First Crush

by Ashley Ludwig

  “Allow me.” Wiping sweaty palms on his jeans, he took over.

  The stuck handle budged, seized, and then gave under his pressure. He shouldered the stubborn door, and its hinges screamed in complaint as he forced it wide, revealing the tower’s round sitting area, more library shelves, covered conversation couches and wingback chairs, and a table topped with dead flowers in an antique vase.

  “After you.”

  She led him through more dust and cobwebs. Musty library books and spoiled rose water assaulted his senses as she paused between a hallway leading east and a small stairwell winding upstairs.

  “Guest rooms on this side.” She’d voiced his thoughts. He fingered a brass door tag and counted four rooms facing north and another four facing south.

  He unlocked the nearest door with her master key, revealing a dark walled room, a canopied bed, and a chair under a dust-covered tarpaulin. With a squeal, she brushed past him.

  “Each room has its own bath!” She paced the small bathroom, studying the cast iron claw-foot tub and a wall mural.

  “Never saw a girl get so excited about indoor plumbing before.” Nick watched, awestruck, while she danced from room to room before ascending the stairs to the second story.

  Shadows lengthened through the slatted blinds as the day slipped into late afternoon, getting closer to five and Mom’s Saturday dinner.

  Upstairs the numbers on the doors went up to sixteen. Seventeen, including the double doors at the end of the hallway. Natalie headed toward the tower room, rattling through the fat bunch of keys like a pro.

  She tried one after the other, but the lock didn’t turn. “Maybe it’s a suite!”

  “Sure you don’t want to wait until tomorrow?”

  “What?” She cocked a grin. “You’re scared.”

  “No, I’m not.”

  “Think you’ll see a ghost?”

  “Wouldn’t be the first time.”

  Natalie’s arm dropped, keys jangling on their hoop. “Wait, really?”

  “I don’t know. I thought I did. Anyway, let’s head next door to my mom’s—” He bit back the where it’s safe. “It’s almost dinnertime.”

  “I want to check this one last room. Then we’ll go.” At last, with the final key, the double doors gave way under her push. A rush of stale air greeted them.

  In the small apartment, a sitting area faced an ancient television that acted as a stand for a newer flat screen model. Nothing was dust-covered in here. A quick survey of the room told the story of the solitary life of a housebound woman.

  Natalie went deeper into the shadows, passing a hand over a dining table stacked with folders and maps rolled up into tubes.

  Nick dragged heavy drapes back from the French doors. Light fought the darkness and won, revealing a neglected balcony. “Hey, Nat. There’s a balcony out here.”

  Dead plants withered in chipped terra cotta pots. Nick stepped across the balcony and crunched across spilled, dried soil. He righted a wrought iron chair, screeching it to rest at the small table.

  Natalie left him to his balcony exploration and made her way through debris piles to the bedroom. He stayed where he was, allowing her space.

  The fresh breeze rippled over his exposed forearms. This was Mrs. Valence’s living area—and Natalie’s bio-grandmother was worthy of being showcased on an episode of Hoarders.

  His boot sent a dried-out plant spinning. Bending to pick it up, he noticed a stubborn geranium with a single bright red blossom was growing from the dried dirt. Judging it worthy of saving, he found water, and returned it to the outdoor table.

  Inside, he heard Natalie walking through the cluttered bedroom. It was just a day since they’d met, and already he was learning there was so much more to her than met the eye. He couldn’t wait to find out what made her tick. And this place! She was in over her head, and deep.

  He forced his thoughts toward the lady who’d lived here. Nick tried to think like his brother; Dalton was good at sorting through mysteries. As the mystery of the Valence estate grew deeper by the second, Nick wanted to know more about this desolate and lonely Californian castle.

  He didn’t know much beyond the ghost stories he’d told and heard in high school. He knew the barest of facts. There had been a fire at the old barn. Mr. Valance was found dead in the rubble, murdered by arson.

  And Natalie said they’d found the old lady at the bottom of the stairs after someone called 9-1-1.

  She hadn’t fallen down the back steps; those doors hadn’t been opened in an age.

  “I’m gonna look down the hall,” he called. At Natalie’s murmured agreement, he backtracked to the corridor and the main stairs.

  Something had drawn the lady out of her apartment and down this creepy hallway.

  At the landing, he knelt by a set of cracked banister rungs. Nick slid his hand across the splintered wood. Someone or something had hit it, and hit it hard, judging by those near ninety-degree breaks. Mrs. Valence?

  The chandelier hung immediately below, its glass bulbs and crystal pendants dark and silent. A couple looked knocked askew. Had she fallen and clung to it before plummeting down to the main floor?

  It was a long way down.

  What had scared her so badly? The ghost? The guilt of murdering her husband and getting away with it?

  A flurry of questions stirred in his thoughts, but one rose to the surface, impossible to ignore.

  The old lady had lived like a hermit for at least two decades. And a fall like that? If it didn’t kill her, it must have at least knocked her out cold.

  So who had called 9-1-1?

  Chapter 9

  The bedroom warmed with late afternoon sunlight. Hands on her knees, Natalie sat on the quilt-covered mattress. She imagined Mrs. Valence’s solitary life in this cavernous place. The room smelled odd—a sickly combination of baby powder, stale cooking, and despair.

  She exhaled long, palming the quilt, unable to fathom the silence. She squeezed her hands over her knees, thoughts going to the frail woman in the hospice bed. Not one of these items would go with her from this world to the next. And when she died … every item in the estate—from cluttered table tops to stuffed closets—would be Natalie’s responsibility. Mrs. Valence’s life was hers to sell, keep, discard, or donate. The weight of that responsibility settled over her, threatening to drag her under.

  Natalie brushed a hand over piles of yellowed papers, dusty magazines, and stacked envelopes. She plucked a copy of Food and Wine from a stack. Published in 1982, its pages were turned and flagged for some later use.

  And it wasn’t just this suite of rooms that needed drastic updating. All sixteen rooms plus the master, then the kitchen, the cavernous dining room, the places water-rings marred the ceiling … She’d watched enough home improvement shows to know that hiring a good contractor should be first on her to-do list. She didn’t dare assume anything was up to code, not to mention safe to live in or house paying guests. Everything from shingles to sewer pipes would have to be inspected.

  Natalie was good with finances. There was room on her credit cards to float some initial repairs. But before the real work could begin, she’d have to haul out a ton of garbage.

  Time to call in the troops. Reaching for her phone, she thumbed a group text:

  Big news. Call or send prayers. ASAP.

  Corie would see it in five seconds, Aaron would ignore it until he was off duty, and Mom and Dad? Who knew where their traveling hospital ship was or when they would be able to reply?

  Natalie kept hold of her cell phone, the invisible tether to her sister. On the nightstand, a small glass rose rested among dusty mementos, almost like the one Corie’d given Mom on Mother’s Day in elementary school. Someone must have given that to Mrs. Valence … Someone who loved her.

  Inside the nightstand drawer, prescription bottles and dried ink pens rolled over notepads. A stack of magazines slid off and spilled to the floor when Natalie rolled it shut. Kneeling to gather the pile, a book
caught her eye.

  “Hello there.” She pulled it from under the bed, wiped dust bunnies from the crumbling leather cover. “What’re you?”

  It wasn’t a Bible like she’d first thought. There was a year stamped on the spine. 1963.

  Cracking open the cover, she saw each page was filled to the margins with tiny, scrawling script. Pen, pencil, it was all written in the same handwriting, as far as she could tell.

  She brushed her fingertips over the strange cursive writing. Each turn of the page revealed more indecipherable text. Not English, but by the strange dots over u’s and o’s, she guessed the writing was German. Other pages looked like something out of a math or science textbook—if only she’d paid attention in either class.

  A few entries held a small drawing of a sun. A moon. A cloud. Some pages were dated, starting in 1963. She touched the earliest handwritten date and brushed it with careful fingers. This book was more than fifty years old.

  Nick’s call echoed through the hallway from downstairs. A glance to her watch showed it was closing in on five.

  An answer to her text blinked. Corie, of course.

  Finals. Hectic. Pray for me too. Home Fri?

  Of course her sister would be first to help. Natalie squeezed her eyes shut in thanks as the invisible weight started to lift.

  There was something important here in these handwritten pages. The book was the closest thing to a connection with Mrs. Valence, with her birth family, that she had. She felt it in her soul.

  Corie was an excellent researcher. Maybe when she arrived they could figure it out together. Clasping the binding shut, she tucked the journal into her purse and headed out the door to find Nick.

  Impossibility swarmed like a hornet’s nest in his mind. How had she found this place? What was her connection?

  Buzzing.

  Burning.

  Sunlight shafted through tree limbs between him and the bulk of the castle. From the shelter of the oak grove, he watched her hand linger on the door before dragging it closed behind her and her companion. The man started the pickup truck as she locked the ornate front doors.

  He swept his gaze across the property from the slowly turning windmill, to the creek water rushing over stones, to the grapevines shivering in the whistling breeze. There was no sign of the police or whoever found Mrs. Valence and called the paramedics.

  They were alone. It was just the three of them.

  He shot a worried glance toward his van hidden in the shadow of the oaks. It remained parked on the far side of the vines. Should Natalie and her companion drive over there, all would be ruined.

  He fought the primal urge to flee. He wasn’t prey; he was the hunter. Should they live, should they die, that was his decision to make.

  Gripping the shovel’s handle, he mentally reviewed what belongings he had back at the cave. His property was secure. There was no way the police could find the cave unless they were looking for it—no one ever had, and he’d seen to things years ago so that no one ever would.

  But if they saw him, followed him? All hope would be lost. His plans, all carefully constructed and beautifully arranged, would be uprooted. Lost.

  He watched the girl grip her skirt to keep it from blowing about her legs and join the man in the truck. The chilly afternoon breeze spun the windmill, casting its long shadow over the property.

  The man seemed to be protective of her. He was watchful, hesitant, as if he sensed what was coming.

  Grinning, he slunk deeper into the shadowy, twisting limbs of the oak grove, bark roughening his hands. Stock-still, he crouched with predatory grace as he heard the truck engine growl to life.

  The truck rumbled away from the main house, paused at the main gates for the girl to lock them, and then drove off again with dust clouding its wake.

  He sifted through the improbability of their arrival as he watched them leave.

  Natalie Turner was here. First the hospital, now the old hotel?

  He dug a clenched fist into his forehead as he sorted through his racing thoughts. Was she related to the woman? If so, how? He brought the Valence family tree to mind as a crow cawed from the stand of oaks. The bird was dark, angry, and beautiful. Crows only came when meals were ready and ripe for the taking.

  Like today.

  Forcing his thoughts back into orderly rows, he reviewed the facts. She’d locked the house and the gates. That meant she had a key. If she had a key, then she was involved.

  She knew the old woman. That’s why she visited the hospital. Everyone who knew Marie Valence, anyone who might be involved with the Valence family, must die. Die so that others might live.

  The bird flapped off toward the lowering sun, cawing as it went, blighting the late afternoon sky. The crow’s throaty cadence matched his whisper: “Must die. Must die.”

  Yes. It was good. It was right. He would find her as he had last night. Providence, really, that their paths had crossed again. With nothing to fear, he would take her and discover her secrets, and maybe this time, he’d catch a glimpse of heaven.

  Chapter 10

  Natalie stared out the window as the road curved around a bend of weeping willows. She slid a glance at Nick. His eyes were hooded in concentration, hands purposeful on the wheel. Steady.

  On the radio, a sports announcer called a baseball game over the crack of a bat and the sigh of a crowd. Nick turned the chatter to low volume as they left the castle in their dust.

  A cooling sea breeze brushed through her hair and over her skin with gentle fingers as the scenery rolled by in a loamy rush. Nick said they were only about twenty miles from the coast. Maybe he’d take her for a daytrip soon.

  The radio station crackled as the announcer’s voice rose in pitch and speed. Nick spun the volume dial up to hear the call, his hands taut on the wheel in anticipation. At the resulting out, he sat back with a groan, then turned, caught her watching.

  “What?”

  “Just, baseball. Sounds like summer.”

  He nodded. “Summer, baseball, hot dogs, barbecues. Gets hot out here in August. Good for the grapes, though.”

  They listened to the next call together, her mind tripping through thoughts of family barbecues and outdoor gatherings. Aaron would like Nick––they could both recite baseball statistics.

  Was she crushing on Nick? The notion shot embarrassment to her toes. But the warmth of his returned gaze, that smile, had her thinking he was crushing on her, as well. She leaned back and listened to the gravel tones in his voice, his passion for the game.

  Was this the start of something more, something bigger, or was he just in the right place at the right time?

  It had been more than a year since she’d dated anyone seriously. Since she’d last been kissed. Pressing her lips together, Natalie could almost hear the promise she’d made to Corie the last time her sister dragged her from a breakup coma. She’d even said Corie’s silly pledge: “When I fall in love, it will be with the right guy, for the right reasons. So help me, God!”

  The right guy.

  The right reasons.

  Only time would tell if that guy was Nick. The man with a sly grin and heart-stopping stare.

  The game went to commercial as Nick pointed out his parents’ home. “Told you it wasn’t far. We actually could’ve walked through the fields—there’s a path.” He turned right, driving under a sign that read “Twin Creeks Management.”

  “Don’t forget these.” Natalie dragged the bouquet from the backseat. The peonies were still perky and fragrant, each bloom, she noticed, tucked in a tiny water capsule. “Must have bought these from a great florist.”

  “Yeah.” His smile revealed a deep dimple in his cheek near a hairline scar.

  He punched in a code, and the white iron fence swung open as she continued her observation of the flowers. “The rose doesn’t really fit with them, though. What’s the deal with that?”

  His smirk turned into a full grin. “That one’s for you.”

  “Oh.”
Hesitant to disrupt the arrangement, she slid it free. The perfect, tight bud of yellow was tinged with pink. “It’s like it can’t make up its mind what color to be.”

  She glanced up from her flower. Was that a blush tinting his ears?

  She turned the stem in her hands and spouted trivia to cover her nerves. “Yellow is for friendship, but pink, that’s reserved for sweethearts.”

  She shielded her grin with the flower as the truck climbed a brush-covered hill.

  Pausing at the crest, Nick rested his arm across the back of her seat. “Well then, what do you suppose that makes us?”

  “Confused?” Natalie pushed a curl behind her ear and inhaled the rose’s perfume. Though the future was uncertain, Nick’s ease with her had her confidence growing. “Maybe I’ll just say thanks and see what happens next.”

  Heart hammering, she didn’t look away until he glanced back to the road. “We’re almost there. Just beyond that hill.”

  “You grew up here?”

  “Sure did.”

  They cruised down a dirt drive and up a hill where acres of green-leafed vines quilted the landscape. Rows of mounded gray lavender bushes, all edged by a grove of citrus trees, stood proud in the fertile soil. At the hill’s apex sat a two-story colonial house with a wrap-around porch, empty rocking chairs facing west for the best view of the sunset.

  Nick pulled into the gravel lot and parked in front of a separate garage. Stairs and a small balcony suggested an apartment or office above. A horse, tail flicking, cantered around a corral at its rider’s urging. Another Twin Creeks Management sign graced the front of the barn.

  “What’s Twin Creeks?”

  “My dad’s winery management business. He manages most of the independent growers in the area. His property cuts along the old dam and the south side of the lake.” He pointed at what she’d assumed was another hillside, but the smooth, flat-topped structure was really an earthen dam. “There’s a creek that runs through here and splits into two directions, marking the property line. Thus, Twin Creeks.”