by Нора Робертс
“I never thought—”
“You tried shaking me off.”
Excuses, rationalizations trembled on her tongue. Weak, she realized. Weak and wrong. “I don’t know if I tried because I thought I could or I knew I couldn’t. I just don’t know the answer to that. Either way, it was wrong because yeah, this is you and me.”
She laid a hand on his cheek. “Solemn promises, here and now. I’ll tell you to your face when I’m done with you.”
That got a smile. “Same goes.”
When she shifted toward him, he put her on his lap. She curled in, held on. “I’m glad you acted like a bully and dragged me up here. I’ve missed talking to you, being with you.”
“I had to be a bully because you were a moron.”
“Calling me names isn’t cutting me a break.” She eased back. “And you’ve got Beckett out there making deliveries.”
“He’s got three kids now. He can use the tips.”
She laughed, reached for his hand, released it when he yelped. “Oh God.” She lifted it again, carefully. “I really nailed you.”
“Tell me about it.”
“It’s your own fault for falling for the ‘oooh, you’re hurting me’ ploy.”
“Won’t happen again.”
“Let me clean it up.”
“Later.” He pulled her back in, just sat while the world rode smooth again. “You wouldn’t have any of that soup left?”
“I have smoked tomato bisque in the freezer. I can heat it up.”
“Sounds good. Later.” He tipped her head back, found her mouth with his.
“Definitely later.”
Feeling sentimental, she roamed his face with kisses as she unbuttoned his shirt. He smelled of sawdust, even along the column of his throat.
“I’ve missed this, too,” she murmured. “Missed touching you.”
Only a few days, really, she thought, but the distance had spanned so wide, so deep, it felt like weeks. And here he was, smelling of sawdust, his chest warm and solid under the rough thermal shirt, and his hard-palmed hands confident and easy as he drew her sweater up and away.
Her true north, she thought. Constant and steady.
He ached for her. Not just physically, but in his heart for the hurt she’d endured. For the fact she’d felt obliged to endure it alone.
She said he couldn’t understand, but she was wrong. He’d never believed you had to experience pain to understand it.
He’d thought he knew her, every facet, but there he’d been wrong. The parts of her that questioned her worth, her courage, her heart, those were new to him, added complexities and vulnerabilities.
To those hurts he offered a gentle touch, an easy glide, pleasing himself with the curves of her, the pulse beats, the sigh of breath warm against his skin.
When she caught his face in her hands, when he saw her smile up at him before their lips met again, he thought: There. There was Avery. All of her.
She stroked her hands down his back, over his hips, back again as if measuring the length of him. Wanting to give, just give and give, she shifted to wrap around him, heard him curse when her shoulder pressed against his sore hand.
“Oops.” It choked a laugh out of her, and everything just fell away. All the guilt and grief, the apologies and worries.
You and me, she thought again. It’s you and me. So she wrapped around him and nipped her teeth at his shoulder.
“I’ve got a taste for you now.” She rolled him over, nipped again.
“Want to play rough?”
“You already did. Hauling me up here, throwing me down on the bed. Let’s see how you like it.” Mindful of his hand, she clamped his wrists, ranged over him.
“I like it fine.”
“Because now we’re naked.”
“It’s a factor.”
She lowered her head, stopped a breath from his lips, pulled back, lowered again. Pulled back.
“You’re asking for trouble.”
“Oh, I can handle you.”
She leaned in again, then slid down to glide her tongue over his chest.
Okay, he thought as his blood surged, she could handle him.
She owned his body, every inch, teasing, inciting, seducing, exciting. Quick and rough one moment, slow and tender the next, leaving him off balance, off rhythm, and totally possessed.
“Owen, Owen, Owen.” She whispered it again and again as she rose over him, drunk with power and lust.
She took him in, deep, deep, clamped her hands on his shoulders as triumph and surrender catapulted through her system. He took her breasts, pressed his hand against her galloping heart.
She lowered again, and this time let her lips take his in a long, trembling kiss.
And she rose again, let her head fall back, let everything that was the two of them fill her.
Then she rode them both empty.
* * *
Later, she doctored his hand, kissed the little wound. In her blue-checked robe she heated soup in the kitchen while he poured them each a glass of wine.
On impulse she lit candles for the table. Not quite a midnight supper, she thought with a glance at the time. But pretty close.
“It’s snowing hard now. You should stay.”
“Yeah, I should.”
Content, she ladled soup into thick white bowls while the snow fell on the rest of the world.
Chapter Seventeen
For as long as he could remember, Owen liked to figure things out, find the answers, wiggle out details. His innate propensity for schedules, agendas, bottom lines, and solutions made him a natural as coordinator of Montgomery Family Contractors. He’d never imagined, not seriously, doing anything else, and couldn’t imagine anything else giving him the same level of satisfaction or pride.
Working with his brothers suited him. They could and did disagree, piss each other off, bitch and complain. But they always came around. He understood their rhythms as well as he understood his own. He knew the weak spots in each, which could be handy if he was pissed off and wanted to needle.
Solving problems in a way that presented the facts, offered possible compromises and the occasional ultimatum was his thing.
He approached the situation with Elizabeth as a problem.
They had a ghost at the inn. Weird fact, yes, but fact. To date she’d proved mostly amenable, somewhat temperamental, and she’d put them all in her debt by warning Beckett when that asshole Sam Freemont assaulted Clare.
She’d only asked one thing. For Billy.
The problem was, who the hell was Billy? When the hell was Billy? What connection did he have to the woman they’d dubbed Elizabeth?
The ring indicated a relationship, possibly an engagement. But that, in Owen’s world, wasn’t fact.
Their resident ghost wasn’t saying either way.
It seemed to Owen the best place to start would be to identify Elizabeth, and to pin down when she’d died.
Where, though it wasn’t verified fact but logical supposition, was the inn.
“Makes the most sense, right?” He’d set up his laptop in The Dining Room on the theory Elizabeth might give him more direction if he worked the problem on location.
“That’s how it strikes me,” Hope agreed, and set coffee at his elbow. “Why else would she be here?”
“I’ve been poking around paranormal activity sites. You pick up all kinds of wild stuff, and a lot of it has to be crap—but what I’ve pulled out is most people who haven’t, you know, passed over, tend to stick around where they died, or go back to a place that was important or significant to them. If she died here, she could’ve been a guest, could’ve worked here, could’ve been related or connected to the owners.”
“Death records would be a starting point, but where to start?”
“That’s part of it, yeah?”
“Well, the way you described what she wore, it makes me think after the start of the Civil War, and before 1870. Not the wide, wide hoopskirt, but still a wi
de skirt.”
“Yeah. Kind of . . .” He held his arms out. “It was a pretty quick look.”
“If she’d let me get a look at her, I’d have a better idea.” And why wouldn’t she? Hope wondered. After all they were—as Avery said—inn-mates. “How about the sleeves?”
“The sleeves?”
“Of the dress, Owen. Long, short, snug, poofy?”
“Oh. Um . . . long. Kind of big, I think.”
“Gloves? Did she wear gloves?”
“I don’t know that I . . . you know, I think so, but without fingers on them. Kind of lacy, or like my grandmother’s crocheting. And now that I think about it, one of those wrap things.”
“A shawl—and you said a snood.”
He could only stare. “I did?”
“You said she had her hair up in a net in the back. That’s a snood.”
“If you say so.”
“I do. I’ve got a minute or two. Can I?” she asked, gesturing at his keyboard.
“Help yourself.”
He turned it toward her as she sat, and waited, enjoying his coffee as she typed.
“I’m pretty sure if you put those elements together, you’re talking early to mid 1860s.”
He let her work in silence for a few minutes. Peaceful here, he thought, in the middle of the day. He should get back next door before too much longer, give Ryder a hand. And maybe slip over to Vesta later, see if he could talk Avery into going out—or staying in.
“How about this?” Hope turned the screen toward him. “What do you think?”
Curious, he studied the illustration of a small group of women in a kind of drawing room. “I think I wonder why women wanted to wear something that looks that uncomfortable.”
“Fashion hurts, Owen. We live with it.”
“I guess. This is pretty close, in type, I mean. The skirt was pretty much like this one, and the sleeves, and it had a high neck like this one. Maybe some lace or something on it.”
“This is fashion from 1862. So you could start there. And I doubt you’re looking for a maid or servant,” Hope added as she studied the illustration. “It’s too fashionable. Not impossible as it could’ve been a dress passed to her by an employer or relative, but going with the odds, she dressed like a woman of some means.”
“We’ll play the odds to start. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome, and it’s interesting. I’ll be in the office if you need me.”
He intended to give it a half hour, then strap on his tool belt. But he got caught up, poking through old records, old newspaper articles, genealogy sites.
At some point, Hope walked back in, freshened his coffee, added a plate of warm cookies.
He finally sat back, frowned at his screen.
“What the hell is this?” Ryder demanded. “You’re sitting here eating cookies while I’m up to my ass next door?”
“Huh?”
“It’s two-fucking-thirty.”
“Oh. Sorry. I think I found her.”
“Found who?” Ryder snatched the last cookie, and his scowl eased off after he bit in.
“You know.” Owen pointed toward the ceiling. “Her.”
“For Christ’s sake, Owen, we’ve got work. Play ghost-hunter on your own time.”
“Eliza Ford, of the New York Fords.”
“I’m glad we cleared that up.”
“Seriously, Ry, I think it fits. She died here, from some kind of fever, in mid September 1862. She’s buried in New York. She was eighteen. Eliza, Elizabeth, Lizzy. That’s kind of cool, isn’t it?”
“I’m riveted. She’s been here for about a hundred and fifty years. I think she can wait until we finish the goddamn work next door.” He picked up the mug, took a drink. “Coffee’s cold.”
“I’m going to go up, try to talk to her. I’ll make up the time after. Avery’s working until six anyway.”
“Really glad this petty business of the job fits in with your social schedule.”
Because Ryder’s tone put his back up, Owen matched it with his own. “I said I’d make up the time, and goddamn it, we owe her. She warned us about Sam Freemont. He might’ve—damn well would have—done worse to Clare if Beck hadn’t gotten there in time.”
“Shit.” Ryder dragged off his gimme cap, raked his hand through his hair. “All right, go talk to your dead friend, then get next door. Are there any more of those cookies?”
“I don’t know. Ask Hope.”
On a grunt, Ryder headed out.
Owen shut down, but left his laptop on the table as he climbed the stairs. He’d found several women between the ages of eighteen and thirty who’d died in town during the right time frame. And there’d be more yet if he went with the theory that a ghost could pick his or her own age.
But Eliza Ford felt right.
He got all the way up before he remembered standard operating procedure had Hope or Carolee locking all the guest room doors when they weren’t occupied. By the living anyway.
He started to turn, go back down. And the door to Elizabeth and Darcy opened.
“Okay. I’ll take that as a come on in.”
It felt strange, stepping into the room that smelled of its signature English lavender scent and Elizabeth’s—or Eliza’s—honeysuckle.
“So.”
The door eased closed, with a quick click, behind him, and had a little chill running along his spine.
“So,” he repeated. “We’ve been open over a month now. Things are going pretty good. We had a little wedding last weekend. I guess you know about that. It went fine, from what Hope reported. So anyway, I’ve got to get to work in the next building, but I’ve been doing some research downstairs. On you. It’d help us help you if we knew who you are. Eliza?”
The lights flickered on and off, made his fingers tingle.
“Are you Eliza Ford?”
The shape came first, blurred and soft, then sharpened into the figure of a woman. She smiled at him, and curtsied.
“I knew it! Eliza.”
She laid a hand on her heart, and he swore he heard the whisper inside his own head. Lizzy.
“They called you Lizzy, a nickname.”
Billy.
“Billy called you Lizzy. Billy who?”
She crossed her other hand over the one at her heart, closed her eyes.
“You loved him. I got that. Did he live here, in Boonsboro, near here, what? Did you come to visit him? Was he with you when you died? Or maybe he died first.”
Her eyes flew open. He recognized shock, cursed himself. Maybe she didn’t know she was dead—or that Billy had to be dead. He’d read up on that, too. “I mean, did you meet him here. At the hotel, at the inn?”
She faded. A moment later the porch door swung wide, then slammed shut.
“Okay. I guess you’ve got some thinking to do. I’ll talk to you later. Nice going, Owen,” he muttered to himself as he went downstairs. “Really tactful. So, Lizzy, how does being dead feel? Shit.”
He carted his laptop out to his truck, got his tools. Then he went through the gate and into the building next door to do penance with his nail gun.
* * *
“That’s so sad.” Avery poured the marinade she’d made that morning over the tuna steaks. “Only eighteen. I know people didn’t live as long, and women usually got married and had kids a lot sooner. But still. Eighteen. A fever?”
“I couldn’t find much—I’ll look more now that I have this name to go on. It was really just a few lines.”
“Eliza. That’s so close to what Beckett started calling her—and the Lizzy nickname, too.”
“It makes it all feel kind of ordained, I guess. Mom picked the name and location of the room, Beckett started calling her Elizabeth because of that. Then Lizzy.”
“I don’t know about ordained, but it’s spooky—a good spooky. And I think you’re great—I’ll even give you brilliant—for finding her, but how’s that going to help you find this Billy?”
“I needed som
ething solid. I have her name, where she lived, where and how she died—even if she didn’t know that—so I can try to follow those dots to him. Was she meeting him here? Was he a local? Another traveler?”
As she washed field greens, she glanced back at him. “September 1862. That could be the answer.”
“Why?”
“Owen.” She let the greens drain, stepped toward him. “How long have you lived in southern Washington County?”
“All my— Oh, shit. I didn’t think of it. I was so focused on finding her, and when I hit that name . . . the Battle of Antietam.”
“Or Sharpsburg, depending which side you were on. September 17, 1862. Bloodiest single day in the Civil War.”
“He could’ve been a soldier. Maybe, maybe,” he mused. “She could’ve come here to try to see him, make some contact. People even went out and watched battles, right? Made frickin’ picnics out of it.”
“People have always been screwy. Anyway, she died the day of the battle. You said she came from New York, so it seems logical she stayed at the inn. If she had friends or relatives in the area, it feels like she would’ve stayed with them. Could be Billy’s from New York, too, and she followed him down here for some reason.”
“Or he’s from the area, and she came to be with him. Or he, like most men his age—if we figure he’s close to hers—was fighting in the war.”
“That seems most likely. Taste this.”
He took the piece of thin, crispy bread. “Good. Really good. What is it?”
“An experiment. Pizza dough, rolled almost paper thin, herbed, baked. I’m thinking of serving it in the new place. So, it feels like if she’d come to see him, and they’d hooked up, she wouldn’t need to find him now. She died, but if he was here, wouldn’t he have been with her? So he, following that train, wasn’t here when she got sick.”
“Or he just let her down. Didn’t come. Could’ve been married, not interested.”
She snatched the plate of bread away before he could grab another piece. “That’s not romantic. Stick with romantic, or no more for you.”
“I’m just considering possibilities.” When she continued to hold the bread out of reach, he rolled his eyes. “Okay, they were the Civil War version of Romeo and Juliet. Star-crossed lovers.”