“Or maybe I wanted to push you, and the ghost did it for me,” she said with a laugh. “I see what the Lucys do around here for entertainment. Teasing Nulls is fun.”
“Now I need another painkiller,” he grumbled. “You aren’t going to give up, are you? You’re probably planning on establishing a rapport with the ghost and selling tickets.”
“I’ve never met a ghost before.” She sipped her chardonnay and thought about it. “I’m pretty sure there wasn’t one when I lived there. But I’m sensitive to emotional energy, and whatever’s in there packs an angry wallop. I’ll have to see how it feels in the morning.”
“I had a man go down and check the utilities,” he said, a little too casually.
Teddy regarded him with suspicion. “And?”
“They’re turned on, as they always are for our rental properties. He saw no reason for the electricity not to work, except maybe your ghost doesn’t want it on.”
She muttered a foul word and took another drink.
Four
June 26: morning
* * *
The next morning, Kurt sat back in his desk chair, still feeling satisfied that he’d zinged the smug Miss Baker with news that her precious ghost had blocked her electricity. His headache had dissipated, and despite ringing telephones and a mountain of paper he needed to plow down, he was prepared for Xavier’s call.
Xavier had been the crazy who’d burned the cross. Monty had insisted that it had been a drug-induced incident instigated by the criminal Xavier had called friend, and they should give the lawyer a second chance. But Kurt now examined everything his agent said or did, so he had the file on hand.
“The Lucys are asking who rented the shop after the Thompsons left,” Xavier said. “Think it’s all right to tell them?”
“I’ve already looked.” Kurt flipped open the file. “The Thompsons were never our tenants. They’re the ones who sold us the property ten years ago. We’ve had a few weekly rentals since then, but after we fixed up the place that first year, we received a lot of complaints and no long term guests. So if the Thompsons are Miss Baker’s relations, she might want to see who they were murdering.”
It felt good to say that. After learning Deputy Walker’s father had been killed on the resort by a lodge contractor, half the town considered the Kennedys accomplices simply for living here.
Kurt’s father had been dead and Kurt had been only twelve when Teddy’s parents moved away. He and Monty had been at school in the city most of the time the Thompsons lived there. The Lucys couldn’t blame his family this time.
Although the family corporation had acquired the property. Kurt kneaded his temple.
“I’ll let them know,” Xavier said in relief.
His agent had been through a lot these past few weeks, Kurt knew, but oddly, the older man had become more. . . lucid. . . lately.
“And the utilities are working again, so I’m drawing up the contract you told me,” Xavier continued.
“Have the crew go over the lines thoroughly. We don’t want an electric short burning the place down overnight.”
After the fire that had almost taken the resort, that prospect made Kurt super-uneasy. Unable to concentrate on the paperwork that consumed his life, he grabbed his keys, told his secretary he’d be back later, and set out for Hillvale.
He convinced himself he was going down to check on the property’s safety—not to see how Teddy Baker was faring—but he was disillusioned of that notion the moment he walked in the shop’s front door.
He’d tried not to notice her too much last night in the dark bar, but in full sunlight Teddy Baker was a knockout. She stood on a stepladder, checking overhead lights, wearing a plunging skin-tight top and jeans that revealed every luscious curve. A figure like that would stop traffic and ought to be illegal.
Her curly hair tumbled down her back this morning. Uncovered by the ugly cap she’d worn yesterday and unfettered by last night’s braid, it formed a dark waterfall that shifted and swayed with every move.
He’d spent the night recalling the mesmerizing fairy who had haunted his lonely childhood dreams. At the time, he’d thought fairy tales had been written for her.
“Your hair wasn’t black when you were little,” he said in accusation.
She gazed down at him from her lofty perch. “Shhh. The world doesn’t need to know that I’m artificially enhanced.”
“Black is not an enhancement.” That was a mean thing to say but it balanced out his insta-lust. She stuck out her tongue and crossed her eyes at him and insta-lust skyrocketed. He countered it with snark. “I take it no one has been pushed down the stairs this morning?”
Children shouted and a dog barked outside. She wrinkled her petite nose and started down the ladder. “I think the smudging soothed the spirit’s ire somewhat. Or she’s gathering her energy. If I’m temporarily agreeing to rent at your outrageous terms, we’ll need new bedding.”
“What would you have done if you owned the place and didn’t have a landlord handy? I remember our agreement including only utilities.” He resisted the urge to help her down by shoving his hands in his pockets.
“If I didn’t have a landlord, I’d have forty-five hundred bucks to furnish the place,” she retorted. “If I’m renting, fully furnished, it should be furnished.”
He might have argued if he hadn’t been confronted by a rhinestone-studded t-shirt displaying her many assets, including cleavage that begged. . . His childhood fairy had grown up. Kurt brought his eyes back to her face. Even at this hour, she wore black mascara. The lady was definitely hiding in full sight. “Have you talked to your mother’s cousin since she lived here?”
She blinked those long, full lashes in surprise, and he allowed himself another score.
“I suppose my parents have. We used to exchange Christmas cards, but no one does that anymore.” She frowned, tilted her head, then headed for the kitchen. “The kids are too quiet.”
“They weren’t quiet a minute ago. Don’t they get a break?”
She didn’t respond but aimed for the back door. He really had better things to do than follow swaying hips through an antiquated kitchen.
Or maybe he didn’t. Now that business had dropped off drastically after the fire, he didn’t have as many guests to pacify. The condos he had hoped to build above the town were supposed to have taken care of his spare time, but thanks to the Lucys, the lawyers had tied his hands. So maybe he ought to spend time in town, learning what deviousness his aunt and niece, and their friends, conspired on now.
The kitchen was blessedly free of meddlers, but the dusty strip of backyard was occupied. With alarm Kurt noted the two black-haired children swaying on the rickety wooden fence. The kids seemed unconcerned about their precarious position, but Samantha looked alarmed. Why was she out here?
He hadn’t quite adjusted to knowing that his father had a child out of wedlock that no one had told him about—until Sam had showed up, practically on his doorstep, the fully grown daughter of a half-brother he’d never known. His newly acquired niece had made no demands on him, but she was the reason the condos were tied up in litigation right now—through no fault of her own. Family secrets tended to be ugly.
Sam stood with shovel in hand, biting her bottom lip, studying the situation, just as he was.
Only the dynamo with lungs forged ahead, shouting, “Mia, you cannot climb the tree. I told you that.”
Tree? Kurt glanced behind the fence where there was, indeed, a pine tree just begging to be climbed. Why did she think that was their goal?
The petite temptress stormed the fence, hauled the sturdy younger child down, dropped him on the ground, and grabbed the older. “If you can’t behave for Miss Samantha, I’ll have to tie you up like Prince Hairy.”
At the sound of his name, the fanged beast flapped its hairy tail but didn’t move more.
“We want to see the ocean,” the child addressed as Mia protested. “Can we go up on the roof?”
“Jeb does not want to see the ocean. He just wants to do what you do, and he’s too little. Do you want to kill your little brother?”
Kurt thought this might be where he parted ways and found a better task, but Teddy threw him a piercing look that meant stay, and Sam smirked. What was he missing?
The boy plopped down on the dog as if it were a large cushion and produced a crumpled snack bar from his shorts. He fed part of it to the dog, then ate the rest, unfazed by his sister’s protests or his aunt’s shouts.
It was the defiant little girl clinging to Teddy’s neck who wept, not the supposedly terrified little boy.
“But Mommy said we should watch out, and the tree is the best place,” Mia cried. “How can we watch out when we’re so little?”
At that, Sam set down her shovel, caught Kurt’s arm, and steered him inside the house.
“What are they watching out for?” he asked.
“You’ll have to ask Teddy. She’ll tell us when she’s ready. But look at them—she knows exactly what those children need,” Sam whispered. “I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s as if she has eyes in the back of her head and a direct link to their brains.”
“That’s ridiculous,” he protested, casting a glance over his shoulder at the tableau, feeling a tug of. . . softness. “The kids got quiet and she went to see, just like any mother would.” Not that his mother ever had, which explained his soft spot for maternal behavior.
“She’s not their mother. She has no kids of her own. But this isn’t the first time today that she’s arrived just in the nick of time. I’m right there, and I don’t notice. She does.”
He shot her a look of disgust. “So they’ve brainwashed you too? You see magic where there’s nothing more than hypervigilance?”
His niece was nearly tall enough to look him in the eye. She patted his coat sleeve and shook her head. “You’ll have to see for yourself. I won’t waste my breath. The azaleas at the lodge are getting leggy and overgrown. Do you mind if I dig one or two to plant here? I’ll trim up the rest and feed them so they’ll look good as new next spring.”
With a scowl, Kurt nodded. He had little idea what azaleas were, but Sam had a green thumb, so he believed she’d do what she said, even if she was wasting her time. The town would be rubble by next spring.
Out of Teddy Baker’s compelling presence, Kurt again considered leaving. As if she knew exactly what he was thinking, the female in question kicked open the back door, still carrying a child much too big for her and trailing a now crumb-smeared boy.
“That fence needs replacing,” she announced without preamble, glaring right at him. “I’ll take the cost out of the first months’ rent.”
Damn, but she was good. Kurt almost laughed as she pushed past him, a galleon in full sail skirting around him as if he were in an insignificant buoy.
He couldn’t remember the last time an eligible female had treated him like a piece of furniture.
“It’s okay, Mia, honey.” Teddy soothed her niece, rocking her in the chair she remembered her mother using. Apparently her mother’s cousin had left the old furnishings intact, for the most part. “I’m here to watch for you, okay? And there’s a whole town full of people who will watch too.” She hoped. It had been one of the reasons for coming here. “Your job is to keep an eye on Jeb and make sure he doesn’t eat any rocks or lizards.”
The child hiccupped, rubbed her runny nose on Teddy’s shirt, and nodded. “Mama says he’d eat the house if someone cut it up for him.”
Teddy laughed. “We’ll have to teach him proper dining. Can the two of you stay up here quietly if I put a DVD in the computer?”
Thank goodness she’d brought supplies. No cell phone coverage put a serious dent in her ability to download movies. She’d have to inquire about cable.
“Okay. Can I have Little Mermaid?” Mia hopped down.
After cleaning up Jeb and settling the kids on the floor in front of her laptop, Teddy figured her landlord had fled. It was a pity. He was the one good-looking thing around this dump. She’d far rather spar over contracts with him than dithering Mr. Black, maybe over a candlelit, wine-soaked dinner. She may have given up on relationships, but she wasn’t quite ready to give up on sex.
To her surprise, she found the businessman stripped of his tailored coat, with his shirt sleeves rolled up, prying at a speaker in the shop wall with a pocket knife.
“What are you doing?” she asked with curiosity. He was a handsome hunk after all, and she was always a sucker for a handyman. Not that she believed for one second that wealthy Kurt Kennedy had ever lifted a hammer in his life. The Dashing Prince of her childhood had been pretty but hadn’t known how to make swords. That had made sense to her enamored six-year-old self.
“Looking to see if this is how you produce ghost wails,” he said, popping off the ring and inspecting the interior. “Where does this connect?”
“I’ve heard no wailing ghosts, and as far as I’m aware, that’s an ancient speaker system my father installed. He liked piping in music. It’s a wonder it’s not playing the Grateful Dead.”
He sent her a look that made her laugh. Okay, so that had been a poor choice of bands.
She contemplated the layout of the old shop. The shelves attached to the walls needed a good coat of paint. The counter glass just needed cleaning but the base. . . stain or paint?
“Even the Dead could produce better tunes than static,” Kennedy said, climbing down the stepstool. “The other sounds the same.” He pointed his knife at the speaker over the window, then looked around at the empty shelves. “What did your father sell in here?”
“Keeping in mind that they were young, and twenty years ago, Hillvale still had a hippie vibe, they sold candles, wind chimes, the ever-popular medieval sword, crystals, anything tourists might buy.” She studied the speaker over her head. It did seem to be producing a noise. “They inherited the building free and clear, but they had to put food on the table while they were finding themselves. I’m not entirely certain they ever found reality, but they’re career missionaries these days.”
“Lucys,” he said in disgust, examining the ceiling and walls. “What tripe do they sell to the natives? Bibles?”
Teddy understood his attitude and didn’t call him on it. She returned to the staircase and followed where the wires had to run. “Healthcare. They teach how to purify water, set up camps for vaccinations, build latrines, glamorous things like that. They’re probably spies and subversives as well, but I’ve quit worrying about them. What happened to the attic door?”
“What attic? Is it okay if I go up there?” He tapped the wall with his knife, still looking for wires.
“There used to be a pull-down staircase from the attic, where my father kept the Christmas decorations.” She led the way up, nearly breaking her neck studying the ceiling above where she distinctly remembered a rectangular door. It wasn’t there now.
In their room, the kids were still hypnotized by the movie. They didn’t even look up as Teddy and Kurt examined the staircase wall adjoined to the ceiling. “If the attic is still there,” she said, “then I would think the wires ran up to equipment. There’s no room on this level for it. I never paid much attention as a kid.”
“Well, there’s your ghost then,” he said with a shrug. “When the electricity came on, the equipment was activated. You’ll need to find the switch or cut off the wires to the speakers.”
“My ghost isn’t in speakers. That’s the faulty wiring. I hope your electricians are good.” Teddy crossed to the bedroom window. “There’s one out there now fiddling with the box. That’s probably the cause of the static. He found a dead fuse.”
Looking over her shoulder, Kurt towered over her by a head since she was wearing ballet flats instead of boots this morning. He troubled her in more ways than one. She knew she ought to practice her seldom used Inner Monitor, but she didn’t need it to sense his lust. His intellectual curiosity wasn’t an emotion—more an instinct, s
he guessed. But almost everything else about him was repressed, trapped behind a steel wall. Not knowing if he was angry or sad or bored put her off balance.
“We need to hammer out a contract so I can start deliveries,” she announced, turning quickly and deliberately forcing him off balance. She didn’t want to be the only one in sexual torment. Creating a new, more secure home took effort, but there was no reason she couldn’t play a little as well.
He backed off, studying the ancient iron bed and solid chest of drawers adorning the bedroom.
Before he could comment, a woman called from below, “Yoo-hoo, anyone home?”
A blast of cold air dropped the temperature to freezing. Teddy shivered. Kurt tested the window frame.
“Down in a sec,” she called, before returning to examine the window. “The panes are old and leaky, but it’s summer. We won’t freeze.” Although they’d just been outside and it hadn’t been this cold in the sun.
“You don’t believe we’re being visited by a spiritual entity blocking out the heat?” he asked dryly, following her to the stairs.
“I read people, not ghosts, not usually. I think the one here had just built up a lot of steam waiting for someone to walk in, and you got the worst of it. I’d feel better if we laid her to rest though.”
“Or found out why she’s here?” he countered.
“Yeah, that too. That’s why the Lucys are gathering. Want to join the séance?”
“Will you be putting up a tarot reading sign too?” he asked in disgust as they reached the bottom and found the shop filling with women.
“No, I sell high-end jewelry, but I’ll start with crystals, geodes, and local crafts and see what the market bears—as soon as you get me that contract.” Arriving in the shop, she greeted Amber, the tarot reader, and Tullah, the owner of the upscale thrift store. Several women she hadn’t met milled around, studying the ceiling where the static had become more pronounced.
Topaz Dreams Page 4
