley remarked wryly. He looked at Deidre. “What’s your take on it? Is it still here or not?”

  She smiled. “Are you asking manager Deidre Nolan or dinner guest Deidre Nolan?”

  Riley grinned, his teeth gleaming. “Dinner guest.”

  “I think you’re right. That at some point along the way, someone found whatever Will Rader hid and made off with it, keeping it to himself—or herself, I suppose. I mean, why make yourself the target of the kind of attention that treasure would bring? Not to mention having to deal with the question of whether you could even legally keep it?”

  “True,” Jack offered.

  “But,” she drawled, “if you ask the manager in me, I’d tell you that it’s likely still here, being guarded by the ghost of Lily Stone, waiting for some clever guest to stumble onto it.”

  “I’d rather keep talking to the dinner guest version, if that’s all right,” Riley said.

  Chloe was surprised to see that Deidre quickly rewarded him with a smile.

  Maybe it’s time we cut out. Give these two a chance.

  “Um, Jack,” she said, “it’s nearly nine, and I want to get some rest tonight. I’m going to see Lily Stone’s niece tomorrow, and I’ve got to leave early for Poughkeepsie.” She hadn’t mentioned this to him before, so she expected the quizzical look he gave her in return.

  “You are?”

  “I got her to agree to a second interview—though I just called it a chat.”

  “How’d you manage that?” Deidre said, her posture perking up. “Tara said she was a dead-end.”

  Chloe wrinkled her nose. She had sort of gone rogue on this one, calling the woman that afternoon with promises she hadn’t run by Deidre first. “I suggested that we wanted to personally tell her what was going to be in the exhibit before it opened. And I hinted that if we could meet with her now, we wouldn’t need to bother her again.” Chloe felt a grimace pinch her face. “I hope that was okay. She wasn’t thrilled about meeting me, but the promise that it would put an end to the resort reaching out to her seemed to do the trick.”

  “It’s fine by me,” Deidre said. “I can’t imagine why we would need to talk to her again.”

  “So, since I’ve got an early morning, I guess we’ll head up, then?” Chloe said, glancing sideways at Jack. A third of his Chocolate Volcano Brownie was still on his plate, and he returned her gaze with one that suggested she was crazy.

  “But I’m not done—”

  She kicked him under the table, following it up with a barely perceptible nod in Riley and Deidre’s direction.

  “Oh. Right.” Jack stood and pulled out Chloe’s chair for her. “You guys keep things going here. The old married folks are turning in.”

  “You know you can count on me to keep a party going,” Riley said, chuckling.

  Jack leaned over the table toward Deidre. “Don’t believe everything he tells you.”

  “I promise not to tell stories on you when you’re not here to defend yourself,” Riley replied, tossing him a two-fingered salute.

  “I wasn’t talking about me. Watch yourself with this one, Deidre. He’s a charmer.”

  “Don’t worry, I will,” she said, her tone wary, but the light in her eyes suggesting she wasn’t the least bit concerned.

  “Tell me you saw that,” Chloe said as soon as she and Jack left the restaurant, following the rich burgundy carpet down the hall to the stairs. “Tell me you picked up on the vibe they were giving off.”

  “Yeah, I caught it,” Jack said, chuckling.

  “Isn’t it great?” She caught the reflection of her face beaming as they passed a gold-filigree mirror at the top of the stairs. Her tawny hair was pulled up into a mound of loose curls, and her hazel eyes shone, illuminated by bronze eyeshadow.

  Jack wrapped an arm around her where her red dress cinched at her waist and nodded at the mirror. “That’s a gorgeous woman, right there.”

  “Come on.” She pulled him by the hand. “We were talking about Riley.”

  “Right, Riley. Well, I think it’s awesome.” He waggled his head. “Not awesome enough to leave half my dessert on the table—”

  She lightly punched his arm, and he grabbed the spot in mock pain, then threw the same arm around her shoulders, pulling her close and kissing the top of her head. “I’d love for him to find someone. She seems pretty great, but then again, we don’t know much about her.”

  “He’ll get to know her. It wasn’t like you and I knew each other before we got thrown together.”

  “We were running from a crime syndicate bent on killing you. We didn’t have any choice but to stick together. And don’t forget, he’s only here for five days, and then it’s back to Miami.”

  “Exactly. Five whole days.” She looked into Jack’s endless green eyes and felt nothing but hope. “In our experience, that’s more than enough time.”

  20

  RILEY

  “How much longer till you have to get back to it?” Riley asked, tossing his black napkin on the table. Now that Chloe and Jack had gone, he turned his seat toward Deidre, giving her his full attention. She looked amazing. Breathtaking. And something about her eyes. Something deep and inviting. A mystery he wanted to solve.

  “I’m technically off, but I’m never truly off while I’m here, you know? They won’t come looking for me unless there’s a real problem.”

  “I’d say you hit your quota of those already.”

  “Don’t I know it. I’m due for a good turn.” She took a sip of water.

  He fixed his most mischievous smile on his face. “I’d say you’re looking at it.”

  She snorted, and t
he sound made him laugh out loud.

  “You did not seriously just say that,” Deidre said.

  “Too much?” he asked, squinting.

  She held up her thumb and forefinger, millimeters apart.

  “I have been known to be a little over the top before,” said Riley.

  “You don’t say. Never would have guessed.”

  He chuckled. “You think you’ve got the measure of me already, eh?”

  “Getting there.”

  He eyed her and wondered how far to push his luck. All right, Riley. No risk, no reward.

  Riley rapped his knuckles on the table. “I hear you guys give tours of the estate and the grounds and whatnot.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Any chance I could arrange for one of those tomorrow?”

  “I think I could do that,” she replied.

  “Any chance I could request a particular tour guide?”

  She cocked her head. “Got someone in mind?”

  “As a matter of fact—”

  Her phone buzzed and, flashing him a guilty look, she answered it.

  “Deidre Nolan, Manager,” she said.

  He watched her countenance transform from engaged amusement to dread.

  “I understand…Yes, tomorrow.” She disconnected the call.

  “What’s going on? You all right?”

  She nodded. “I’m fine. But…that was the police.” She exhaled deeply. “They’re saying Nate Lewis’s death most likely wasn’t an accident.”

  21

  The truth about Nate Lewis would be out soon.

  Then they would know.

  They would know there was a murderer loose on Stonehall Estate.