by K. J. Emrick
“Hey,” Jon said to her, gently this time. “Why don’t you go back to the Inn and lie down for a couple of hours. The kids and I got this covered.”
“Yeah!” Zane cheered. “We’re covering the whole place!”
“That’s not what he meant, little brother,” Colby told him. “But it’s fine with me too, Mom, if you want to go back to the Inn for a little bit. We can meet back here, right? There’s a little restaurant at the other end of everything.”
Darcy tilted her head at her daughter. She’d always acted so grown up, even more so now that she was an actual teenager. Yet here she was, just as eager as Zane to spend the day with laser tag and skee ball. She wasn’t ready to give up being young. Not yet.
“You’re sure?” She said it more to Jon than she did to Colby, but it was still her daughter who answered.
“Go on, Mom. We got this.”
“Yeah,” Zane echoed. “Got this. Got laser tag! Pew, pew! Pew, pew!”
Darcy looked back at Jon, her eyebrow up in a silent question.
He shrugged. “I may have taught him the sound a laser gun makes. That’s what dads are for, right?”
That was true. Being a parent wasn’t all about teaching kids how to do math or save money. You needed to teach them how to make good sound effects when they played, too. Darcy got up and kissed the top of her husband’s head. Her kids would be in good hands with a man who was still young at heart, even if he had gray in his temples.
In a place like this, the kids could easily burn up two hours playing. They wouldn’t even know she was gone. In fact, they were already rushing back to get in line for the next laser tag game before she could tell them goodbye. At least Jon waved to her and blew her a kiss. For the next few hours, she was on her own.
Outside, it had started snowing again, and everything was beautiful. This was such a small town, dependent on tourism to stay alive just like Misty Hollow was. Darcy would never want to see a giant play center like this one in the middle of her town, but she was glad it was here. She wanted a quiet vacation, but her kids wanted fun things to do. This place was perfect for both.
She got in the car and started the engine, and let it warm up a little before heading out. The snow came down harder as she drove, reflecting red and blue and green from the Christmas lights of the houses she passed.
Darcy smiled. Life was good.
Something was wrong.
She could feel it. This was new.
This was different.
Something was wrong.
Darcy was asleep almost as soon as her head hit her pillow in the room. She woke an hour and a half later, feeling rested and refreshed. The beds at the Inn were unbelievably soft. There was a pillow-top mattress cover that had done wonders for her back and her shoulders and—yes, she was going to say it—her soul. Maybe she wasn’t the young girl she used to be when her adventures in Misty Hollow began, but was she really so old now that she needed afternoon naps?
She told herself she wasn’t. Of course she wasn’t. She just needed a little pick-me-up and the nap had definitely done it for her. But now, Jon and the kids were waiting for her to pick them up and she needed to get going. The owner had been at the front desk on her way in, and he’d promised to give them a tour of the place before dinner. Darcy was really looking forward to that. She didn’t want to miss it because she slept too long.
This Inn must have been beautiful when it was a mansion. The woodwork in the hallways and the rooms was stunning. The rugs weren’t original, they couldn’t be, but they were all designs that would have fit in perfectly two centuries ago. She could only imagine how much time it took to maintain a place like this, dusting, washing, repairs and upkeep. Not to mention the expense. It made her wonder how Maxwell turned a profit. Maybe it was busier in the summertime than it was this close to Christmas.
Slipping her socks and sneakers back on, she shook her head at herself. She was not going to be curious about anything on this trip. Not the ghosts, not how this place was run, none of it. She was just going to enjoy this time with her family. She’d promised Jon that’s how it was going to be, and she was going to stick to that promise.
She snatched the keys to the car up from the dresser as she started humming a song to herself and opened the door, stepped out into the hallway—
And nearly ran through the person standing there.
The tall, gaunt man was transparent and ghastly pale. His clothes were from a bygone era. The short collared white shirt and rough brown trousers would have been a common sort of fashion in the middle of the nineteenth century. His eyes were wide and blank on his unshaven face as he stared at her.
A ghost with a five o’clock shadow. It was so unexpected she almost burst out laughing.
The ghost smiled at her with crooked teeth as if he really could see her with those empty eyes. Sweeping an arm across his middle, he bowed to her…
Took a bad step with his left foot…
And tripped.
Reflexively, Darcy threw a hand out to catch him before her mind told her don’t be a total dufus. For Pete’s sake, he’s a ghost!
She watched as the man fell right through the floor, arms flailing, mouth open wide in alarm. It was like watching Charlie Chaplin take a pratfall in an old black and white silent film. Maybe it shouldn’t have been funny, but it was. This time she couldn’t help it. She snickered behind her cupped hand.
Up he popped through the floor again, dusting off the front of his trousers as if a ghost could get dirty from falling down—no, falling through—a floor. He looked up at Darcy and shrugged, as if he was embarrassed.
Then he turned without moving his feet, floating an inch above the floor, and moved toward a door at the end of the hallway with a Christmas wreath nailed to the center of it…
And bounced off as if he had really hit it.
Darcy laughed again. It wasn’t a mean laugh, it was just that seeing a ghost act like he just ran into a door…she didn’t think she’d ever seen anything like this. A clumsy ghost! In life, this man must have been a total klutz for it to carry over into his afterlife like this.
The ghost rubbed at an imagined pain in his forehead, and then glared at the door. Putting out a hand, he grabbed for the doorknob, and mimicked the motions of opening it. Of course the door didn’t open, but he went through it as if it had.
Doors didn’t stop ghosts. They could pass through anything, short of a line of salt or a few other things Darcy knew about. This ghost was just clumsy.
Or maybe…crazy?
So. First there was the ghost of Mrs. Bylow on the stairs, and now this ghost up here wandering the halls and literally bumping into things. Well, this place was old, and it wouldn’t surprise Darcy to know there were more than a few suspicious deaths that had left ghosts here. Old houses had a soul of their own sometimes, and lots of stories to tell.
This ghost didn’t ask for her help, either. In fact, their meeting had been completely accidental. He hadn’t hung around to talk. If he didn’t want her help, then she wasn’t going to offer it. She was on vacation.
She went down the hallway in the direction of the stairs, humming that song to herself again. When she was almost there, she passed the open door to the Inn’s library. They’d seen it on the way to their room earlier, and of course Darcy had glanced in. She couldn’t resist the allure of books. This library was a bibliophile’s dream.
The room was much bigger than she would have expected. Easily thirty feet by forty feet, completely open with shelves lining each of the walls, full of books from one end to the other. There were soft chairs arranged in the middle, with a table in between and a reading lamp. There were no windows here, and no clocks either. It looked like the perfect place to lose track of time altogether.
The variety of books impressed Darcy, too. There were leather-bound books with faded spines, and she could see several books on travel displayed with their front covers facing out to catch people’s attention. There were also sev
eral sections of more modern paperback novels for light reading. She was definitely looking forward to exploring the selection later. Maybe after the kids had gone to bed. She had no doubt she could find something in here to read. Several somethings, in fact. She could take a couple back to the room to read in bed…
Darcy’s train of thought was interrupted when a haze began to form in the far corner of the room, over by some of the older looking books. It was a misty sort of light that settled low to the floor, floating there for a moment before it brought itself together, drawing inward until it took on the shape of a person.
The light faded, leaving a shadow of a short, elderly woman with gray hair tied in a bun and a long dress that fluttered constantly in a breeze that wasn’t there. A ghost had just entered the library. Darcy didn’t dare move. She watched as the spirit scanned the shelves slowly before reaching up to touch the brown leather spine of a one old, thick book. Her fingers caressed it almost lovingly.
Then her head snapped around toward Darcy, and her eyes flared brightly in the shadows of a lean, wrinkled face.
Darcy blinked, and the flash left two tiny afterimages on her retinas. When she could open her eyes again without them stinging, the ghost was gone. There was an odor that lingered on the air after her. It smelled like…hate.
Three ghosts in the same building? Were they unrelated, Darcy wondered, or were they maybe connected somehow? This many apparitions in one place couldn’t be a coincidence, could it? With slow steps, she went to the corner, and put her hand through the spot the ghost had occupied not two minutes ago. It was cold in a way that was not natural. There was something else, too. Her gift was trying to tell her something. She opened herself to it, really tried to listen to it. She sensed…something wasn’t right.
Something felt wrong.
She thought back to the news article Jon had found online. It didn’t say anything about multiple ghosts in the Hideaway Inn. It had only mentioned Mrs. Bylow’s death and the many sightings of her on the stairs over the years. Shouldn’t there have been more information online about the Hideaway Inn, if there were other ghosts? Suspicious deaths, or murders, or anything like that. There should have been something.
Maybe they just hadn’t looked far enough. They stopped at the first story they found, instead of scrolling further. Darcy hadn’t wanted to do any ghost investigating on this trip. No mystery solving. She wanted to give the family a normal Christmas vacation where ghosts weren’t coming out of the woodwork and where people weren’t trying to kill her or Jon. A vacation where they could just relax and have fun.
She smirked, and shook her head. She should have known better. After all, this was her family she was talking about. Peace on Earth wasn’t usually their luck.
Still, none of these ghosts had asked for help. Each of them had made eye contact with her, and they knew she was here. If they wanted her help, they would ask.
She should just leave it at that.
She really should.
Or…should she?
Honestly, would it hurt to do a little sleuthing on their vacation? She didn’t have to do anything about it. She would just be looking for answers about the ghosts, and she had to admit she was curious. With Jon’s police investigation skills, he could easily do another online search to see if there were more stories about this place out there in the internet.
Besides. Mrs. Bylow’s murder was decades ago. Nearly two centuries. If all the ghosts were connected somehow then it meant they all died that long ago. Even if she found answers to why they were here, what would it matter? It was ancient history. It was nothing that would affect their vacation time.
With a sigh, she turned away from the fading cold spot in the library and made her way down the stairs. For now, she was going to go pick up Jon and the kids. That was what she was going to do right now.
She walked through the main room on the first floor, noticing that Maxwell Bylow had added to the decorations while she slept. There was spray-on snow across the bottoms of the windowpanes now, and Christmas lights strung between the wall sconces, and four mistletoe sprigs taped to the front of the check-in counter. Nobody was going to be able to kiss under those!
Well, there were still the ones in the doorway, she thought with a smile.
Chapter 3
“I’m not sure I understand what you’re saying.”
Jon said that to her as he edged the car carefully around a slippery curve just outside the town limits, on the way back to the Hideaway Inn. Colby and Zane were jabbering excitedly in the backseat, endlessly rehashing everything they’d done in the fun center. The story got bigger and bigger with each retelling. Darcy had smiled and made sure to be very interested in the whole thing…the first three times.
Eventually they started bragging about who was the best at laser tag and the trampoline basketball and who ate the most cheese fries. Darcy left them to it. Up front, the grownups were talking about ghosts.
“Jon, I’m telling you,” she said again, “there’s more spirits in that place. There has to be other things that happened there. Bad things. Murders, maybe. I don’t know. I’m just worried.”
“About what?” he reached over to hold her hand with one of his while the other kept a tight grip on the wheel.
“What do you mean, about what? You just heard me say there’s more ghosts in the Inn.”
“Well, sure, but ghosts don’t usually worry you. You’ve been around ghosts your whole life. I’ve seen you face down things that would turn Rambo’s hair white. Ghosts don’t worry you.”
“They do when there’s this many in one place.” Not that any of the ghosts had seemed all that scary to her. The guy in the hallway had been kind of funny, actually. “Jon, with that many ghosts in one place, you start to wonder about what caused it, you know?”
“But the place is old, right? There could have been lots of things that happened there over time”
“Then how come,” she asked, “we only found the one report about the Hideaway Inn online? I mean, what happened in that place?”
From the back, Colby stopped in the middle of a laugh she was sharing with her brother. She looked up front, her expression suddenly serious. “A house is made by the people who live there,” she told her mom. “It’s the people who make it what it is.”
Darcy caught her daughter’s eyes in the rearview mirror. Colby had that look on her face that she always did whenever her gift took over and made her unintentionally say something important. Her gift was so much more developed than Darcy’s had been at that age, and the things she learned from her sixth sense were often too strong to keep in check. They just came popping out, leaving Darcy and the others to figure out what they meant.
A house is made by the people who live there. It’s the people who make it what it is.
She tucked that away for later, when she would have time to think about it. Sometimes the things Colby said only made sense in hindsight. She knew what house her daughter was talking about. The Hideaway Inn, of course. That part was obvious. As for the rest of it…well, time would tell.
She gave Colby a wink. Her daughter shrugged and looked out her window at the winter snow.
Zane caught on to their conversation, and his voice had a little tremble in it as he asked, “Mama? Did you say there’s lotsa ghosts there?”
She tried not to lie to her children. She and Jon had raised them to be smart, bright kids. “Yeah, buddy. There’s a few ghosts there.”
“Um. You mean the nice kind of ghosts, right? Friendly ghosts…right?”
The kids had both seen the most recent Casper the Friendly Ghost movie, of course. They had also seen their mother help lots of spirits move on from the world of the living to the next place. Some of those ghosts had been very friendly. Some of them had been so scary they had given Darcy nightmares for weeks. They knew ghosts came in lots of different shades…even if that was a bad pun.
So what kind of ghosts were the ones at the Hideaway Inn?
“I don’t know yet,” she decided to tell him. It was true. She really didn’t. “They haven’t said anything to me yet. I’ve only really met the one, and he bowed to me like a polite gentleman. So maybe they are nice. Maybe they’re just confused. Colby, honey, have any of these ghosts talked to you?”
“Um.” Colby shrugged. “Not any of the ones you were telling Daddy about.”
Darcy relaxed a little. Her daughter was strong in the family gift, yes, but she was barely thirteen and Darcy didn’t want her getting into paranormal situations that were over her head—
“I mean,” her daughter added after a heartbeat, “the boy in the bathroom did, but he was kind of nice.”
The car swerved on the road before Jon got it back under control, but it had nothing to do with ice or snow. He looked up sharply at the rearview mirror, his expression as shocked as Darcy imagined her own was. “What do you mean,” he asked sharply, ‘the boy in the bathroom talked to you? The en suite bathroom in our room? That bathroom?”
“Well, yeah. What bathroom did you think I meant?”
He was not amused. “Exactly when was there a boy in the bathroom with you?”
“Da-a-ad,” she said with a sigh. “Not a real boy. It was a ghost boy. Er, a boy’s ghost. He was just a kid. Like, my age.”
Darcy felt her jaw drop. “Ghost boy or not, he shouldn’t be in the bathroom when you’re in there to…you know. You’re talking about here at the Inn, right? The boy was here at the Hideaway, in the bathroom with you?”
“Well, yeah. After we got here, I went in to put my bathroom stuff away. Like, my toothbrush and stuff.” Colby shrugged again like it was no big deal. “When I looked up, I could see him in the mirror. He waved, and then he blew on the mirror and made it all fog up. That’s when he wrote stuff to me in the steam.”
Jon looked over at Darcy, obviously expecting her to explain what they were both thinking to their daughter. Their deal, in matters like this, was that anything involving their daughter and ghosts was Darcy’s area of parental responsibility. “Colby…” She had lots of questions stacked up on themselves now, and all she could do was pick one to start with. “Listen. What did the boy in the mirror say to you?”